AFL PLAYOFFS ERK* - REPOST FROM LAST YEAR'S "FALL DOWN AND BE EMBARRASSED IN FRONT OF ELEVENTY-BILLION PEOPLE GUY!"

I'm totally cheating here; today for the first time since I started with the seizures, psychotic break and tremors, which is about 18 months, I played my viola, and surprise of surprises, I sounded damn good (for about 3 minutes; I have my work cut out for me!) So, that right there is an achievement. My goal for writing still stands, although I have edited nothing, but I'm so over the moon about being able to play. I'm cheating because of NaNoWriMo. Q'uel horrores! Or somethiing...

I wonder if these are free-range violas, because the price has really skyrocketed!

Q: Have you heard about the latest form of urban violence?

A: Drive-by viola solos.

So, here's a little number I cobbled up during the American Football season last year as we headed into our playoff season. Enjoy!

First off, goals, schmoals. AS OF LAST NIGHT, I HAD 10087 WORDS FOR NANO!!!!!!!!!!!! (To quote Andi-Roo, my benchmate in this furball, "there was a great tossing of glitter! "Huzzah!) 

Anyway, I got a wild hair and am completely taken with this topic today last year. My low impulse inhibition just took over. Oh well. I'm off the streets and non-violent. Such is life.

This is not your typical Sunday check in post. Nope, first off, it's Monday and second off, here in the good ol’ U S of A, it is Martin Luther King Jr.'s Birthday and President Obama's 2nd Inaugural Celebration! So, what better way for me to celebrate, than to write about yesterday's NFC Championship game between the Atlanta Falcons and the San Francisco 49ers that featured guys running over guys and plowing into unaware guys on the side-lines. That’s right, “UNAWARE” guys on the side lines, during one of two games that will decide which of two teams are going to the Hyper Bowl, er, uh I mean, Super Bowl LXVII (is that 47 or 67? I failed Roman Numerals in Ancient Times class.)

Sing Along: "I see I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X, XI, XII, XIII, XIV, XV,   XVI, XVII, XVII Wheels"

Anyway, dude got clipped below the knees and fell as if pole-axed, backward onto that hard surface and landed backwards, head-first, with a bounce or two and was thankfully unhurt. Apparently, he works at the Atlanta Falcons field and this was their first ever(!) playoff event, and really, he can’t be faulted for that part of it. The poor guy had his back turned to the action and was most likely, looking at and marveling at the crowd and all of their noise, hoo ha, folderol and mostly, NOISE. And boy, howdy, there was a bunch of it, being as how, my Google says, the Georgia Dome can shovel 71,250 people into permanent seats. 

courtesy of hollandbobolland via YouTube. Plesae visit and "like."

This is the kind of noise that Guy Who Fell Down experienced for the FIRST TIME!

The first time I ever faced a crowd like that was when I played for the Moody Blues. I was in my mid-30s and had been playing viola professionally for about 15 years, by this time. My performing experience went from symphony-polite-coughing and maybe a standing ovation, or two. Occasionally, the 

standing ovations were prolonged.

Stunning, wonderous. I love Mozzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz..... *snore*

Once, during a Grand Pause, or a fermata, where the orchestra came to a screeching, abrupt halt after a fortississimo passage and it was deathly quiet, I had the great good fortune to hear a bellowed “I FRY MINE IN LARD…” from the back of the Hall and then, a stunned quiet, from both the orchestra and the audience. As one, we all swelled up like toads or horses being saddled, as not one soul in that huge hall wanted to be the first to laugh.

The Grand Pause fortunately, is one of those musical devices that has no metered time, so as the Conductor stared us all down, daring us to laugh, and we played “one potato, two potato, three potato, four…” Concert master and Principal Second Violin and Principal Viola and Principal Cello all sitting there, giving one another, the hairy eyeball, becoming rather like “High Noon,” and I and my stand partner who are on the 2^nd stand, not daring to look at one another, because we are cut ups, idiots and jokers, are puffing up like horses around rattle snakes, we’re both holding our breaths, because HolyMotherOfGod. . . I’mJustSoGonnaLaugh. . . I see his viola scroll start to shake out of the corner of my eye and my eyes start to water and my nose starts to tickle, am I gonna sneeze? And just then. . . As I start to go eeeeeeeeeee? As the air is leaking out?

