Ok... I'm stoked!!! I'm not a regular concert goer. All concerts for me have to meet the very high standards of the very first concert that I ever went to! That would have been the Osmond's at the Iowa State Fair when I was about 10. My mom took myself and 2 of my friends to that concert. I've been told that the 3 of us sat there, with our mouths hanging open, and hardly made a sound during that concert. We were in awe! Donny Osmond!!! My original "American Idol"!!!!

Since then, I've made a few more concerts. Lover Boy and REO Speedwagon were the biggies in college. In fact, I've seen REO in concert way more than any normal, sane person probably should, but I like their music! I've seen Kid Rock, Uncle Kracker and Kenny Chesney, Kansas, George Thourogood, and more. I can honestly say, with my oh so vast amounts of concert experience, that last night's Rascal Flatts concert was by far the best I've ever been to. Sorry Donny... but someone finally surpassed the "wow" factor for me for concerts set by you all those many, many years ago!



Amber and I were graced with free tickets, thanks to a friend of Amber's who couldn't go to the concert. We left, thankfully, quite early, and learned that you HAVE to get there early if you plan on parking within a large radius of the concert venue. And, if you plan on eatting at TGI Fridays (which is practically attached to the place), you'd better get there darn early! Since we were early, we decided to go ahead and park and eat early. Thankfully we did! We were done eatting around 5:15 p.m. We had been seated right away and enjoyed our meal. Had we been any later, and still were determined to eat there, we would have been late to the concert. By the time we left, there was more than a 2 hour wait for a table! If you left, you lost your parking spot. And, it was cold and rainy, so walking somewhere else would not have been fun, either. We happened to do the very right thing by being so early!!! Awesome start to the evening!



Our seats were straight back from the stage, one level up off of the floor. Not close-close to the stage, but a straight shot view of everything. It rocked! From the opening act, one Chris Young, who put on an awesome show of his own, to the encore, this show was amazing!

I remember going to see REO once, and the highlight of that concert was that they had a "new" technology.... lazer lights! Instead of just singing, they had lazers that shined lights all around the venue and across the crowd and added something new and exciting to the show. Wow! Things have come sooooo far since then! Kenny Chesney's concert several years back was the closest to this, but WOW!, this was amazing! The music was fantastic, the band had the right amount of down-hominess-talk-to-ya between songs, the backdrop show... the lights, the pictures, the computer graphics, the stage.... was beyond amazing!!! They even through in a hymn in the middle of things, and it was just right! (Can you tell I had a really great time?!)




We started out sitting, singing a little, yelling quite a bit.. just watching that show! It didn't take too awful long, though, for us to be on our feet, yelling and singing and Whoot-ing and have a blast! It's darn hard to NOT get caught up in the mood of the night in that type of atmosphere. I'll gladly take my scratchy voice, slightly sore throat, and weariness today. They just mean that I had a great time with my Amber last night!

Trying to keep up with background changes was impossible. But fun to watch!

That is the guy who opened for Rascal Flatts! He was awesome himself! He ended the night back on the stage with the whole crew, too. Just awesome!!! The whole night was incredible!

Heck, the whole day was beyond awesome!!!! I got a job, too!!!! Part-time, but it's a start. I'll be working as a receptionist at a doctor's office. The hours are perfect with the boys and I'm exited about it! : ) I start that on Tues. Monday we are making a trip to Burlington and meeting Amy there, so that she can get fitted for her dress for Amber's wedding.

I'm so happy to be home!