A lot of you know I’ve been interviewing many beauty pageant titleholders on my radio program. I even judged one not long ago. Well, when it came time for the St. Francis pageant, I had to go. Nikki had come in to sing Stille Nacht special for the program and it will always be one of the highlights of our show in 2004.
You also know nothing ever comes easy for me. Simply getting to an event…on time…can be a major effort. There’s tires that go flat. Injuries that just freakishly manifest themselves upon me. Urges to go on vacation–well, I do tend to go on vacation frequently. You have to admit.
So I know what date the event is…but have no idea when it will happen. I e-mail Nikki. You’d figure she knows and she tells me “7:00 p.m., I think.” Okay, that wasn’t exactly authoritative. So now I’m picturing trying to sneak into the auditorium when it is underway. I figure 6:30 to be safe.
Yeah. Safety. All about the safety. That’s me.
So I have the time. I have the date. Where is it being held? “Thomas More Auditorium.” What the hell is that? Time to pull out all the research stops. So I google Thomas More Auditorium, St. Francis. Nothing definitive. I further find out this location is on the corner of KK & Warnimont. Great, so I look that up. But Warnimont changes name and splits a couple of places. Sweating now. MapQuest, GoogleMaps, MapBlast, YahooMaps…all open in separate browsers. Comparing, contrasting…looking for an actual address to input into my GPS in the car.
Nothing, but I had it narrowed down.
See, I figured out Warnimont becomes Lake Drive. And I found a St. Francis Seminary. I figured, “Thomas More was a famous religious type character. Must be the name of one of the buildings there.”
So I get in the car at 6:00 (to be safe) and dial in 3257 S Lake Dr.
It writes itself from there, don’t it.
The sun is setting and I’m following my GPS’s commands. For the most part. I kind of know where St. Francis is, but I don’t have much call to go out there, so I’m basically blindly following the GPS commands. Which hurts me in the Marquette. It considered going straight, toward the lake, an “exit” which threw me. I knew I did something wrong as I started going north on 43 when the GPS announced: “Off route. Recalculating.” I always thought they should allow you to download different voices. I would get the Homer Simpson model so when I’d pull a maneuver like that, it would just announce, “Doh!”
So now I’m the only Milwaukee native ever to go north from the Marquette in an attempt to find St. Francis.
This also explains why I bought a GPS in the first place.
Well, that and it’s electronics. We all know I love electronics. Unfortunately, they don’t love me back.
I somehow exit and get back on the freeway and give it another go. I’m driving along on the Hoan Bridge (which as a kid I always thought was the “Home Bridge” and the most embarrassing name of landmark ever. That was before the U.S. Bank company defaced my beloved First Wisconsin Building, but I digress.) I noticed the Port of Milwaukee, which I started thinking I should really go explore some time. I had read that the Port of Milwaukee is actually more active than the Chicago Port and thought that might be exciting . . .
Okay, missed another exit.
“Off route. Recalculating.” She kind of sounded like that female voice that announces how much time until the self-destruct of the bad guy’s lair sounds in all the James Bond movies. I really need Homer. Or like Moe from the Three Stooges. “Eh…wise guy, hunh?”
I somehow get myself on Oklahoma and I’m going straight for the lake. Stay on target, I murmur to myself in some sort of Star Wars flashback. Stay on target.
Oddly, I get to the lake and I turn right. I do not drive into the drink. Anyway, there were houses in the way. They would have stopped me.
I go past some beautiful church-like stuff on my right, but I figure this just didn’t look right. I keep driving. And driving. My GPS is saying, “Make a U – Turn.” So I figure it must have been that church looking place.
But there was no one in the parking lot. And it was ten to seven. Seems odd.
Wait a minute, I think. Nikki said 7:00 p.m., I think! If it were 7:30, I’d be 40 minutes early. I did it! I found the place. In fact, the approach was so gorgeous I decided to pull out my new digital camera and snap a shot of the exterior.
As I get out of the car, I see signs for the “Seminary Theater.” That’s got to be it, I think. Then I see a little sheet of paper taped below the sign. “This way to the Talent Show.” That’s odd, I thought. Usually, they call these pageants, but whatever.
I walk in and another sign says go in elevator to Talent show. Third floor for Talent Show. Well, I think, they certainly have enough signs.
The place is like a hundred years old. The lights are dim and I slowly step down the hallway under these unshielded bulbs of maybe 30 watts a piece. Prerecorded rap music is playing at the end of the hallway. This should be interesting, I think. Never saw someone “rap” for their talent.
No one is manning the ticket table. I pat myself on the back, again, for being so early. I seek out one of the ladies at the refreshments booth. They seemed very surprised to see me.
That’s when I look around and notice I’m the only white guy in the place. Heck, I’m the only guy.
It’s starting to sink in. This is why they call it being thick.
“Uh, is this the Thomas More Auditorium?”
“No.”
“Do you know where it is?”
“No. We could probably find somebody.”
I look at my watch. Five to seven.
“That won’t be necessary. Do you have a corner in which I can curl up and have a good cry?”
They just look as I quickly make for the door.
FIVE MINUTES! How am I going to find a place that I have no address for in FIVE MINUTES!
