Happy Together Tour at the Crest Theatre in Sacramento

When I first laid eyes on the groovy poster for the Happy Together Tour, the show coming to the Crest Theatre on July 6th, I was hesitant. Because the first band listed was The Turtles, and while they are an OK group from my teen years, they weren’t all that fabulous to me. I read down the list and my eyes landed on the guy from Three Dog Night, yawn, yeah. Followed by Gary Puckett and the Union Gap. OK, Young Girl get out of my mind. What? Is he a pervert, lusting after jailbait? Might be silliness. But then I saw Mark Lindsay, whom you may recall from Paul Revere and the Raiders, and hey, maybe this would be a fun show in a goofy sort of way. The clincher was Gary Lewis and the Playboys. Everybody loves a clown, so why don’t you?

I suggested the show to my husband, who immediately pooh-poohed it. He muttered something about John Lennon and the rattles of jewelry in the balcony, and then he started coughing, wheezing and singing like Tom Waits, telling me there will be nothing but 70-year-old people hobbling about in the lobby. See what I put up with? What he really means is now I will owe him one. I might have to do something dreadful like go the grocery store or eat stir-fried weeds for dinner and not moan about it.

It seemed like a perfect evening out to invite my friend, Barbara, and her husband. Sure why not, the four of us could go to the show. That way Barbara and I can bond in sisterly solidarity belting out This Diamond Ring Doesn’t Shine for Me Anymore while our husbands roll eyes and acknowledge each other’s boredom through those all-knowing glances.

I had a listing appointment yesterday over at Woodside, but I pushed it back by 15 minutes so I would have ample time to go online and buy advance tickets, prior to the public offering. I have ticket buying down to a science. I open the seating chart in one browser and starting a few minutes before the opening time, I begin clicking refresh over and over in another browser. Often, the Crest is off by a few minutes, but luck was on my side yesterday.

Bank of America had just sent me a revised counter for a Cooperative Short Sale, moving a few fees around when I realized, OMG, it was 9:59. Time to go to the secret link to buy tickets. Darn. The website said tickets were not on sale. Like a person with a psychological disorder, I drooled and clicked refresh again and again and again, and whoa, I was in. Just like that. I entered the code, and the website took me to a page to select tickets. I could not believe my eyes. Front row and center seats, four tickets were mine! That almost never happens. My heart raced. My eyebrows got stuck together.

I clicked buy and the website took me to a new page, one that I had not seen before. Oh, no, something new. It wanted my user name and password. Did I have a user name? I quickly tried to open a vault where I store passwords. It did not immediately respond. That’s because emails were hitting my email account at the same time an update was about to take place from Adobe Reader. Everything slowed. If I had a dog, I would have kicked it. No, not really, I would never kick a dog. I might kick a Republican, though.

I looked through possible user names and could not find a name for that website. It was then that I noticed the continue button. I clicked. Now it wanted my credit card information, which I threw on the page from memory. I could not believe we got front row and center seats. My eyes were spinning in circles. Breathing became difficult. My fingers trembled.

I clicked BUY.

The screen returned to my credit card information. What the? I know I put the code in the box. I entered it again. The screen returned to the page with my credit card information and missing 3-digit code. I entered a completely new card and a new code. The screen returned to the page with my credit card information. Was this like the movie Groundhog Day? Do I have to listen to Sonny and Cher over and over? Oh, I see, it had unchecked the box that I checked NO to whether I wanted insurance. I clicked BUY again fully confident that now the sale was complete.

Big red letters: Your Time Has Expired. Start Over.

Ahhhhhhh. I unleashed a string of unpublishable words. My cats ran for cover, paws over their little kitty ears. And just like that, I ended up with Row 2 tickets. Row 2, where I will have to sit and stare at the people who are sitting in Row 1, IN MY SEATS.

Yes, I realize how petty and shallow these thoughts are, and how I should be strung up my toenails because female babies in China are being murdered and we broke the planet and honeybees are dying and the air is so bad over Mauna Loa that it will never be safe to breathe again, while I am spending my valuable time left on earth griping about having to stare at the back of the heads of those people who will be in my seats at the Crest Theatre for the Happy Together show.