Sometimes it's lonely at the top

(Disclaimer: The following should not be taken as a series of complaints. I'm very grateful for this rare treat, I'm just cataloguing the emotions behind them, just as I do each and every time I blog. So, if on the face, it comes off as petty, it's certainly not the place I'm coming from. I don't want to be petty. Not Tom, not Richard and especially not Lori Petty. Great, now I need a disclaimer for that!)

It started back in November. My co-worker, Daren, was giving me the traditional scary-as-hell ride to work, and we were listening to Q104.3. That's a classic rock station that plays the same 27 songs over and over again. So when the deejay said he was giving away Joe Bonamassa tickets at Radio City Music Hall, I was certainly surprised. And interested. I'd seen Joe before at B.B. King's and he's quite the talented guitarist. The part about it being on Q104.3 escaped me, since they don't play his music, but no gripe here.

Mainly I was calling for "ark," the back half of this combo we call "Park." I'm a fan, but Mark's the mega-fan. I was surprised when the phone rang at the radio station and I was shocked when I was told I won, but there it was. Two tickets to see Joe Bonamassa at Radio City, and I was entered for the grand prize of an autographed guitar and a meet-and-greet with Joe B. as well. Spectacular, right?

The next day I hear from Gianna at the radio station, she says the tickets aren't there yet and she'll contact me when they are. A month or so passes and I'm not overly concerned, but wondering what's going on with the tickets.

After the Christmas break, I heard from Gianna again. She told me to go to the station to pick them up. I replied that I don't come to the city that often during business hours, but would make it happen. Then she gave me a long series of instructions of how and when to get them. And then after all that, she added that she could Fed Ex them to me. I think I did a double take, even with no one else in the room. Shouldn't that have been said earlier?

No bother, she took down some info so she could e-mail me some release forms before they could be sent and then hung up. I was about to text Mark with the good news about the tickets and Gianna called back. "By the way, I didn't tell you, you're the grand-prize winner!"

I can't tell you how stunned I was at that. In fact, it had completely slipped my mind that there was a guitar and a meet-and-greet in play, I was just concerned about getting our seats at that point, I guess. My head was pounding as I shakily texted Mark about that one.

Then I signed and e-mailed back my release forms, got the tickets the next day -- although she had thrown some fear in me by saying if they got lost on the way, that was it on that front. But no problem there.

As far as Gianna had said, the radio station's part was done and someone else would be handling the guitar and the meet-and-greet for me. Except that never happened. I never got a call or email from anyone else on it.

The week of the show, I emailed Gianna back and told her the situation, completely unconfident about it based on what she had told me earlier. But by the end of the day, she had gotten back to me with meet-and-greet details. She had also dispatched another email about the guitar.

In the meantime, a conflict had sprung up for Mark. The guy who never had to go anywhere for work was in Atlanta all week. And he was gonna be flapping his wings pretty hard to get home for the show. The meet-and-greet was an impossibility. Can't tell you how much I didn't relish going to that alone. Mark's the super-fan, I'm just the "hey, I enjoy your music" fan.

The next day, another email from Gianna. The guitar was being Fed Ex-ed to me the day of the show. Potential problem: I had to leave for the city at 2 p.m. in order to get the bus, train and walking done to be there by the designated meet-and-greet time. Do I leave the guitar on my doorstep or ask a neighbor if it's not there by 2?

That proved to be no problem either. It showed up in the morning. I made the difficult decision not to lug the guitar onto the bus, train and subway for an autograph and left it behind. Mark's suggestion ... which he later took back ... after I'd decided to take his advice.

Of course, I'm at Radio City nice and early, cause you never know when you're gonna have a bus, or a train, or a walking problem. In the lobby, a lady from PBS was taking names for the meet-and-greet. Only she didn't have mine, she just had the PBS people's.

