What a week

This has been like the longest week ever. Thank goodness all events were happy occassions so I'm not minding the lack of sleep too much. Last I wrote was Tuesday when I saw the Dixie Chicks at the XM Satellite taping. Since then I've been listening to the new album nonstop. I usually have a lot of trouble getting comfortable with new albums. Only listening to one song that I like the most until I know it before moving on. On Taking the Long Way I'd say at least 5 of the 15 tracks are totally out of this world. And another 8 are totally fantastic. Only two songs, Lubbock or Leave It and Everybody Knows I can do without. The best are Taking the Long Way, Easy Silence (best of the best), Not Ready to Make Nice, Baby Hold On, and So Hard. What makes these 5 songs so outstanding is that they are explicitly personal. They deal directly with "the incident", challenges in parenting while keeping your marriage strong, and infertiliy, which both Emily and Martie have discussed their personal ordeals regarding. They are just awesome awesome songs. I can't get enough.

On Wednesday the Dixie Chicks were on the Howard Stern Show on Sirius Satellite radio. Now, I don't have Sirius but lets just say I heard Wednesday afternoon from my brother in California (and a heavy metal fan in high school) that he is now a big fan of the Dixie Chicks. Not neccessarily because of their musical accomplishments, but more for their ability to keep up a conversation with Howard. They talked about underwear preferences and sexual escapades. Sure its bathroom humor, but alas, humor that a majority of Americans can appreciate, myself included. Natalie is a big Howard fan which I'm sure helped them get the spot on the show. You can't hear the show unless you have Sirus but you can read a summary on Howard's site at http://www.howardstern.com/rundown.hs?d=1148540400. Beware though, I know a little bit too much about these girls now. Still love them though!

Thursday was my alma mater's graduation at Madison Square Garden. Since I work a couple blocks away and can't make donations to the school (yet) I figure I can make an appearence. Only know a couple graduates but I was mostly there to see some of my friends who had siblings graduating. Hung in the back with MGR and her kid Zip who finally is warming up to me. She usually just looks and me and cries. This time she was smacking me and laughing at me when I made fart sounds. Warning to parents, the only way I know how to entertain babies is with fart sounds. Just a heads up in case you were thinking of asking me to babysit. Also saw AK and SK and their tiny twin girls. So cute.

Friday morn. Woke at 5 am in order to make it by 6 to the Good Morning America Dixie Chicks concert. Last Tuesday I saw a tiny note on a Dixie Chicks press release saying that if you want VIP passes to shoot some ABC executive an email. I sent one with my name and info, then I sent another from my email with Destiny's name and info, then I IMed SP and told her to email the info as well. Destiny received a VIP confirmation. Shosh received a VIP confirmation. The chick at ABC is on my shitlist. Where was my VIP confirmation? She sucks. She better give me a spot at Kenny Chesney next week.

The Dixie Chicks were awesome. I was a hit in the crowd. I brought my iPod speaker and was blasting the album so we could all listen while we waited. The band finally came out followed by Natalie and Emily. I figured Martie was hiding after the world found out the things we did about her on Howard Wednesday morn. But she too came out soon after that. I couldn't help but scream bababooey a few times just for the hell of it. They rehearsed the songs they were going to be playing. They did Taking the Long Way, Not Ready to Make Nice, and Truth #2. They also rehearsed Lubbock or Leave It but that wasn't included in the live show. Only the big guitar ending of the song made it on GMA. They were awesome and the best part is we didn't have any jerk Dixie Chick haters in the crowd screaming at them.

Shabbat I spent in Crown Heights with my friend SW who had never been there before. When the sirens blasted signifying the 10 minute warning before the Sabbath began SW was dying. She thought it was the funniest thing ever. I had really nice meals at my buddy GPW's aunt Friday night and SW's buddy who she was in town for a visit on Shabbos day. Got a chance to visit ESS after which was nice.

Sunday Sunday Sunday. Sunday we had tickets to the Kenny Chesney concert in Hershey, PA. It was a super long drive but the time passed fairly fast, especially after we stopped for slushies and my bottle of scotch accidently poured itself into the cup. Whoopsie. How'd that happen? Dad, if you are reading this, I'm totally kidding. Everyone else, rock on! We finally got there at long long last. We entered the stadium as Sugarland was just finishing their first song. Jennifer was awesome of course but the sound people must have been stoned and the music was blaring so loud you could barely make out the lyrics. Kenny came on around 9 and played for almost 2 hours straight. To be honest, it wasn't the best concert of his I've been to. There were a bunch of songs I'd really expected to hear that he didn't sing. He didn't even sing "The Good Stuff". I mean come on dude. That's like his version of Tim's "Don't Take the Girl" and Tim never misses an opportunity to fit that crowd pleaser into his set list. I was fairly disappointed. Our seats were good. In the bleachers but directly to the side of the stage. We were far but for 30 bucks you can complain too much and we could see fine. When we left we wandered around the parking lot for at least 20 minutes trying to find our car. When we got to it the crowd leaving was not going anywhere. They had closed the exit to fight the traffic prob. My roommate MK soon to be MKR was out chatting it up with the security forces and convinced them to open up a different route so we could get out of there. She sweet talked them enough to do something, otherwise we'd probably still be sitting in that field right now. I was also handy as the driver. I don't know whats up with drivers outside of New York and LA. Can you believe they were all waiting in a single file line? I was like, are they crazy? I drove onto the gravel side of the road almost running down some post concert tailgaters in the process and quickly passed at least 50-60 cars. Destiny and I laughed as we passed cars with shouts of "WHAT THE F*%@!!!" and "HEY!!!" and "WE'VE BEEN WAITING FOR AN HOUR!!". I screamed back at them, "YOU JUST WISHED YOU THOUGHT OF IT FIRST!!!" I got us back in good time (its easy when you are averaging 80 MPH on the highway). We only got lost twice, a new record for me.

Yesterday I went to a BBQ in West Hempstead at AK and SK's house. They were celebrating a bunch of different things. It was quite the challenging year for them but they now have two beautiful twin girls and everyone is happy and healthy. It was a seudah hodaah, or a festive meal of thanksgiving, thanking God for everything He has given them. Friends and family came from all over and it was awesome to be there for it. Of course, I was there for the free BBQ, but it had nice symbolism as well.

That was my crazy crazy week in a nutshell. Thanks for the support. Peace.