Message In A Washer

The Police were my favorite band back in 7th and 8th grade.

On a nightly basis, I would sing along with the songs on Outlandos d'Amour, Reggatta De Blanc, Zenyatta Mondatta, etc. During my 7th grade year, they played in the Assembly Hall at the University of Illinois as part of their Synchronicity tour, about 80 miles east of my hometown of Springfield.

I sooooooooooo wanted to go, but I was not allowed. My brother *did* end up going, and brought me back a shirt.



It was nice, but you can imagine how it wasn't quite the same as being there.

Earlier this year, there were rumblings that The Police were reuniting for a tour, and were going to roll into Chicago at some point in the summer, playing the best ballpark in the world, Wrigley Field.

As you are probably already aware, sure enough, the rumors were true.

I didn't get around to purchasing tickets for the show, and figured they were sold out.

But yesterday, a coworker came up to me and said, "Hey, do you need tickets for The Police?"

"F*ck you!" I enthusiastically replied. "Are you serious?"

He was serious. He had four tickets he was willing to sell to me for four hundred and fifty bucks. Now, that sounds like a lot, but he was selling them to me for what he had paid for them.

I called my wife all excited about it, then she got all excited about it. As I was riding home on the train, the excitement kind of wore off.

$450.00. That's a lot of cash. Plus, who were we going to get to babysit our three younguns? The show is at 7:00pm on a Thursday night, and we would probably have to leave Brookfield at least a couple hours earlier than that to make sure we could get there, park, all that crap.

We have had babysitters before, but it's a big deal trying to get someone to feed your three under-fives and put them to bed.

After briefly discussing it, we both decided to call my coworker and regretfully decline his tickets.

My wife calls me today, finally at wit's end with all the dirty dishes produced over the course of a kid-filled day (our dishwasher broke about six months ago), especially since she is busy taking a summer statistics class in preparation for her starting grad school in the fall.

So, we're getting a dishwasher, which will probably cost about the price of the four Police tickets. I'm thinking a Synchronicity sticker would bring some color to our new, drab white appliance.