More about the people who paid for the meet-and-greet through PBS. I'm not sure they saw me at all, standing there all by myself. They seemed to be doing everything but making eye contact. It was a reclusive half-hour, I'll tell you that. With a side order of "should I worry that I'm not on this list"?

Some side issue sprung up between PBS lady and a couple of representatives, I'm not sure whether they were Radio City or Joe B. people, but PBS woman wasn't happy about it. One of the reps started taking names. I worked my way over there, THAT list I was on. Whew. He asked me where my "plus-one" was, I said he couldn't make it.

Now I'm bright-orange Radio City Music Hall wrist-banded and we're led down the hall, down some stairs. And there's a curtain with Joe's name all over it. Some basic tenets of meet-and-greets were given out -- no single pictures taken ... unless, of course, you came by yourself.

And before we knew it, Joe was in front of us with a disarming "sorry, I'm late." There were two people ahead of me and one group of four people behind me, and the guy halves of the couples were trying to stop the women halves from taking pictures. I tried to help, I really did, when I said, "I've heard that people can get thrown out for doing that."

I turned back around, and one of the guy halves said, "She's been here before." One of the woman halves retorted snottily, "I don't care if she's been here before." And that was my big interaction with a non-guitarist at the meet-and-greet. Was trying to help, but I shoulda kept my mouth shut.

I had been stressing about what actually I would say to Joe when it was my turn, but I really shouldn't have worried about it. I told him about super-fan rushing back for the show and thanked him for the guitar (now the latter HAD to be something that no one else in the line was going to say). And then the picture, and before I knew it, I was bundling back up and out the door.

It was about 90 minutes between the time that ended and when we'd be let in for the show, so I got lost in the NBC building for a while. (Funny thing was I almost rolled my eyes when someone at Penn Station had asked me where the exit was, and then I was a couple minutes away from doing the same at NBC. What a maze!)

A hot chocolate and some laps around Radio City and 30 Rock later, it was time to go in for the show. And now I did find some people I could actually talk to -- Dan and Roseanne! Well, not the Conners of TV's Roseanne, and actually, it's Dan and Roseann. But I met some nice people. And incensed them equally -- Dan with my story of getting the guitar and Roseann with the tale of the meet-and-greet. She had been told Joe wasn't doing any because the show was being recorded or some such nonsense. To clarify, I think that Joe's peeps weren't doing meet-and-greets, although he did have the PBS ones ... and mine.

Despite the fact that Dan wanted Mark "to miss his plane" out of Atlanta -- it may sound overly harsh, but it really made me laugh hard, I enjoyed talking with them a lot. And the rum helped too.

When you're sitting in the audience at Radio City, you kinda bemoan the sight line, especially when someone taller is right in front of you. But the minute the music starts, you realize it couldn't sound better.

Joe did two amazing sets, starting off with an acoustic one. This included my (and Roseann's) favorite song "Different Shades of Blue," a tremendous cover of Robert Johnson's "Stones in My Passway," and Daniel Lanois' atmospheric "Still Water." Mark texted during the first song, his plane had just landed.

Then a break (and another rum) before the electric set. More great material, including a dynamic blues triumvirate: Howlin Wolf's "Hidden Charms," Muddy Waters' "I Can't Be Satisfied" and Otis Rush's "Double Trouble." I didn't even THINK about Clapton's version during the latter, so that should say a tremendous lot. And I knew a lot more of his material than I did the previous time I saw him.

And then Mark showed up! He got to see about an hour of the show, including Dan's favorite, a cover of Tim Curry's "Sloe Gin." The three-song encore included a Hendrix cover, "Hey Baby (New Rising Sun), "Oh Beautiful" and "So, What Would I Do."

I didn't get to say goodbye to Dan and Roseann, who ducked out before we stood and turned around, so ... "Bye guys, nice to meet ya!" And then we came home and Mark played with the guitar ... and the cats ... and the dog. And it was good, and back to our wacky embarrassment-of-riches existence that is Grand Central Station meets the Bronx Zoo.