The Wedding Temptress

Hello Wedding Season. 

I think I'm ready. 

So ready! 

I love this planning phase. I can almost see each wedding before it happens as I make set lists and laminate my printed sheets of bridal party names (with phonetic spellings of course). I picture the guests in chic, bright colors; a stunning bride - with whom I have been meeting and planning all these months - and adorable, carefree children bouncing about the bandstand. I imagine them all becoming increasingly sweaty and silly as the evening progresses, because of music we select and play for them. I am visualizing each one. Imagining the rooms we'll be in, the families, the personalities, the goals we made materializing into this beautiful, perfect day...

I think there is a fine line between craving excellence and being OCD. Sometimes during this time of year, I wake up worrying over some detail for some wedding that is due to occur many weeks (or months) from now. I need to find the balance of caring a LOT, and perhaps caring too much. I enjoy all of this wayyyy more than I ever planned, much  more than necessary. But I can't quit her, that sultry wedding band temptress. 

Her siren song is a medley of 80s pop and current dance hits, and I am foundered by her call.

Party Bus

I haven't kept you up to date, but it's a sign that things are busy around here. I like busy. I am effective when busy, sunken when inert. Inert when immobile. It's a vicious cycle. 

Today I am the opposite of sunken, though. I'm downright animated!

But only because these past two days have been a BLAST. Yesterday I got to be on the radio with an Irishman, then later found myself holding court with said Irishman and two other pals around 1ayem at a bar in Bucktown. How many soccer moms can say that about an average Thursday night, eh? Luck o' the Welsh! 

(For the record, I am only something like 1/22 Welsh, but it still holds up, and sounds more fitting than "luck o' the Austrians!")

Two nights ago, this Welshwoman played at The Orrington Bar in Evanston, which sounds very hotel-like (and it is) but it was super fun; and being neither a wedding nor fundraiser, the hotel gig had a certain (very) laid-back charm. I tried to minimize the between-song babble - I mean "banter" - and got through three fun sets of mostly original material with some great players like Jennifer Lowe, Jim Hines, Scott Tipping, Geoff Lowe and Matt Nelson, all the while watching dear friends enjoy their hotel bar french fries, droopy-lettuced burgers and gun-spray sodas.
Then, to top off all of this goodness, I was an ol' pro on the radio yesterday, because I had been invited onto another station this past Sunday, and had exorcised all of the warbling and bumbling then (sorry Kathy Kelly and WNUR!). Look at me, all relatively radio ready!

When I get off this party bus and actually start to get back to work, I'll write in. Until then, let's enjoy the ride and see some sights!