Ain't nothin' like the blues

to get a girl's toes a tappin'. The B. B. King show last night was great! The man is 80, and he's still going strong. He's quite the showman and his band is awesome. It was so much fun.

Important safety tips for the next time I visit that particular concert venue:
1. Dress light; it gets very hot in there.
2. Arrive more than 2 hours early if you plan to eat at the casino.
3. See how much the VIP boxes cost.

We had to wait more than an hour to get into the "fine dining" restaurant. When we walked into the place, the line for the buffet was just insane, so we decided to go on to the Island Grille. I was kicking myself for a while. I had started getting hungry around 4:30 or so, but I was meeting mom and Eva at 5:30 and we were planning on dinner first, so I didn't eat. Big mistake. We didn't get into the restaurant until after 7 p.m. The show was starting at 8, so we were a bit rushed. On the other hand, the food was very good. My steak was perfect, and I only overingulged a little on the bread and butter.

While waiting to get in, I briefly considered picking a fight with two older ladies who were all dressed up in gold lame. We called them the Golden Girls, and they were sitting next to me on a bench outside the restaurant commenting on how "disgusting" they find tattoos, particularly on women. Naturally, I took offense, but since the concert tickets cost us $58 per person, I bit my tongue so as not to get kicked out of the casino. Plus I was weak from hunger, and I'm not sure I could have taken them.

The venue itself, beside being overly warm, was nice. Very good acoustics. The seats were pretty narrow, which I think is how they crammed 2000 people into the space (it's quite cozy). As I sat down, I thought to myself how 60 pounds ago, I wouldn't have been comfortable in those seats at all. And I saw more than one person who was having a very hard time fitting into the seat. The armrests go up, but not all the way, so if you're of a certain size, you're probably going to be stabbed by the armrest. At least if you're in one of the side sections. The chairs on the floor didn't have arm rests, so not as much of an issue there.

Excellent people watching opportunities, too. People of all shapes and sizes wearing everything from gold lame (see above) to tube tops and shorts with flip flops. All in all a really good night, and the kind of thing I should do more often (get out of the house, that is).