Disappointment, Debt, & Dreamwalkin'

The other day, I received an e-mail from the Toby Keith International Fan Club announcing that Toby would be at the nearby casino in late January. I immediately forwarded the announcement to Queen-a-Athena and Chris, both of whom also would like to see His Toby-Ness.

Because the show is at a casino, there was no advance sale on the tix for fan club members. But I made sure my membership is current so I could enter the fan club raffles for both the back-stage Meet & Greet and the On-Stage pass.

My fellow Toby fans and I decided that we simply couldn't afford the most expensive tickets, but would take either of the two lower levels. And we wanted seats on the aisle, so we couldn't order the tickets on-line.

Tickets went on sale at 10AM on Saturday 12/2. I started calling the casino box office at 9:58am. I tried the on-line method, too, but couldn't specify an aisle seat, and the three seats I got weren't on the aisle, so I foolishly released them. A moment later, the on-line connection said no seats were available. The whole time I did this, I was also speed-dialing the casino. I got a busy signal until about 10:50am, at which point I was put on hold. At 11:05am, a nice young man named James offered to help me. Except he had nothing left to sell me but the $125 seats.

I'm unemployed. I need to be realistic. As much as I want to see his Toby-ness and perhaps meet him back stage again, I can't justify $125. I know my friends can't either.

I'm really glad I decided not to enter the raffles until I had purchased the tickets. How awful would it have been if I'd won the passes -- and not had tickets to the show? If he comes back to area soon--and he plays around here a lot--I can enter then.

Oh well. I had my moment with Toby several years ago. I guess I shouldn't be greedy. But without his music, I never would have written the book that landed me my agent. And he wrote a song about my muse, too. I owe that man. Just not $125 worth.