A Late Christmas Present

This past Christmas the kids got together and gave us a number of presents and one of them was tickets to see the Moody Blues. The Moody Blues was Ann's favorite group when I first met her and we used to listen to them a lot as we dated and later married. We had seen them once before, like 15 years ago, when they came to the Nissan Pavilion. A good show that was partly ruined by two women sitting behind us who decided they were way more interested in talking to each other then listening to the music and the fact that it takes two hours just to get out of the Nissan Pavilion parking lot. The tickets this time were for the DAR Constitution Hall. DAR = Daughters of the American Revolution. I've lived in this area going back all the way to high school and I've never been to Constitution Hall, which is a crime in itself. Anyway the venue was very nice and the Moody Blues didn't disappoint. They played all the old favorites and the crowd ate it up. The crowd itself was definitely on the older side. I felt like we were on the younger side of the average age, which is saying something these days. Overall a very good time so thanks kids for the treat.

Saturday consisted of a rowing club meeting in the morning as we try to get things rolling for the coming year. We also signed up for dog sitting for Daughter#2 as she and her husband were headed to Philly to pick up a drum set. We were a little worried how Gracie, her dog, would get along with our three new additions. Ann drove out to Gainevilles to meet Daughter#2 and pick up Gracie. When she got back to our house, we slowly introduced Gracie to each of our new dogs one at a time so she wouldn't feel overwhelmed. Amy and Emily can do that. A few butt sniffs and everything seemed to go well and we all settled in to enjoy the rest of the day watching the basketball tournament.

Sunday I got up early and walked first Gracie and Scruffy up to the tennis courts and back a distance of about 2 miles. After walking them, I walked the twins, Amy and Emily, around the loop, which is just over 2 miles to burn off some of that terrier energy. It seemed to work. Daughter#2 and her husband had returned from Philly Saturday night and they wanted to go out for lunch. The Son joined us and we headed out for Thai, I'm not a big Asian food guy, but Daughter#2 and The son are so I don't mind eating Thai. We all ate our fill. They had a sea bass special that I got and loved. It came with a seaweed salad, which I really liked. Who knew? We said goodbye to Daughter#2 around 2:00 and I spent the rest of the day catching up on chores - doing laundry and grocery shopping. Needless to say, I crashed early, but a good weekend overall.

The weather forecast is calling for temperatures to reach the high 70s and even low 80s by the weekend. Rowing season starts this weekend so a perfect fit. I can't wait to get back on the water. I just hope the winds stay down so I can actually get out. I need the work.

Straight No Chaser

Today the federal government was closed due to the snow storm that rolled through over the weekend. Closing the Government only happens once about every 20 years or so so it's an event when it happens. Having traveled out today, I can see why they did. Even some of the more major roads were in less then great condition. Like they had been plowed once and then forgotten. Forget the side roads. People wouldn't have been able to get out of their neighborhoods. It really didn't matter all that much to me as I had already arranged to have the day off before the storm. One of the reasons I did was to attend a performance of Straight No Chaser at the Birchmere. SNC came to fame a few years back as the a cappello group from Indiana University with their You Tube rendition of the 12 Days of Christmas. It's embarrassing to admit I've lived in this area on and off (mostly on) since the 60s and its my first trip to the Birchmere. It's a very well known local venue and a number of well known stars have come through there on their way to the top. It's open seating and you are seated in the order you show up. First come first served. Its nice you can enjoy a drink from their bar as you wait until they open the seating area. After you are seated you have about an hour and a half to eat before the show starts. Ann and I both had the prime rib, which was surprisingly good. I also had the bread pudding with bourbon sauce for desert. Very tasty indeed. The show was highly entertaining. The guys put on a good show. They combined their well known holiday favorites with tunes like "Stand By Me". They rocked the crowd and gave two encores. They stayed and signed autographs afterward although we passed on that aspect. I do have to go into work tomorrow after all.

