With My Hair Slicked Back/With Carrion Shellac

Where to start?

Well, a couple of months ago, Mike got word from a friend of his that Tom Waits was going to play a show in Columbus. A couple of years ago he played Akron and by the time I found out all the tickets were gone. This time I was ready--not optimistic but ready. I locked the door to my office, got the credit card out, logged onto TicketMaster and kept hitting "Refresh." For 20 minutes. AND IT WORKED! I actually got tickets! Unbelievable. I couldn't really read the seating chart to see what AAA PIT meant but, as long as it was in the theatre, I was happy.

Next hurdle: finding someone to watch the kid overnight. We were hoping to spare Mike's folks that particular situation just because they already watch him alot and, tho he's usually a good baby, when he's not, he's not. Our friend Erica was set to watch him--until her friends told her that babysitting on Saturday would overlap with the surprise birthday party they had planned for her. Ooops. We finally arranged with Grammy and Grandpop that we would come back the same night and pick him up so that their Sunday would be unencumbered (very important for church goin' folk).

We wanted to hit the road by 2 on Saturday but, of course, everything took longer than it should have. I was particularly nervous as the tickets were ETickets meaning you get in by swiping the credit card you used to buy them. I managed to loose that card the day I bought the tickets. I was told that the new card and the original order number would get me in but I could just see the night turning into a very expensive version of "Jukebox Hero." We got into Columbus at about 7:15 and by 7:30 a very nice volunteer usher lady was personally escorting us to the ticket office window to get our tickets. The show was at the Ohio Theatre and, as anyone who has ever been to a restored-grand-old-theatre can tell you, the usher ladies are usually of the older variety. Our escort was no exception and, as she hustled us thru the crowd, she kept saying, "I've never seen anything like this! I've never even heard of Tom Waits and I thought I was with it!" I assured her that after that show, she would be.

We got our tickets, no problem, and I went to find our seats while Mike went to find the men's room. I showed my ticket to another set of usher ladies who told me to show it to "the man in the bowtie." I did so and he took me to my seat.

In. The. FRONT. ROW.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The look on Mike's face must have been the same one I had of "This is really great but it can't possibly be right but I'm going to keep a straight face so maybe we can get away with it." One of Mike's friends from work was there and the two of them kept texting each other like a couple of middle school girls (tho, to their credit, they stopped before the show started.) This guy is the one who told us about the show in the first place and their seats were good but up in the normal floor section. Once he saw where we were, the texts became variations on "You lucky bastard." "How did you get those seats? You bastard!" O Mighty TicketMaster Gods: Our Humble Thanks To You.

Here is a shot of the stage backdrop from my seat:



Here is a shot of Tom's parade drum:



This is not a music review blog so I'll keep it short and just say that the show was phenomenal, especially "Cemetery Polka" and a crazy, unhinged version of "Hoist That Rag," that made me feel like I was actually inside the head of Tom Waits. He must have seen me in the front row because they also did, "November," which is one of my favorites. No intermission, just 2 straight hours of perfect music. From the front row.

Dang.

Mike drove back, which made it about 8 hours worth of driving in less than 24 hours. We got in at about 3:30, picked up the kid (sound asleep and he stayed that way) got home, poured Donny into his crib, crashed in our bed and woke up at 9 when the kid started squawking.

Today we went to the Carnegie International. Donny was pretty good but it was hard to look at art the way I'm used to looking at art. I had to just accept everything quickly and at face value, without time to read the labels. There was one installation with lights and venetian blinds that Donny really liked. I was hoping he'd be into the room with the crystal orbs scattered around but he was a bit too fussy for that. By the time we got halfway thru, he was asleep. I carried him for awhile but then we started getting sleepy too. We packed him up and called it a day.

How was your weekend?

Summerness

I had a night out with Aunt Shirley on Monday. It started at The Red Room to which I keep giving chances not to be ridiculous and which keeps being ridiculous. Any appetizer that includes a plastic syringe of hot sauce is JUST TRYING TOO HARD. Really: calm down, already!

ANYhow, we went to the New Hazlett Theatre to see Peter Murphy. I contend he is my generations Goth Tom Jones and he certainly worked that angle. And I mean that in the best possible way. And I should know as our seats were in the sweeeet third row. Really, really good seats. The man is such a great singer that I suspended all disbelief (tho the early era Bowie mime moves were a bit much).

When Mike dropped me off to meet Sheryl he noticed that I had forgotten my wedding ring. "What are you guys?" he asked setting up the best joke of the night: "A couple of Goth Cougars?"

Roar.

But back to the boy: he had a busy weekend which, unfortunately, coincided with more teething. His aunt, uncle and cousin were in from Denver and they were all very geeked to see him. Jack, his cousin, is 9 and, from what his mom says, is very excited about Donny. It made it all the more sad when Jack set off fireworks for Donovan and it scared the bejesus out of the kid. Susie says Jack's fine and I hope he is. The look on his face tho, when Donny started to cry--ooooh, I felt so bad for the kid!

