We Are in Love

I interrupt this cliffhanger blog to bring you the following update...

We Are in Love...with Harry Connick Jr.

My birthday is right around the corner, April 25th, to be exact. So to celebrate my birthday, Bebe and Jenny bought the three of us tickets to see Harry Connick Jr. at the Ryman. Now, I love me some HC Jr. This was my 3rd concert...and they just keep getting better!!!

We started the evening at Sambuca with Lobster Ravioli, Shrimp and Crab Rangoons, Crab and Lobster Bisque, and Sea Bass Skewers. After our lovely candlelight dinner, (Bebe -"How are you supposed to read the menu in this light?") we finished with cheesecake sopapillas and tiramisu. Can I just say, YUMM-O!!!

Then we headed on over to the Ryman. We settled into our seats, just as Harry was singing his first song. Nice job on the seats, Jen-Dog!!! Right side of the stage about 20 rows back...in front of the horn section...the side where he comes to sing...perfect shot of his beautiful face while he plays piano!!! SA-WEET!!!

He was in rare form last night. HC Jr. was telling tall tales, cracking jokes, and dancing all over the stage. A couple of songs into the evening, HC Jr. starts telling us that he thought this show was on Monday evening. They had pulled into town on Monday morning and he had geared his whole day towards performing on Monday night. During his workout, a buddy proceeded to tell him the show was Tuesday. He disagreed. Buddy argued. HC disagreed again, "Dude, I always know my tour dates. The show is tonight" Buddy reinforced, show's tomorrow dude. HC Jr. texted his tour manager..."Hey, when is the Nashville show? Tonight, right." Tour manager texts back, show is Tuesday. "Man, my whole Monday is ruined!!!"

He has had a whirlwind couple of weeks, starting with the New Orleans Saints win at the Superbowl..."Who Dat?". Harry (and the entire city of New Orleans) are so proud of their Saints, and he was so excited to share all of the wonderful ways that the superbowl win has helped the city of NO to rebound from the devastating effects of Hurricane Katrina.

But speaking of the Saints, part of HC's whirlwind weeks, was singing the national anthem at the Daytona 500. He has gotten letters from folks who are unhappy with him because he did not remove his hat during the national anthem. He apologized to all of us, said he sincerely did not mean to offend, and if anyone should be upset, it should be him..."They made me put on this leather Daytona 500 jacket with all of this NASCAR stuff on it, No Gucci, No Prada...Just NASCAR, and I don't do NASCAR!"

After that, his whirlwind, landed him in NOLA for Mardi Gras. He treated us to some Mardi Gras piano and some Zulu King. Then, he treated us to some NOLA style trumpet playing and dancing. Oh my, he did him some dancing on that stage last night!!!!

So that brings us to his visit to the White House to sing to President and Mrs. Obama. He laughed and said it was really awkward to sing love songs to the President. He also asked if anyone in the audience was in love, because if you were not in love, the next few songs would be a little awkward for you and you might want to go get a drink.

He gave us some insider tips of how to sound sexy while singing (like he needs ANY help)...apparently Julio Iglesis gave him this tip...sing like it is 20 degrees and you are freezing...HILARIOUS!!!

Some other memorable quotes..."You have to think about your sentence trajectory...sentences have a beginning, a middle and an end.", "It's not like I have any top 10 hits, can you name one, I don't have any. I'm no Carrie Underwood. I don't know why I'm yelling at you, sir.", and "Thank you for spending your hard earned money to come and listen to my schluck."

And then he told us this very sad story...His 13 year old daughter came home from school not too long ago and she was upset. He asked what was wrong but she did not want to tell him. She did not want to hurt his feelings. He finally talked her into telling him. She said, "Dad, a friend came up to me today and said, Your dad sucks, he sings grandpa songs." "So you know what I did", HC asked, "I went over to that boys house...no just kidding, I do sing grandpa songs and I like it that way."

He was very gracious, very funny, and super awesome!!! I truly believe that HC loves Music City, respects Nashville and the musical heritage of the Ryman and I'm hoping that he will follow through on his dream to record country music "his way". I will always remember this special birthday evening in February. For about 4 whole hours, I did not even think about all the junk that has to be packed up in my house, or moving, or finding a new house, or Ryan leaving on Monday to start his new job in Jackson...Thank you for the awesome birthday HC Jr., Jenny and Bebe!!!

We now return you to regularly scheduled cliffhanger....

Melissa