Sunday, July 17, 2005

A Face In The Crowd

It seemed like an okay plan. Kathleen and her boyfriend Erik were driving up from Laguna Niguel for the Pasadena Jazz Festival and wanted me to meet them. Being wishy-washy, I didn’t commit right away, and we decided to hook-up via cell phone on Saturday.

Well, Saturday came and I missed her call, but no problem, right? That’s what cell phones are for. Kath said she’d leave hers on.

Around three o’clock I checked Yahoo for directions and current traffic conditions and figure it’d take me about an hour. Yeah, I know what you’re thinking—trusting Yahoo was dumb. The directions were fine, but a two-car fender bender lengthened my journey to an hour-and-a-half.

Anyway, being a whiz at following directions (didn’t even write ‘em down!) I found the place (near the Rose Bowl), parked, paid my forty bucks to enter and called Kath.

Uh-oh. Straight to voicemail. Right about then, misgivings set in.

Nevertheless, she’d said she keep checking, right? So, I figured it was just a matter of time before she’d discover I was there.

Time for plan B.

Okay, so how hard could it be to find one of the twenty or so white faces among thousands of black ones? And, if I kept moving, wouldn’t she see me?

Turns out the answer is no.

I bought a beer, hiked around the place for almost two hours, and never found her. By that time, I was exhausted so I located my car and drove home.

Lesson: Always have your cell phone on vibrate.

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