Well, I finally made it home, but I'm pretty exhausted. I'll try my best to be coherent and add what I can. It was so great to see my list buds! The kind of friends you can just pick right up with, so natural. Love it!
The Wiltern is a beautiful place but the whole thing was not very well organized. I guess the big-wig dinner took longer than they expected and as Kakki said, we stood outside the door in crowded heat for an hour waiting to be seated. Bob and I actually went to the box office and complained, going so far as to ask for a refund, mostly for drama. The lady at the box actually agreed that the situation sucked, but said that they would start very soon and we would miss an awesome concert if we chose to leave. (This, of course, turned out to be true!) When we did get in, they were still auctioning off stuff to the hi-rollers like " walk in part on Will and Grace", "Poster signed by all that night's performers" and "private jet to front row tickets for opening night of Celine Dion's new show in Vegas" (barf) I'm pretty sure Michael CAine bought that one for 5K, as he racked up roughly 20K in purchases in the name of charity. Oh yeah, the auctioneers were Don Henley and Paul Riser. I didn't notice what time the concert actually started but I guess it could have been 2 hours late, I'm not sure. Our seats were quite comfortable, temperature wise anyway, I guess the higher you got the hotter it was. Sorry you guys had to sweat through it! So, that wasn't you yelling out "We Love You Joni" in unison???? The concert has been covered well by Kakki and Rick. I'll add that Joni DID introduce her second song with "This is a Dylan song I've always loved. It's a thrill to be able to sing it here" I'll also add that her orchestral version of Woodstock was by far the highlight of the evening for me. Quite dramatic..Mesmerizing. I had brought a little gift I made for Joni, a raku necklace, and a card.. Our very expensive tickets included a "VIP Post-Concert Party". I was hoping she would be there and I could give it to her. The party was a veritable sugar fest with every sort of dessert imaginable. I swear the whole place smelled like sugar. We waited patiently, chatting with some folks for at least 30 minutes, but the only celeb we saw was Mick Fleetwood. I was starting to figure that they just weren't going to show and we were going to leave when in struts Larry Klein. I jumped in front of him and introduced myself, complimented him on the great show. I told him I had a little gift for Joni and asked if she was coming. He said he didn't think so but said he would be happy to give it to her for me. So, it's in Mr. Klein's hands. I hope she did get it, and enjoyed it. Now, more sleep, Phyliss
