Concert Choir Tour Day Five: It's only day five?

Aloha!

I never know how to start these posts.  This part of each post probably takes 25% of the total time it takes to write each one of these.  I try to pretend I am always in a sunny and happy mood, despite the muggy temps on the bus or the continuous flow of obvious questions from the boys.   Well…that worked pretty easily.

At the present moment, we are heading south into Dallas on 35W.  We’ve passed some pretty impressive sights so far here in Dallas, including the unbelievably enormous Texas Motor Speedway.  Unfortunately, only the staff really got to see it.  The boys are having their rest period at the moment.  Typically, I would strongly consider waking them so they could see such a sight, but knowing we will be coming back this way in a week or so, it was a little easier to pass it up this once.

The boys did very well this morning getting up and out of the hotel.  The original plan was to potentially go swimming in the morning, but we thought it would be cutting it a little close on time and elected not to attempt it.  All the boys needed to shower this morning because there just wasn’t time to last night after the game.  They also all needed to pack their belongings and eat at the great full breakfast buffet at our motel.  The BW we stayed at last night was great.  Very accommodating, very responsive with any needs we had, and the breakfast was first-rate.  I would certainly recommend them in the future.

UH-OH!  It JUST happened!  I didn’t want to say anything for fear of jinxing it, but somehow, someway, for some reason, it took until THIS moment in the tour for a boy to come-up and ask to go to the bathroom at an inopportune time.  Generally, this happens so early in the tour that we almost stop the bus in the Choir building parking lot and let them run in to go, but for some reason this year the bladders aligned.  Aaron and I wouldn’t even talk about it with Lisa for fear of jinxing it.  The only wood on the bus, an umbrella handle behind Rodney has been knocked more than an arrow at Choirboy Camp.  All was for naught though.  I’m sure ya’ll’d (yes, I just created my own word consisting of “you” “all” & “would”) like to know who the boy that broke the streak was.  Well, just assume it was yours.

Every year, the choir has a personality of its very own that differs from year to year based on the boys and the leadership involved.  I can’t recall a choir that gets along as well as this one has.  (Knock on the umbrella.)  There are the usual disturbances from mile to mile, but on the whole, they do very well.  I think the more remarkable aspect is the way they chose their rooming.  The older boys are very open to the idea of hanging-out with the younger boys.  This has maybe clouded the inter-choir hierarchy some, but I think it has helped to facilitate a more mature and relaxed choir than usual.  I like the direction this is headed and in the coming days I hope to work more with the leaders in the choir on honing their role in the organization to help it function better. 

We managed to get out of the hotel basically on-time.  We made a quick stop at the QT station to resupply our water.  You will be happy to know that we are going through a lot of water. This is already the second time we’ve had to buy water on the tour.  10 cases later, we were back on the road.  We put “How to Train Your Dragon” in the DVD player.  That was a petty cute movie.  The boys enjoyed it, mostly because it wasn’t educational like the others we have been watching. They are certainly in “school’s out for summer” mode, but we are good about tricking them into learning when we need to be.  Down the road, we also handed out the couple letters we had and the 20 or so emails we received in the past day.  We are down to only two boys that have no received a letter, so that is good.  I plan to contact those families today and let them know.  If you don’t hear from me, you’re not one of them.  J

We ate lunch at McDonald’s and that pretty much brings us up to now.  The weather is good and warm, but we aren’t going to dwell on that much.  The bus is running very well.  (Knock on the umbrella).  The boys are in generally good health.  (Knock on the umbrella).  The staff is in a generally good mood.  Things are going well.

I have a pile of receipts to make purchase orders for, so I need to end this for now.  Have a terrific Sunday, and KEEP those letters coming!  I will try to include some photos tonight if there are any good photo ops.

-PJ