Cold Spaghetti

Paul and I enjoyed a wonderful night out, just the two of us, where we actually did something memorable! We enjoyed a once-in-a-lifetime event: seeing the incredible BB King live for New Orleans House of Blue’s 13th Anniversary party. Paul had seen BB once (by generous invitation of our friends Millard and Violet, who had an extra ticket) in Detroit’s beautiful Fox Theatre. Paul has raved about that night ever since and swore that if given the opportunity, we had to see him again. I noticed the performance about a month ago, called my parents who agreed to come to town for babysitting, and… Happy early Valentine’s Day, Paul!

We left early to have dinner at House of Blues before the performance — do this and you get special entrance before general admission into the standing room only hall. Dinner was excellent, even by New Orleans standards, which is seriously saying something. We ordered directly from the recommendations of the staff, splitting each dish, and could not have been more impressed… shrimp in a BBQ beer sauce, smothered chicken served with wet naps, and bread pudding. Even with our attempts to draw out dinner as long as possible, we still nabbed a decent spot in the “early entrance” line… freezing for an hour in the 40-degree weather. (Yes, we would have considered this a heat wave in Ann Arbor.) We made it a point to get the scoop on the hall and had a plan — get directly upstairs to the balcony and nab a rail spot to look down on the performance rather than look up from the standing room floor. (Extra plus of upstairs: the a second bar — open, for this show — directly behind.) We did all of this and even with the special roped off VIP seating in the front row a step below us, felt like we were going to have a decent vantage.

UNTIL THEY SHOWED UP.

Four Royal Assholes From Chicago came with the three dancers they’d picked up at one of the clubs. Flashing pimp-wads thicker than their necks, they rolled out 100s to buy assorted memorabilia and dozens upon dozens of drinks. And EVERY TIME THEY STOOD UP, MOVED, OR LEANED — WHICH WAS THE WHOLE SHOW — THEY BLOCKED OR OBSTRUCTED OUR VIEW. AND THEY SHOUTED AT EACH OTHER THE WHOLE DAMN TIME. Their obnoxiousness put a seriously dense cloud over the wonderful time we were trying to have. Although my mother scolded me about it later and I’m a little embarrassed to admit it, I stuck my chewing gum onto the jacket of the most obnoxious guy before we left. What I really wanted to do was spill a drink on them, but I was concerned about the trouble it might cause. (Paul sensed that I might do something and excused me early on in the night for any trouble I might get us into. I told him if he needed to act like he didn’t know me for his own protection that this would be okay.)

Still, despite the obstructions and interruptions, the performance was amazing. BB was full of energy… danced, spoke back and forth with Lucille, played off his wonderful band, and gave an enthusiastic show. The band primarily provided back-up (Paul had said that in Detroit, the band was much more of the “show”) — this was almost all just BB himself. He played much of what one would expect (Rock Me Baby, Just Like a Woman, Been Downhearted, The Thrill is Gone) with other little things thrown in (I especially liked his take on “Summertime”). We hope to catch him again at Mobile’s Saenger Theatre in June.