The Conductor gives the downbeat and off we go, probably in a swift Presto to get to the end of this bitch, so we can all exit stage Left, Right and Center at a dead run. To this day, I do not remember what on God’s Green Earth we were playing, but it was probably Rachmaninoff. I’ve been ambushed by him a number of times. 

Him, and his Grande Pauses. Well, that was a digression.

Okay, I haven't faced Wembley and I'm sure I don't want to; actually, I probably do. We rocked it at 1-800-ASK-GARY Field. A name like that for a Venue just drips class. I can't wait until Kotex, or Fleet Enema buys a sponsorship and demands to have it named after their company.

In the summer of 1992, the Moody Blues were in a resurgence and instead of having a summer off, we had a tour around the Midwest for a few weeks. We had an afternoon rehearsal with their conductor who told us the basics, miced us up and off we went. We had a full orchestra, and plexiglass partitions between each section. I felt like we were in cattle pens. That night, the orchestra was in place, when the Blues with Justin Hayward took the stage.

There were 10,000 people in the audience. Up to that point, I had never played with that many people in an audience. When that audience roared and that sound hit the stage, the orchestra, who for the most part had not experienced that before, was pretty well aware that this night and this concert were going to be hella different. But first, we had to get over the shock of all of those people yelling. If we had been zebras, we’d have been dead ones. We all just froze for about 2 beats and then our training kicked in and off we went.

It was an exhilarating experience I’ve always loved the Moody Blues for their more orchestral stuff, dating back to 1967 and 1968. The conductor, Larry Greene is also their arranger, and he had gone back and arranged some of their harder rock stuff like “Ride My Seesaw” for strings and that was a blast to play as well. I’ve found that I like music with a harder edge to it. I’m sure it’s one of the reasons I don’t like Mozart and I revere Beethoven, and he would have been down with all of this. Mozart gets right up to an idea and then backs away. He never really releases that full passion that lies underneath his tepid ideas, and maybe that is why; you can't push passion into a tepid idea. The idea itself has to be passionate.

Beethoven takes a musical idea in his teeth and just ragdolls it. He wrings every inch of emotion and pathos and exhilaration from it, until you're exhausted by just listening to it. I love that and I love playing Beethoven; he is so worth it. I also love the fact that he doesn’t bore the violists to death in his orchestral and other ensemble writing. Mozart is too precious, hard to play and there’s damn little reward for all of that work; he’s insipid. Oops, lemme get back to our sideline guy.

My personal muse, from birth. We share the same birthday, some say, just not the same year.

I’ve enjoyed my rock ‘n’ roll violist career, which has also veered off into blues, metal, blue-grass, country, pop, motown and a bit of rap and hip-hop, believe it or not. But, back to our poor dude, man. Did I feel for him. Guy stood up; I was so relieved, he fell hard. As he was turning around, the Fox Team, (Terry, Howie, Michael, Jimmy and Whoever) were helpfully pointing out that this was the Falcon’s first playoff Event ever. The guy who had been knocked over was wearing a jacket that said “Event Team” on it.

As the man turned and looked at the camera you could tell he was thinking, “Oh dear, can I move to Saturn? Maybe to Pluto. Pluto isn’t far enough away… My wife is going to divorce me. What was I thinking? My grandkids are going to be talking about this and wanting to hear this story, forevah!. This is going to be on AFV, isn’t it? Geez, on National TV, no, INTERNATIONAL! Gack! Did my Aunt in Outer Slobovia see me? I hope I don’t get fired. I would have been better off shitting my pants, or throwing up. At least farting, maybe. You can't smell that over the air. I'm so dead”

Relax, guy, if I hear you got in trouble over this, I’m writing a letter. I’ve done so much stupid stuff in front of the public, it’s not funny. I’ve fallen off stages, fallen out of chairs. Fallen off risers. I very gracefully draped myself across 3 people once, along with my viola and bow, held up over my head and rolled like a barrel down to the floor, protecting my baby, my viola, my honey, my Wolf. How I managed that, I will never know. I’ve taken bows wearing Taco Bell on formal, black velvet unknowingly, after playing a triumphant Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. To make matters worse, my stand partner’s fly was open during the whole performance. I don’t think Beethoven would have minded.