TSO

Last night Ann, The Son and I headed downtown to see the Trans-Siberian Orchestra at the Verizon Center. Its been a concert I had been looking forward to since their tour was announced. Not only that, but I believed I had scored some seats close to the stage. The evening started out somewhat auspiciously, however. The plan was for Ann and I to take the Metro from Springfield and meet up with The Son in Crystal City. As we pulled into the Crystal City station, however, two gentlemen with suitcases rose to exit the train in front of us and took their sweet time in doing so, so as I reached the door, I heard the familiar refrain "Doors Closing". That's right, the doors closed before we could get off and the train pulled away. We got off at the next station and managed to contact The Son who got on the next train and we hooked up at Pentagon City. Once we were all together, the rest of the trip downtown was uneventful. Once we got downtown, we began to look for somewhere to eat. I had gotten a few suggestions from a fellow blogger (thanks Zan), but didn't have time to research her suggestions. Right across from the Verizon Center was a Legal Seafood. That sounded good to everyone so we headed on in. We were seated promptly and began looking over the menu. It all sounded good to me and since this an outing of sorts for us, I decided we could do it right and get appetizers and deserts as well. The Son ordered mussels and I ordered 1/2 dozen oysters. James, our server, brought me an assortment, 2 from Oregon, 2 from NJ and 2 from Cape Cod. The Cape Cods were the best of the lot. Its been a while since I've had oysters and man were they good. I finished off those and followed with a seafood casserole and Boston Creme Pie for desert. With dinner over, we headed across the street to the arena. There was an incredibly long line to get in. They didn't seem to have but 2 doors open, which seemed pretty dumb given the large number of people waiting to get inside. Once we were inside, we had no idea which direction to head. Our seats were on the floor so all the permanent signs for seat sections were of no use to us. We had to ask an usher for help and she got us heading in the right direction. Our seats were as good as I had hoped. Maybe 8 to 10 rows back. Settling in, we overheard others talking about how many times they had seen TSO. Seems someone behind us had seem them 7 times over the years. The show was a little late getting started as most shows do it would seem, but it was definitely worth the wait. TSO puts on one of the most incredible shows I've ever seen. We were close enough to the stage that when the pyros went off, we could feel the heat. The first half of the show was their holiday music, which was as good as ever. The second half was some of the music from their new Night Castle CD, which turned out better then I had been expecting. They finished up with with Christmas Cannon, which I think is about my favorite piece that they do. To you give you a bit of the flavor of the event I'll leave you with two videos I shot during the concert. First up, the Wizard in Winter:

Well maybe not. The video wouldn't upload. Instead a picture of the The Son enjoying his mussels.

Concert Week

Well Bah! Humbug! Here it is and I missed the second day of posting for Holidailes. What a way to start. Just plum forgot about it. Obviously my memory isn't what it use to be or at least not that I remember. :-)

This week is concert week for Ann and I. Monday night we saw "Jersey Boys" down at the National Theatre and tonight we will make our way down to the Verizon Center with The Son to see the Trans-Siberian Orchestra.

I've been wanting to see "Jersey Boys" for a while now. I've been a fan of the 4 Seasons for a long time dating back to the days when I was a Jersey Boy myself. Not enough of a fan to spend hundreds of dollars to go to NY to see it on Broadway, but a fan. I finally saw that a touring company was bringing the show to Washington and I couldn't wait to buy tickets. That is until I saw the prices. Not that they were outrageous by theatre standards, but theatre tickets do not come cheap. So I hem and hawed and didn't buy tickets when they first were available. I procrastinated some more and it wasn't to a few weeks ago that I finally bit the bullet and got us tickets. As Monday approached. we couldn't decide either how to get down to the theatre. Take the Metro? Drive? As it turned out, a person in our vanpool had just been down to the National a few days before, loved the show, but told us how it took an hour just to get out of the parking garage after the show. I wanted to take the Metro based on that, but Ann wanted us to drive so drive we did. Getting in was not a problem, A little traffic getting over the 14th Street bridge was all. Right before turning onto Pennsylvania Ave, we saw a presidential motorcade roar on by. That was kind of neat. So we parked down on level 4 of the nearest parking garage and walked about a block to the theatre. Our tickets were in the very last row of the orchestra, but the National isn't a big theatre so we had an excellent view of the stage. I wanted to reserve drinks for us at intermission, but when I approached the bar I discovered I had no wallet. I remember taking it out of my pants to pay for parking but then I couldn't remember if I had laid it on the seat between my legs or put it somewhere else in the car while I attempted to park (Backed in). My biggest fear was leaving it on the seat between my legs meaning it would have fallen out of the car when I got out. The idea of my wallet going missing and/or stolen kind of freaked me out. But the show itself was great. All their great songs and a little background on the group, how they came to be and the stories behind the songs etc. Very enjoyable and I would recommend it to anyone. My wallet turned up in the car so the evening ended well. And we zoomed right out of the garage, No waiting at all. We were home in no time.

We will definitely be taking Metro to the Verizon Center tonight though. The plan is to meet up with The Son at the Crystal City stop, take Metro down to the Verizon Center, have dinner somewhere in Chinatown and then go to the concert. We saw TSO about three years ago as a gift from Daughter#2. The show was incredible. I've been wanting to see them again ever since. Ann has balked so we haven't gone, but this year I was really up for it. Now that I have pushed it, I am sure the bulk of the concert will be from their new CD just out - Night Castle. From what I can gather, it is not Christmas related as their first couple of CDs were. That and the music is very dark so we shall see. I've always thought of them (TSO) as being Christmas related and given the time of year what I want to hear, but I'll withhold judgement until afterward. Either way it should be a fun night.