One Incredible Night of Music... In Our House!

or OMG! That's Francis Dunnery playing in our dining room!

Okay, so last night one of our favorite musicians performed... in our dining room!!

Seriously!!! Dude, I'm not kidding. He played in our HOUSE!

A bit of background:

Geo and I will be celebrating 25 years married next month. For a while now we've been trying to figure out how to mark this momentous milestone. Do we go away? If so, where? Do we have a party? If so, when? Do we sit on the couch, scratch our respective asses, eat junk food, watch the telly and burp really loudly? If so... WTF? That's just any old Tuesday.

Then Geo had the proverbial light-bulb-over-the-head, AHAH! moment and threw out the whole hosting a Francis Dunnery house concert idea. Brilliant!

We have been on the perspective hosting list ever since he started performing in people's homes exclusively about five years ago, but we never bit because of the cost and lack of substantial space in our tiny home. But this time we said, what the ef? Screw the spacial constraints. Let's do it!

And so we did.

And it was FAN-F*CKING-TASTIC!!!

So worth the few hours of testiness and snarking between me and Geo leading up to the evening's events. All you marrieds out there know what I'm talking about.

Most of our guests had arrived by the time Francis and Erica pulled in the driveway. We ushered them upstairs to our bedroom for a bit of private time before the show. The first thing Francis did when he walked into our room was say, "Right. Well first things first, I'm jumping on this." No, he wasn't talking about leaping on the bed. He grabbed my mallets and started banging out a tune on my steel pan. He hadn't even taken his coat off yet. And here's the sickening thing: even though he had no idea how to play the drum... he still was able to put out a tune much more melodic and rythmic than anything I could have done.

Amazing. Musicians. They really rock... at everything.

We spent the next 30 minutes or so chatting about anything and everything... from the set list for the evening (we got to choose the songs he played) to his child custody issues to astrology to their house in the Poconos to the marvels of iPhone apps to touring baseball fields this summer.

It was unbelievable. Francis. In our bedroom. Talking and laughing like we've been friends for years.

Then the show started and it was truly magical. Our friends, most of whom had never heard of him or his music, became enchanted by his talent, uplifting musical message and his humor. We had chosen the Astrology Show which means he goes through the zodiac signs and explains their characteristics to the corresponding audience members between songs. It was a blast. Lots of laughs and more than one or two insights. He played with our friends and they responded in kind.

A good time was definitely had by all. His irrepressible charm had worked it's magic. By the end of the evening, most of the folks in the room were Francis converts vowing to catch him perform again. Afterwards, Francis mingled with the crowd, chatting, signing autographs, graciously posing for photos.

And to top it off, Mr. D really dug my chicken curry. He even wanted the recipe. For any of you who have English friends, you know the Brits are connoisseurs of curry... so HUGE compliment there, which made the Italian in me very, very happy indeed.

We could not have asked for a more memorable means by which to mark our milestone. We are still grinning from ear to ear thinking about it all. His beaming brilliance definitely took the chill off of a bitter winter night.

So a big, fat, Burgh bear hug of thanks goes out to Francis and Erica for giving us a memory that will last our lifetime. It has been a pleasure and privilege getting to know you over the last couple decades. Here's to many more gatherings spent together.

Not a bad start to 2010. Not bad at all.