Sweet music

Sweet music

By Tom Guarisco | Also by this reporter

Saturday, April 1, 2006

The big live concert in Baton Rouge may be on life support, but there’s still great music to be heard, sometimes in the most unlikely of places.

Sure, Bono hasn’t been here in awhile, and when you say The Boss, it is summarily assumed you’re talking about the governor’s husband, Coach Blanco.

But just last month, I heard a piece of music that was just as memorable as any concert.

It was a Sunday afternoon, one of those days where the sky is clear blue all day, and at night the crisp air soothes your sun-warmed skin. … OK, I’m getting ahead of myself. The weekend actually started out a little bumpy. My family showed up on Friday evening to meet friends for dinner at a place that, for almost 15 years, I’ve considered home turf: The Chimes.

It’s where I met my wife, where I’ve spent countless hours arguing about movies, decisively solving political problems that stump mere professionals and discussing whether England will ever return to its 1966 World Cup glory. (I’ve never, however, attempted the beers-of-the-world consume-athon that earns you a chewing-gum sized plaque on the wall.)

Then, I showed up on this recent Friday. Children are welcome, some in our group insisted. But we knew better.

When you walk up to a hostess at a college restaurant with a rambunctious three-year-old in tow, you don’t get the Hi!-Welcome-to-my-college! vibe.

“It’s a 45 minute wait,” she said with a tone that didn’t try to hide her disdain for our judgment. Her eyes, which fell upon our perpetual-motion child, said something like, “You’re not bringing that thing in here, are you?”

It was at this moment I felt what a buzz kill it must be for a college kid to see grown-ups like us helplessly chasing a three-year-old.

Even though our group’s hipness quotient was surely boosted by the presence of my older daughter, who had just turned 18, our friends and our children at that moment represented the most clear and present danger to those innocent young people’s good time.

We ultimately found another place with no wait and where we did not sicken other diners.

By Sunday afternoon, my wife and I were chuckling about that evening. We sat for another meal out on Sunday afternoon with our young daughter (OK, so we’re gamblers). This time it was at Moe’s, on the covered patio. It is a child of the 80s demographic heaven, where young children roam free, disruptive, yes, but rendered harmless little wildebeests whose cheese quesadillas are still tasty when cold.

Dressed in a floral print Laura Ashley, our little peach danced the swirls and spins of a ballerina in spring, barefoot, with her eyes closed to the soul-stirring sounds of Jimi Hendrix’s Foxy Lady.

You’ve got to be all mine, all mine

Oooh, foxy lady

Yep, we were right at home.

(Tom Guarisco is 225 editor.)

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