Can’t wait for the elevator. Gotta hurry. Here’s the steps. Wait a minute, no lights on in here. No, no, gotta hurry. Got to get moving. Steps are all the same. Don’t need lights. Even though this is building I’ve never been in before. And every floor seems to list to the left. And it’s excruciating dark already . . .
Ever try to walk down steps in the dark? Well, before you criticize me on this, you ought to try it. Particularly if the landings are unusually, well, shallow.
That’s right. Walked right into the wall. My response? Instead of the usual, “Owie!” or “Not the face!” was just, “Well, I guess I have some writing ahead of me.”
Rubbing my schnoz, I emerge from the building AND STILL NO ONE is in the parking lot. That talent show must be at eight or something. Why am I even wondering? I have like three minutes left. And at pageants, they don’t play coming attractions and Mountain Dew ads before the show.
I hop into the Red Rocket (yeah, that’s the car) and I just shake my head. Now what? Well, on the way here I went past KK. Why don’t I just drive the length of it in St. Francis? That was the best I could do at this point.
That’s what I did. One or two blocks from where I crossed KK, was a huge lit sign “Thomas More High School.” I’m swearing under my breath, “What’s up with Google not having that &@$! thing?” What’s more I’m following other cars back to a parking lot…this has GOT to be the place!
People are still arriving, so even if I’m late, I shouldn’t be too bad. It was only 7:05. I’d just sneak in the back . . .
Just bought my ticket. It reads 7:30 on the ticket face. Hmmm. Guess I didn’t need to rush quite so much, did I?
The lady selling the ticket asks, “Who are you here for?”
I look at her and mumble, “I guess the groom.” I think I’m preconditioned. She thought I was trying to be funny. In reality, I think I bonked my head more than I thought in that dark stairwell.
“And how many?”
I look around. There is no one within 20 feet of me. I hate this question. When I’m at the movies. When I go out to eat. Everytime, the admission question becomes a personal affront to my lifestyle. “One,” I say quietly. In today’s society, being a party of one is just a shave better than full on leprosy. I wonder if any of those pageant queens will ever adopt a platform of “Stop the persecution of the alone.” I’ve finally grown into being comfortable with always being alone and yet that persistent question.
Rant over.
I find my seat and I get the camera ready. It’s my new Canon PowerShot SD110 3.2MP Digital Elph with a 2x Optical Zoom with a 16Mb SD card standard–I upgraded to the 256Mb…I’m geeking out a little now, right? Sorry. Tell me to stop when that happens again.
Anyway, I figure this will be a great test for it. Dark auditorium and I’m back in the H row, so that’s a good 60-70 yards from the action I figure. Well, feet maybe. I dunno. I was getting all prepared for metric and we never went and now I can’t judge distances. Darn 70s. They should have never said that to us kids.
Rant over.
So I turn on the camera and note the “LOW BATTERY” icon. Oh, no! Not at the beginning. I figure I can sneak three or four shots, maybe. So I shoot two and notice it taking a while to recharge. Better save the battery.
I put the camera away and that’s when I hear the host announce the swimsuit competition. GADNABIT! My camera is out of commission!
By the way, the swimsuit competition is far too short. I just thought I’d mention this. I’m thinking you could budget, oh, let’s say 30 minutes or so for this. It would give the young ladies time to change into their outfits for the talent portion as it takes time to get through all the ladies in the suits.
Just thought I’d make the suggestion. I was enjoying the presentation immensely. The guy next to me had some sort of 500 power telescopic lens on his camera and ate up two rolls of film during the 20 seconds that competition seems to take.
During the talent, we had singers, dancers, a young lady played flute and then we had one young woman that was an art major and drew a picture of Jim Morrison to the Doors tune “Light my Fire.” They were all very talented young people.
During intermission, I met one of the young ladies that will be on my show in the near future and we took a few pictures that turned out just fine. This was good, because everything I took of action up on stage–what little I chanced–was pathetic. The flash just didn’t travel all that distance–traditional or metric.
We get to Nikki’s goodbye speech and she absolutely floors me by mentioning me by name. That was really something. She’s such a class act.
I attempt to take a photo as she’s taking off the crown, but the flash won’t recharge. Then when she takes it off, she holds the crown out for all to see. However, I’m messing around so much with the camera, I just see her move the crown out and I figure, “Holy Christmas! She’s going to throw the tiara into the crowd! Just like a Brewers game.” Luckily, Nikki’s relations with about 20 really large cousins is in front of me, so I’m not frightened I’ll get beamed with it. Either way, I flinched. The camera dude next to me snickers and continues snapping away.
I did squeeze off one more photo. I probably have juice for just one more. They are about to announce the new Miss St. Francis . . . and . . . my . . . battery . . . dies.
Okay. That just isn’t right.
Anyway, the night was great. I did find the place and saw some great entertainment. Nikki mentioned me in her farewell speech and she saw I was there. Sure, they sneaked the newly crowned Miss St. Francis out the back door like the President amid Secret Service so I couldn’t invite her on the show…but it was a great night as it was.
I figure, why try my luck?
Captain Catastrophe
P.S. I’m going to the Wheel & Sprocket bike show next week to get a new bike. Any suggestions? (And a helpful suggestion–not something like upping my insurance.)