The point is, a roaring crowd is pretty impressive; I was awed by it when I was on the “receiving” end of it the first time. It does take some getting used to. So, Guy Who Was Knocked Down and Was Embarrassed, don’t be. I hope you get a chance to get used to it as more Falcons playoff games come your way. I hope you are okay. You made my day.

#ROW 80 1st QTR SUNDAY CHECK IN – POST 23 – WHAT STRANGE CRITTERS THESE NON-FRETTED INSTRUMENTS BE

He was born in 1837, only ten years after the death of Beethoven. Born on the same continent, but in another country, born in another time. He probably thinks himself as a child of the Enlightenment, because that is surely when his kind began to achieve the finest of their voices. Their voices are many and they are powerful and fine. They soar and growl, sing and weep. They are the family of strings.

All things considered, he is one of the minor nobility. Being born in Bologna in 1837 (although there is dispute and it is thought he is older,) he is a poor cousin to the Cremona family of Amati, Stradivarius, Guarnieri, Storioni and Guadagnini. He is a Guidantus. Italian and a pure snob, even against the Strad violas. Only twelve Strad violas are still around and they were not his finest. Violas and violins have different ratios in terms of their sizes, just as cellos do. Wonderful violin makers don't always make wonderful violas and vice versa. Wolf holds his own against all comers and seems strangely oblivious and insouciant, much like his current partner.

His scroll and serif are unique. Seen head on, his scroll is off-center; a hallmark of Guidantus.

Meet Wolf. Sorry I don't have a picture of his front. My PD was too bad. This is from the Strad school.

The striping down the back is unique as well. Matched maple, called "tiger striping." I do not think it a formal term. I think Peter used that. Peter Psarianos, who cared for him, had great affection for Wolf. But, Peter loves all  the instruments under his care.

Wolf slept for a long time and his memory is vague regarding his earlier years. He’s not even sure when he came from Italy to San Francisco. He just knows he ended up there and in the hands of a young woman who played briefly in the San Francisco Symphony. His mistress fell ill with a peculiar muscular wasting disease. He went back to sleep for a long period of time. He awoke to find himself in a room with lots of others of his kind.

He ended up in my hands in 1974; bought by a maker/dealer in San Jose, California, by my mother. I was off to college and she wanted to be sure I had something nice-er to play than the hideous brick I had been fighting with for the last 3 years. I took him around in his beat up old case and played him for my new Viola professor and friends. The consensus? Not bad, probably a keeper. He hadn’t been played in a long time and he sounded… kinda pinchy, but that faded over time, as he regained his voice.

And boy, howdy, did he! He just wanted to be played; he was a teenage viola (137 years) in viol years by this time and he was tired of all this hanging about! Lots and lots of playing commenced and his voice grew and grew and grew. Smallish, but deep, the proportions are perfect for this instrument. It’s really easy to think in terms of a great big violin, but that just sounds horrible.

A whole bunch of instrument makers have tried a lot of stupid things to make violas better. Instead, they just made them into the butt of jokes: Q: Why are violas bigger than violins? A: They aren’t, the violinists heads are bigger. Q: Have you heard about the latest form of urban violence? A: Drive-by Viola solos.

Otto Erdesz viola, circa 1974. I almost unreservedly do not like modern instruments, either. They are too raw-sounding. It takes at least 50 years before they start to behave.

Welcome to strange and tubby. Try to shift positions on this bastard. Good luck. We'll see you in the ER when you yank a finger out of joint or bust an elbow. It got worse. See below.

Anyway, these loons, the instrument makers, like Otto Erdesz who makes beautiful viola bows made a bunch of violas that look like their asses are on steroids. I worked for a guy once, selling fine instruments and got to play some Amatis and Strads, which was awesome! Then, when I found their true worth or provenance, I hastily gave them back to the shop owner, Peter. He loved that game. "Here, Mary. Play this viola that just came in for sale on a commission." I'd play along. Beautiful tone; played like butter, I'd run up and down the finger board, play a bunch of double stops. "What is it?" I'd ask. He'd say, "Whadda ya think?" Smartass me, "Stanley Steemer. Italian, Cremona school. Guarneri?" He'd grin. "Storioni." I'd gawk. "O Holy Mother of God, take it back NOW!"

