My Birthday, Mark's "Gig"

Exactly one year ago today, a hard-fought real estate deal disintegrated on us. Oh, wait, that wasn't exactly it.

Exactly one year ago today, I turned 30. Wait, it wasn't as simple as that.

Exactly one year ago today, I turned 30 and a hard-fought real estate deal disintegrated on us at the very same time. Yeah, that was how my day went.

Here's to another year. It got pretty fun after the real estate nightmare was over!


Mark told me his band had a gig earlier this week. I was super-excited!

Then I found out that by "band", he meant only him and the lead singer. The other two guys were busy.

Then I found out that by "gig", he meant "open mic" at a coffee house.

Ah well. Performing their songs in public would still be a good thing to do, and fun for me to watch. I asked Chani if she wanted to come along with us, and she did. Yes, her husband is also in the band but would not be going, but who cares about those kind of details. We joked that she was more dedicated to the band than Captain D. was.

Then I found out that by "coffee house", the guys really meant "the cafeteria at the high school in the next town" (where the lead singer is a teacher). My dream of ordering a nice Mexican hot chocolate and enjoying myself in an eclectic atmosphere while listening to local musicians perform original compositions was replaced by a dream of sitting in a cafeteria on an orange plastic chair watching awkward 15 year-olds perform Guns 'n Roses covers. And by "dream", I mean "obligation".


Chani and I were delighted to see that they had covered our tables with large pieces of paper and provided coloured pencils. Then a skinny blonde 15 year-old stole our coloured pencils RIGHT OUT FROM UNDER OUR NOSES, laughed apologetically, and gave us four white pencil crayons with broken leads instead. I think Chani came close to swearing at her loudly--but I hear you get in trouble for that kind of thing, so I'm glad she didn't.


We made do with what we had and spent our time drawing caricatures of the various teenagers who performed.




Mark and Derick (lead singer) did a few songs and sounded really good, so at least the night was not a total loss.