Basketball and Karaoke

I decided to go out to sing last night. It's not unusual for me to go singing on a Thursday night but my plans of meeting a bunch of friends at Champp's fell through because of the NCAA playoffs and Champp's, being a sports bar, would be CROWDED to say the least.

When I left work I had the idea that I would go to Excueses and then the Reef. With this in mind I took 40 Join the Band bracelets to sell as I got up to sing. I got home and was suddenly unmotivated to go out to Excueses because I found out that the U of I game was going on in my neighborhood (the Allstate Arena). I knew traffic would be BAD and did not know if I wanted to fight it and I did have a lot of preparing to do for when Jannette arrives tonight. Like a good girl, I went ahead and started cleaning and ended up getting a lot accomplished by 8:00 and decided to get ready and go out to Excueses so that I could, in fact, sell some bracelets and then I could head to the Reef and sell the rest.

When I got to Excueses I found out there would be no karaoke that night so that everyone could watch basketball. So, I got in my car and went to the Reef earlier than anticipated. When I got there I was the only person I knew (except for Mikey the KJ). That is unusual because I know everyone. Okay. I recognized the owners but I never actually talked to them. Oh, and I knew Cathy the bartender and Shue, the weekend bartender who hangs out there during the week.

I sang one song and then my friend Nikki came in and sat with me. Then more people I knew started to come in. I ended up having a GREAT time. I was also in the mood to sing ballady type songs that had a lot of vocal dynamics so I sang "If My Heart Had Wings" and "Cry" by Faith Hill and "It's all Coming Back to Me Now" by Celine Dion. Then my friend Matt (I like to call him English Matt) asked me to sing "Like a Prayer" so I ended the night with that one.

Well, at one point a girl sitting at the table in front of me found a random $20 bill on the floor. Everyone checked their wallets and it did not belong to any of us (can you believe everyone was so honest?) so I said, "Well, since you just found that $20 you could buy a bracelet from me to support Cancer Research". She ended up buying 5 and others at her table bought some too. I then started going around to everyone I knew and told them about my bracelets and they all bought some. When it was my turn to sing I got up and sang "Cry" and when I finished I waited for applause to die down and said, "Okay. Now that I have your attention I want to tell you about my bracelets." I told them about them and how they fund cancer research then told them to come see me if they would like to buy one. A ton of people ended up coming back to me to buy them. Even more came back just to give me a couple dollars and did not take bracelets. One man handed me $4 and I tried to hand him 4 bracelets and he looked at me and said "No. I have cancer" then I noticed the hole in his throat. I made him take one. I then walked accross the bar to give some bracelets to some guys who were calling me over. I was so overwhelmed by the man I had just seen that I was shaking as I handed the wrist bands over and exchanged money.

By the next time I sang I had only 3 bracelets left so when I finished I made the anouncement that only three remained and reminded them that 99% goes directly to cancer research. As I walked back Lois stopped me and said she would take all three because she lost her dad to cancer. I went to grab the three and three others told me they wanted them but I had to tell them they were sold but that I would bring more tomorrow.

I came to work this morning and everyone was shocked that I sold all 40 wrist bands and came in with $49 in just one night. I am going to take 100 this weekend.