Life In The BBG World (03/19/2016)

Well it's been a while since I have hunted and pecked at the keyboard but I have an amusing story that happened today which has many similarities to an event that happened with my Mom back in the late '70s. Typically I would just post to Facebook and write a mini-novel there but I decided I should post here as it is much easier to find on my blog page than on my Facebook page. Goodness gracious I post so much there that I lose patience looking for something that I posted about way back in mid-February. LOL.

So anyways as I am typing right now the original plan was for me to be at The Tabernacle in downtown Atlanta with a couple of friends having a craft beer or two and mangling the lyrics to Vance Joy songs.

That was the plan! LOL. Instead I am in my messy bedroom with BooBoo Dammit staring at me as only she can trying to get me to feed her yet again even though she was fed hmm like 13m48s ago. Not going to work BooBoo! I am in the typing zone.

So let's head back in the time travel machine in Marc's aka BBG's world to sometime in the latter 70s. Okay it may have been the real early 80s. Memories get a little jumbled when you go back ohemgee 35 years. Geezus I am old. LOL. Okay back to point BBG.

So my stepdad Gene (my youngest brother's father) used to work for CNR (Canadian National Railway) as their head photographer I guess in what was their PR department when CNR was a huge important cog of the Canadian economy. He used to have to travel for trade shows and take pics of trains, planes and automobiles. Okay ixnay the last two modes of transportation it was really trains and the scenery you would see if you took a train and the people you would see along the way. Remember back then we humans actually stopped and smelled the roses in our interactions with other humanoids. So my stepdad was in Washington, DC on some PR junket and he called my Mom back in Chomedey and asked her to join him for a weekend in DC. I was in my late teens then and my sister Shawnie was a year and half behind me in age and we were more than capable to take care of our younger brothers Randolf and Rene while our Mom went to join our stepdad in Washington, DC.

This is when it gets funny. My stepdad tells my Mom to book a flight to Dulles and he will pick her up or arrange for a taxi/limo service to pick her up and bring her to wherever the festivities were in DC. Well my Mom booked her flight to meet my stepdad but my Mom being French Canadian may have misheard my Canadian American stepdad's instruction to book a flight to Dulles. Mom booked a flight to Dallas. As in Texas. LOL. Remember back then there were no cellphones. No computers. Good Gawd you would get busy dial tones when you would call people back then and there was no such thing as voicemail. So Dad spent a weekend near Dulles and Mom spent a weekend in Dallas. That story has been shared in the family and with friends for years and years.

Sadly the protagonists in this part of the blog are no longer with us. That's where I come in to continue what we can now call a family tradition. Hmm is it a German thing or a French Canadian family tradition. I'll let others decide.

As many of my friends know and can ascertain I am a total live music junkie. I think nothing of driving hundreds and hundreds of miles to go see concerts. I consider Atlanta and Charlotte my backyard almost and those destinations are what 140 miles and 100 miles away. Sheesh I have meandered to Raleigh NC, Tampa FL, Macon GA and Salem VA to see shows in the last year. Often these decisions are made after a trivia night or some cooking adventure in my kitchen. This implies that BBG may or may not have had a beer, a shot or a glass of wine and perhaps the decision making process is a little more liberal than if I was stone cold sober. Note I said one beer or shot or glass of wine. LOL. As if.

So this year's goal is 60 concerts. Not 60 acts. 60 concerts from 01/01 to 12/31. My musical tastes pretty much run the gamut except for maybe hip hop and what passes for music on Hit Radio in the 2010s. One of the joys of owning my VW Passat is that it came with SiriusXM radio and that has opened my musical world to artists like the Lumineers, Mumford & Sons, Nathaniel Rateliff and Vance Joy.Not exactly artists you hear on the radio or see on TV covered on the mindless talent shows like American Idol, The Voice, etc etc.

So back in late December I booked a ticket for Vance Joy in my backyard of Atlanta. I see an artist on tour and I immediately book a ticket if they are in my backyard. I regret missing Rush last year in Atlanta on their 40th anniversary tour because I hemmed and hawed. I swore then and there, I see an act I want to see I buy a ticket.

I have had it on my concert calendar for months. March 19th, 8 pm Atlanta, The Tabernacle. I told friends I was going. I told friends I would see them there. So around 430pm today I head out the door on my way to Atlanta to see Vance Joy. I stopped for a coffee around 6pm in Commerce, GA which is kind of the halfway point and then I look up on my Ticketmaster app the address for the Tabernacle in Atlanta as I have never been there and I was going to imput into my GPS. This is when I discover I had a ticket for Vance Joy alright but my ticket was for last night at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville TN. Let's say that my favorite F word escaped my lips several times in a row. LOL.

Immediately I rechecked my Ticketmaster app to make sure that I am a doofus which it did confirm so I thought hmm I guess I need to get another ticket. LOL. Well eff that idea the dang show is sold out. Yay me in Commerce GA not. An hour later I am finishing this blog. LOL.

I am my Mom's son.