 And, I got to play some Erdesz violas. They go for about 14k. They’re beautiful to look at, but the C string, lower notes are just muddy, no clarity, no gruffness and if you play in upper positions on the C string, like I love to do for that intense sound, it sounds very weak. My Guidantus, which was bought for 1,500.00 in 1974 is much, much, much more expensive today. I had to have Wolf certified and insured when I had all of his pegs, chin rest, tailpin and everything refit. Wolf has bling-bling. Actually, I have bling-bling just being around him. The odd thing about him is his dating. Supposedly, he was born in 1837, there are some Guidantus violas around that time, but the school was thriving a century earlier and there are some Guidantus viol da gambas from 1737, but buttloads of actual violas. Another mystery, but Wolf has been certified by an appraiser due to provenance and that is damn hard to fake and why would anyone go to the trouble.

Musicians are a cruel lot. I would never walk into a rehearsal with this. This shouts, "I can't PLAY. Put me in the handicapped section!" Oh, wait, I'm a violist; I'm already IN the handicapped section. Joke, I play viola like a violinist. This was so it would make it "easier to shift positions." If you have to make it easier to do something that the rest of the "human" race and I use that term politely, 'cause musicians, you're on the wrong track. What's next? A stick and a washtub with twine. They tried that. It sucked.

So, working in the shop was fun. I got to play a bunch of different violins and violas. It turns out that Wolf, my first viola I ever played when I went looking was the one. Violins? Feh. I’ve played some killer violins. They make me sound great. They still suck. It’s a violin. The only thing that would make that worse is playing Mozart on one.

So, when Wolf and I aren’t out terrorizing viola sections, or hamming it up in the Tampa Bay Chamber Orchestra, we were off playing Styx’s “Domo Arigato Mr. Roboto,” or Alan Parsons Project or Moody Blues stuff. Turns out I had way more fun playing Symphonic Dances from “West Side Story.” Man, does that cook.

But back to these here instruments. Turns out the damn things have personalities. Makes sense. The wood is alive. There was this guy who wasn’t a professional violinist, but could easily have been; he was a dentist, but prided himself on his musicianship and was in a few of the local groups, around Detroit. He bought himself a Strad. He was happy with it for a while, then I noticed he didn’t talk about it much. I asked him what the problem was. “The damn thing hates lights. I can only play in a dark room.” I nodded sagely. “I can relate. Wolf hates the cold. He loves Florida.” The dentist looked at me. “And this is a problem?”  I said, “Well, yeah, every time I have to tour up north, we fight.” I got the impression the dentist thought I was making this up. So, I said, "It's complicated." I got an even stranger look. "We've been together longer than I've been with any of my husbands." Dentist laughed uneasily. "Ha ha, good thing I'm married." M'kay, I'm shutting up now.

I had to explain that Wolf found a way to make 2 strings go out of tune precisely at the down beat. Pain. In. My. Ass. So, I remembered Nathan Gordon’s old trick of the warm-up to the warm-up. No more sliding in under the down beat. It worked, but honestly, Wolf loves Florida, but does NOT like ceiling fans. His 440 A becomes like 441. Don’t ask. How we suffer for our art. So, it’s basically turn off the fan in the room I practice in. No biggie. 

What was a biggie was this asinine German violin I bought and a damn nice one. Beautiful tone and easy to play. Made in 1845. No real wars going on, so I figured they could spare a few years and make fiddles without screwing that up. The violin was for gigs and I was playing with Manhattan Transfer at the time. Well, this violin had a serious eating disorder. It ate E strings Iike I eat string cheese. Strings aren't cheap. At the rate this thing was going, I was replacing 2 E strings a month, at 10 bucks a pop.  During our Manhattan Transfer tour, the conductor who was a hell of a pianist and I were improvising on Rachmaninoff's "Variations on a Theme by Paganini" just goofing. There's a lot of down time on tours. I improved all the time with people. Anne Murray's side men and I played a killer "Ashokan Farewell" riffing it. 

These evil bastards are everywhere, dreaming of Mozart.

Anyway, I guess my stupid violin didn't want to play Rocky, so during one of the Transfer tunes that damned violin ate his E string. I was playing 1st violin, which I hate. I improvised by playing all that high shit on the A string. I was pissed. After that tune and while the Transfer schmoozed with the audience, I was off that stage, changed the string, tuned it and back in my chair in time for the next tune. Conductor Yaron Gershovsky told me later, he'd never seen that in all his years of conducting. I asked him if he wanted to buy a violin.

