Meanwhile, back at the ranch: Happy New Year!!

Wow. 2009. Seems like yesterday it was just 2000. How did 2009 get here so fast?!

Here is Steffi on the eve of New Year's 2000 with her Millennium bug and it looks like Duncan is going to clobber her with a bottle of sprite?! Must have been a warm night if I let these two out with shorts and t-shirts! That's why we live in Texas!

Last night was great. We stayed at the Hilton downtown, which was completely sold out and from what we saw (and heard next door) many rooms had large parties. We had dinner at Carmelo's, an Italian restaurant on 5th street. Both of us had veal, something we hadn't had in many years, but it was a specialty on their menu and we both enjoyed it. (See, Kelly, we do eat something other than chicken!)

After dinner we walked toward Antone's and along the way were were amused by all the clubs with long lines of happy people celebrating the new year and just how many styles of short, sleeveless black dresses there were on display. We had a drink at the Gingerman and talked to a guy who was celebrating his 30th birthday with a bunch of "over the hill" balloons tied around his neck. He was celebrating two days early because he said all his friends were always too tired after New Years to go out again on the 2nd.

Then we wandered over to Antones where the Bob show had been advertised to start at 10, but we knew it would be 11 at the earliest before he started to play. We had missed the first warm-up band but caught the second one. We wished we had missed that too. The band was called the Black and White Years but they played 80's style music. I'm pretty sure we had color in the 80's so I don't know what their name was all about. They were loud and were kind of a mix between Soft Cell and Devo. Some people enjoyed them, but the consensus in the line to the ladies room was that an hour of muzak would have been better. Here is the lead singer and drummer in the background. I really took this picture for the 2009 balloons in the background.

Bob came on pretty promptly at 11:30. By then we had moved over to the right side of the stage where we wouldn't be trampled by people going to and from the bar and bathroom.

Bob had pretty much the same band he had at the Paramount the other night with the addition of Billy Harvey (far right in picture below). That's the lovely Harmony on bass (in one of those sleeveless short black dresses! and her silver 4" heels), Rafael Gayul on drums and Jeff Plankenhorn on the other side of the stage. He had his trio of horns up there too.

Susan Antone came on stage to count down to the new year for everyone. They let a bunch of balloons drop from various areas around the club and for the next several hours people bopped them around. Occasionally one would hit a ceiling fan and shoot out in a random direction.