How To Spend a Perfect Evening

I'm afraid I stayed up a little too late to post yesterday! :) I woke up about a half-hour ago after some odd, but unmemorable dreams.

Yesterday morning I was woken out of a nasty dream about work by my Dad who needed help moving donated food from his church to a local food bank. It took up most of the morning, and I forgot to eat until about 1 o'clock, when I made chicken noodle soup for Meg who wasn't feeling her best. We watched "The Diva that Wouldn't Die" and "The Love Bug" from 1969. She had just found the latter at Fred's the day after Christmas, so it was a lot of fun to watch straight through. After that I had a bit more of a snack and we played Phase 10 while she was on the couch.

My perfect evening started about 4:45 when I took Mom out to dinner to Coho's Cafe in Redmond. This is the fancy place that my coworkers and I go for people's birthdays. Oh my! We had their delicious seafood bisque, scrumptious salads, and Mom had a crab, cheese and artichoke dip with flat bread and I had a pair of chicken tacos with spicy sauce (my favorite). We then shared a small, rich, dark chocolate lava cake to finish. It was right around 6:30 when we left, and we straightway got on State Route 520 to go to the Seattle Symphony downtown. Traffic was light (as it was a Wednesday night) and we parked in an overflow garage across the street from Benaroya Hall just after 7pm.

The program started at 7:30 with a few choral waltzes by Bhrams. It is like nothing else to hear the symphony play live. No recording can capture it. This was a very short program... it felt like it was over in just minutes... but it had to be at least a half-hour. Following a short intermission, they began Beethoven's Ninth Symphony in D Minor. This was an hour long performance of pure joy. Often times I closed my eyes to focus. I was surprised how gently it started out! And often times it was very soft. It is a symphony in four parts. Between each you could hear a chorus of coughs ring out from the audience... quite funny. The last movement was the famous Ode to Joy melody. It started with just the basses and cellos, grew to include the violas, then the violins before the brass, winds and percussion brought it to a climax. Later on the soloists and choir joined in with the original lyrics, sung in German. Both the German and English is printed in the program, and I was surprised how vastly different it was from anything I was familiar with. It's so much fun to give a present of an evening out... best idea I ever had. Not only does my Mom love it, but I love it too! And it really only works if you go together. :)

Not only this, but I was home in plenty of time to talk for the rest of the night with my best friend.

I am Happy. Thank you for everything, Lord.

Jp