I have a friend who owns a Gofriller cello. It is magnificent. Their scrolls are unique. So are their value. 1 million US the last time I heard. Since I don't play cello, I just look. I tried once, it just sounded like "Singapore's Greatest Hits." Everything was quarter-tones.

My favorite story is the guy who brought in his cello for repair. It had a perfectly round hole through the front. His son threw a fast ball in the house and it went right through the front. The cello was a Gofriller. Ouch. That was several thousand dollars and months to repair. I’ve had exactly one repair done to Wolf and Peter had to remove Wolf’s front, or his face. There was a viola-shaped dust bunny in there, that’s how long it had been. He sounded much better without his “pal” the viola-shaped dust bunny. Peter asked me if I wanted to see him without his face. I passed on that one. How strange, but it’s just too… something. Wolf is my alter ego, husband, friend. Peter asked me if I wanted his dust bunny. I said no to that, too. Just reunite me with Wolf.  

#ROW80 1ST QTR POST 7 – SUNDAY CHECK IN AND THE NFC CHAMPIONSHI-*ERK*

I'm totally cheating here; today for the first time since I started with the seizures, psychotic break and tremors, which is about 18 months, I played my viola, and surprise of surprises, I sounded damn good (for about 3 minutes; I have my work cut out for me!) So, that right there is an achievement. My goal for writing still stands, although I have edited nothing, but I'm so over the moon about being able to play. 

I wonder if these are free-range violas, because the price has really skyrocketed!

Q: Have you heard about the latest form of urban violence?

A: Drive-by viola solos.

So, here's a little number I cobbled up during the American Football season last year as we headed into our playoff season. Enjoy!

  

First off, goals, schmoals. I got a wild hair and am completely taken with this topic today. My low impulse inhibition just took over. Oh well. I'm off the streets and non-violent. Such is life.

This is not your typical Sunday check in post. Nope, first off, it's Monday and second off, here in the good ol’ U S of A, it is Martin Luther King Jr.'s Birthday and President Obama's 2nd Inaugural Celebration! So, what better way for me to celebrate, than to write about yesterday's NFC Championship game between the Atlanta Falcons and the San Francisco 49ers that featured guys running over guys and plowing into unaware guys on the side-lines. That’s right, “UNAWARE” guys on the side lines, during one of two games that will decide which of two teams are going to the Hyper Bowl, er, uh I mean, Super Bowl LXVII (is that 47 or 67? I failed Roman Numerals in Ancient Times class.)

Sing Along: "I see I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X, XI, XII, XIII, XIV, XV,   XVI, XVII, XVIII Wheels"

Anyway, dude got clipped below the knees and fell as if pole-axed, backward onto that hard surface and landed backwards, head-first, with a bounce or two and was thankfully unhurt. Apparently, he works at the Atlanta Falcons field and this was their first ever(!) playoff event, and really, he can’t be faulted for that part of it. The poor guy had his back turned to the action and was most likely, looking at and marveling at the crowd and all of their noise, hoo ha, folderol and mostly, NOISE. And boy, howdy, there was a bunch of it, being as how, my Google says, the Georgia Dome can shovel 71,250 people into permanent seats. 

The first time I ever faced a crowd like that was when I played for the Moody Blues. I was in my mid-30s and had been playing viola professionally for about 20 years, by this time. My performing experience went from symphony-polite-coughing and maybe a standing ovation, or two. Occasionally, the standing ovations were prolonged.

Stunning, wonderous. I love Mozzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz..... *snore*

Once, during a Grand Pause, or a fermata, where the orchestra came to a screeching halt after a fortississimo passage and it was deathly quiet, I had the great good fortune to hear a bellowed “I FRY MINE IN LARD…” from the back of the audience and then, stunning quiet. Nary a peep, cough, fart or rustle.

The fermata fortunately, is one of those musical devices that has no metered time, so as the Conductor stared us all down, daring us to laugh, and we all played “one potato, two potato, three potato, four…” Concert master and Principal Second Violin and Principal Viola and Principal Cello all sitting there, giving one another, the hairy eyeball, becoming rather like “High Noon,” and I and my stand partner who are on the 2^nd stand, not daring to look at one another, because we are truly deranged idiots and jokers, are puffing up like horses around rattle snakes, we’re both holding our breaths, because HolyMotherOfGod, I’mSoGonnaLaugh… I see his viola scroll start to shake out of the corner of my eye and just then? As I start to go eeeeeeeeeee? As the air is leaking out?

