The Lemon Drops Helped

Thanks to everyone for their support on Friday, whether you wished me good luck in spirit, through a text, showed up and hung out watching from the sidelines or made awesome signs out of construction paper that was bigger than your head! And major props to our waiter who told everyone my number when handing out the voting slips. Half of my siblings showed up. My aunts and uncles were there. My sister Theresa made the signs I requested. My mom's political friends were lured in thinking there was another meeting about equal karaoke rights. The girls I nanny and their 'rents were right there in the front row with signs and smiles. My Daddy gave me a rose and a pep talk before I went up. My grandma said even though she couldn't hear me sing, she knew I did well because she watched everyone else's reactions. People took off work, stayed out late, dropped their other plans, ate up a Friday night. There was a lot of love in the room last Friday for Tam, and it wasn't just the knee high boots and short dress. It was so nice of everyone to come out for lil' ole me.

It was so fun to perform! I wasn't as nervous as the first time (the lemon drop shots prob helped) and there were so many people there that came out to cheer me on that it just felt like a karaoke party or something. I saw all the people in my performing group again and most everyone seems to be friendly (while some other's claws are out a little). I even met some people from the other performing groups.

I was intending to do Hit Me With Your Best Shot and practiced it all week, but I waited too long to register and someone signed up with it before I did. While they did say I could still sing it if I wanted to, I felt like not only would that be disrespectful to the person who chose it first, but it would also be unoriginal on my part. So I decided to sing Hurts So Good on the fly. While my performance wasn't the best I could have done, I was one of the louder ones! I can't gauge how well I did by applause because my mother invited everyone she knew. In all honesty though, I had some strangers come up to me to tell me they truly thought I did a great job.

The last performance before the semi-finals will be March 20th at The Oasis (formerly P.I. Nights) on West Lake Rd and Kelso Drive by Waldameer. My mother, because it IS my mother, has already reserved seating for 25 on a raised platform area. Out of the 12 that are left in my group, they are eliminating only 2, so I am very hopeful I'll at least get to the semi-finals. If that happens, it's a whole different ball game since all the remaining contestants (40 of them) will be cut in half for the final in May.

However this all turns out, I know I will just be happy I finally did it. It's not just because I am a person who gives credit where credit is due (Stephanie, Laurie and Devin should be at the finals), but because I am not a person that wishes harm on someone else just so my life is easier (unless you were that jerk who cut me off on Parade Street today). I am not exactly a competitive person, except at board games, and I always feel horrible when someone is cut. But if we all made it to the semi-finals, we'd be looking at a twelve hour night of karaoke with only one rotation.

I think I just described my hell.