You Know You're Getting Old When....

I went out with my girlfriends last night.

We had a lovely evening downtown-- lots of shopping, lots of eating and a boatful of laughter.

We ended up the Bittercreek Ale House... packed at a table surrounded by

a majority of people that looked 15 years younger.

Anyway, towards the end of our meal, a band started setting up behind us.

It was already overly loud in the place... so we all kind of cringed... thinking we'd never be able

to hear each other now.

I had a major flashback to when I was in my very early twenties.

Somehow I had convinced my bosses at my first TV station (KVBC in Vegas)

to let me do a week's worth of special reports on "Jazz Legends Who Live in Las Vegas"...

We spotlighted Joe Williams (the singer for the Count Basie's Orchestra who we followed to the Playboy Jazz Festival to get video of him performing),

Marlena Shaw (the Grammy award winning singer who sang at my wedding)

and several others-- including this guy-- Carl Fontana.

He's one of the best trombonists in history.

Shortly after we shot interviews and video with Carl, a well-known, modern-day

saxophonist and trombonist was coming to Vegas for a concert-- a guy by the

name of Richard Elliot.

Carl had heard of him- but never seen him... so I invited my 60 something year old friend

to go out with me and my 20 something year old friends to the concert.

Of course, Richard Elliot knew who Mr. Fontana was and paid tribute to him at the beginning of the concert.

But what I remember most... was Carl rolling up pieces of his cocktail napkin and stuffing them

in his ears to help block out the loud music.

He loved it-- but thought it was too loud.

Now flash back to last night... in downtown Boise with my girlfriends.

As the band prepared to play, I, for a moment,

actually sized up the cocktail napkins on our table.