Mercifully, the Conductor gives the downbeat and off we go. To this day, I do not remember what on God’s Green Earth we were playing, probably Rachmaninoff. I’ve been ambushed by him a number of times. Him and his G. P.s. Well, that was a digression.

This all changed when we started playing in open-air theaters and stadiums.

Okay, I haven't faced Wembley and I'm sure I don't want to; actually, I probably do. We rocked it at 1-800-ASK-GARY Field. A name like that for a Venue just drips class. I can't wait until Kotex, or Fleet Enema buys a sponsorship and demands to have it named after their company.

In the summer of 1992, the Moody Blues were in a resurgence and instead of having a summer off, we had a tour around the Midwest for a few weeks. We had an afternoon rehearsal with their conductor who told us the basics, micced us up and off we went. We had a full orchestra, and plexiglass partitions between each section. I felt like we were in cattle pens. That night, the orchestra was in place, when the Blues with Justin Hayward took the stage.

There were 10,000 people in the audience. Up to that point, I had never played with that many people in an audience. When that audience roared and that sound hit the stage, the orchestra, who for the most part had not experienced that before, was pretty well aware that this night and this concert was going to be different. But first, we had to get over the shock of all of those people yelling. If we had been zebras, we’d have been dead ones. We all just froze for about 2 beats and then our training kicked in and off we went.

 It was an exhilarating experience I’ve always loved the Moody Blues more orchestral stuff, but the conductor, Larry Greene is also their arranger, and he had gone back and arranged some of their harder rock stuff like “Ride My Seesaw” for strings and that’s a blast to play as well. I’ve found that I like music with a harder edge to it. I’m sure it’s one of the reasons I don’t like Mozart and I revere Beethoven. 

Mozart gets right up to an idea and then backs away. Beethoven takes it in his teeth and ragdolls it. I love that. I also love the fact that he doesn’t bore the violists to death in his orchestral and other ensemble writing. Mozart is precious, hard to play and there’s damn little reward for all of that work; he’s insipid. Oops, lemme get back to our sideline guy.

I’ve enjoyed my rock ‘n’ roll violist career, which has also veered off into blues, metal and a bit of rap, believe it or not. But, back to our poor dude. Man, did I feel for him. Guy stood up; I was so relieved, he fell hard. As he was turning around, the Fox Team, (Terry, Howie, Michael, Jimmy and Whoever) were helpfully pointing out that this was the Falcon’s first playoff Event ever. The guy who had been knocked over was wearing a jacket that said “Event Team” on it.

As the man turned and looked at the camera you could tell what he was thinking: “Oh dear, can I move to Saturn? Maybe to Pluto. Pluto isn’t far enough away… My wife is going to divorce me. What was I thinking, looking at that stupid bunch of loud-ass people? My ass is on the line, here. My ass... is my ass too wide? My grandkids are going to be talking about this and wanting to hear this story, forevah!. This is going to be on AFV, isn’t it? Geez, on National TV, no, INTERNATIONAL, TV! Gack! Did my Aunt in Outer Slobovia see me? I hope I don’t get fired. Geez, does my head hurt. Can I go home?”

Relax, guy, if I hear you got in trouble over this, I’m writing a letter. I’ve done so much stupid stuff in front of the public, it’s not funny. I’ve fallen off stages, fallen out of chairs. Fallen off risers. I very gracefully draped myself across 3 people once, along with my viola and bow, held up over my head and rolled like a barrel down to the floor, protecting my baby, my viola, Wolf. How I managed that, I will never know. I’ve taken bows wearing Taco Bell on formal, black velvet unknowingly, after playing a triumphant Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. To make matters worse, my stand partner’s fly was open during the whole performance. I don’t think Beethoven would have minded.

The point is, a roaring crowd is pretty impressive; I was awed by it when I was on the “receiving” end of it the first time. It does take some getting used to. So, Guy Who Was Knocked Down and Was Embarrassed, don’t be. I hope you get a chance to get used to playoff events as more come your way. I hope you are okay. You totally made my day!