Brushes with Greatness

We had a very fun, very eventful day in New York City on Monday.

Peter is a member of the FMI Symphonic Band, one of four state-wide bands made up of Catholic School students in Connecticut, grades 5-8. It's rare for a 5th grader to make Symphonic band, but Peter did it, and plays alto sax for them.

The FMI bands put on three concerts in the spring, and one of them takes them to NYC, where they perform on the plaza at Lincoln Center for a lunchtime concert. Isabel and I were both able to go with him, serving as chaperones (and for me, as a roadie, hauling percussion equipment for one of the instructors).

The bus ride to NYC took almost three hours, given traffic on I-95 and in Manhattan. The concert went off fine. The FMI Concert Band played first; Peter's buddy Anthony, also a rare fifth grader, plays trumpet for Concert Band. Peter's Symphonic Band played after them. Both bands had enthusiastic crowds of parents, but also construction workers, office workers, parents and children, and other assorted New Yorkers who were happy to hear some excellent music for free. During the first piece, Peter had a small emergency with a broken reed, but he was a consumate professional and fixed the problem and played on. Fabulous performances all around.

After the concert, we all went on a tour of Madison Square Garden. Our tour guide, Joe, had a bad habit of talking before the entire group was gathered arund him, but we stayed close and managed to hear most of the good stuff. Joe sounded a little like George from Seinfeld -- a little less manic than George, but about as tuned in to others' needs.

The tour included a peek inside the Knicks' and Rangers' locker rooms. They didn't smell too bad, which was nice. But what was really cool was that outside the locker rooms were pictures of Knicks and Rangers who have made their respective Halls of Fame. I got to see the picture of Phil Esposito, my childhood hero, who was traded from the Bruins to the Rangers when I was 8. And here I am with Brad Park, who was traded for Espo, and became my new hero when I was 8. that was very cool.

After the Garden tour, we had some time on our own in Times Square. Now, Peter gets a little embarrassed about "babyish" things, but his buddy Anthony embraces all things weird and childish, and so Anthony dragged Peter over to take a picture with Elmo. There are lots of costumed characters in NYC, getting pictures with tourists while they advertise various goods and services. As far as we could tell, though, Elmo was not advertising anything. It was most likely an unemployed young woman in a ratty Elmo costume who posed for the picture and then held out a canvass tote bag that said "TIPS." So we felt like we were moving the economy along when we have her a dollar.

After wandering around Time Square, we had dinner at Planet Hollywood. Here's where things got really interesting.

Planet Hollywood is a celebrity-themed restaurant, as we were told by our waiter, Bumper, in the lobby before we went upstairs. The restaurant was started by, among others, Sylvester Stallone and Bruce Willis, so there's lots of memorabelia there from those two stars, plus other things like the original Chewbacca costume from Star Wars. They also host a lot of celebrities there in a private room.

Well, as we were waiting outside to be seated, a group came in flanked by police officers. One man looked just like Snoop Dogg -- the rapper featured in this very blog just a few days ago (see the final video that Strudel posted)! That got us very excited, to say the least. As we were waiting in the lobby to be seated, who comes down the stairs, but three members of Three 6 Mafia, the rap group that won an Oscar for Best Song for "It's Hard Out There for a Pimp," featured in the film Hustle and Flow. I'm not going to post a link for that video. You can figure out why on your own. But I'll give you the link for Three 6's "Poppin' My Collar," a song a prefer anyway.

We went upstairs and were seated, and then we ordered, and I took Anthony and Peter for a walk to look at the memorabelia, including this display with the robe and boots work by Sly Stallone in Rocky III (which, of course, co-starred Lymphoma Survivor Mr. T).

We went back to our table, and Peter went to the bathroom. Her ran back to us, saying "I saw Snoop Dogg in the bathroom!" How did you know it was him? we asked. "He was talking to some guy, saying Fo' Shizzle, my nizzle bizzle fizzle!" Five minutes later, after we finally stopped laughing, we asked if he was sure it was Snoop, and he told us that he confirmed it with the bathroom attendent.

Soon after, we got on the bus and headed back home, visions of childhood heroes, out of work actors, and medical marijuana dancing in our heads. We were home by about 9:00.

I am, to say the least, still exhausted. But it was worth it, not just because Peter did such a great job, but also because, well....do I really need to tell you why?