Mike took the week off to have a "staycation," which is when you stay at home during your vacation to get stuff done. He's been doing a great job with that and the bonus is when I'm done with work, I don't have to wait for him to get done. That means we were done with stuff early enough to have a picnic, baby's first. We ate O Fries in the new park between the Carnegie Library and Hillman Library. The Krishnas were there drumming and chanting and Donny got to run around in the grass in his bare feet. Perfect way to end the day.

Guess I Get This Week's "Best Mom" Medal

When I went to pick Donny up from daycare yesterday his teacher, Miss Erin, was running down the list of things he needs there; "He needs more milk--I think he still has some blueberries. I saw them in the fridge today and thought, 'Those must be Donovan's! No other babies get fresh fruit for lunch!'"

Huh?

E-Town to Dahntahn

WHEW, its been a busy week--or is it a busy two weeks? At this point I have no idea. What that means blogwise is that I'm going to be stingy with the writing and lavish with the photos. You're welcome.

Last Sunday, Mike, Donovan and I drove to see my family in Elyria. Its a 3 hour drive there and the same back and to maximize our time we left at about 8am. Donny slept alot on the way there and I thought he would be alright but, once we got there, it must have been too much unfamiliarity all at once. He was cranky and reticent with my Mom (of all people!) and the trip to the Aunts was over in about 20 minutes (tho he did play their 19th century untuneable piano as you'll see in the photos below). My sister was in the hospital so Mike and Donny went home and I stayed a couple of extra days to help out at home.

I got home on Wednesday and plunged straight back into work--which is getting increasingly crazy these days. Not bad, necessarily, just hard to keep up with. Needless to say I was glad to see the weekend come.

Today was babyday and it was fun tho the rain kept us housebound all day. We missed the Whole Foods Ice Cream Social but, once Mike got done with work, we all three went downtown to the Magarac Attack! We saw our friends Will and Kirsten and we got to meet Kirsten's Dad, Don. We watched the Spuds, walked Donny around and then went to Primanti's. Then we looked at the cool fountain but did'nt take any photos.

See? Even that much tired me out. Now for the photos

My Son, Joe Magerac
:
Baby's First Primanti's Sammich!

So Very Sweaty...

What you see above, gentle readers, is what I got my son at the Melwood Avenue Multiple family yardsale. FOR $3. AAAAANNNND: they delivered it, plus the insane cast aluminum and glass bakeware set. But back to the drums: $3!?!?! I know Donny won't be able to use them for years but, I'm sorry, it had to be done. I kept thinking of the clip of John Bonham's son from The Song Remains the Same. Time to start training that baby hair into a mullet!

So, yeah: today was Babyday and it went much, much better than last week. Which is surprising as both yesterday and today were scorching, horrid hot. Donny and I started the day by visiting the yardsale which, despite the drums and the bakeware, was'nt all that. Still, it was a good excuse to go to the "other" end of Melwood and make nice with some of those neighbors. Donovan, of course, was ooohed and aaahed over. He almost got a free little plastic racecar as a bribe to stop crying but he pushed it away in a fit of tiredness. We came home, I gave him a bottle and he fell asleep in his crip. When I woke him up an hour later I thought for sure his diaper had sprung a leak but, no, the huge babysized wetspot on the sheet was just sweat. With that in mind, I changed his clothes, fed him and then we went in search of airconditioning.

Our first stop was the library (tho the bus itself was gloriously cool). We hung out in the children's room, which I had fully expected to be full of kids and parents beating the heat like we were. It was actually sort of empty so we took over the toys and the couch. There were a few other mouthbreathers there so Donny got to socialize. We stayed there about an hour, hour and a half, checked out a book called Astro Bunnies, and then went to our secret hideaway, The Frick Fine Art Building. I tried again to take photos of Donovan in front of the fake art, this time with slightly more success:
My actual goal was to kill enough time for us to meet Mike at Whole Foods, which we did. From there we got some subs (cause ain't nobody in this house cookin'. Not in this heat...) From there we drove home and, getting out of the car, we got an invite yelled to us from our nextdoor neighbors to come join their daughter's graduation party. After 7 years here you'd think we'd know more folks but we don't and this seemed like a good opportunity. We changed the boy into his pjs and went over. They have a wonderful deck and pool and the party was in full swing. Again, Mr. Popularbaby went over very well. Our neighbor Nancy kept trying to get me to put Donny's feet in the pool but I did'nt feel I would be able to hold onto him well if I did. He did, however, get to play with a Yorkie puppy--his first real puppy interaction--and that was great.

Now the kid's asleep and I have to pack. We're going to visit my folks tomorrow. Mike and Donny are coming back tomorrow night but I'm staying for a few days. My sister's been in the hospital so I'm going home to help out--not sure how yet but off I go. Wish me luck!