| Kurt had stayed at the Monte Carlo a couple of years before and knew of an interesting brew pub within the hotel. He suggested we meet there for dinner before going to the concert, "just" across the street. This brew pub, known simply as the Monte Carlo Pub and Brewery, brews all of it's own beer on site and is apparently the only micro brewery in the area. The beer was very good (did the pale ale mostly), and although I only ordered a Caesar salad, the serving was so big I could only eat about 1/3 of the thing. The girls finished up and went to shop at a dress store across from the pub while Kurt and I drank another beer and talked about Steely Dan and how excited we were to be seeing them that night. It started getting to be show time and we weren't very successful in getting the girls away from their shopping, so we gave them their tickets and told them to meet us at the show. Kurt bought a big can of Fosters to tide him over until getting to the venue. We got to our seats with Michael McDonald, the warm up act, halfway through his set. It sounded great and Kurt and I were feeling good. The girls joined us a couple of songs before Mike McDonald finished up. Between acts the sound system played nothing but fabulous, rootsy, dub-style. Tee and I quickly took notice. When Steely Dan took the stage I was feeling better than I had in a long time; just in time. We had good seats about a dozen rows up and off to the right of the stage. Steely Dan busted out an amazing set of tunes which Kurt attempted to note on his Blackberry throughout the show. We all danced and sang and had a generally raucous time. Kurt kept giving high fives to some people behind us who seemed somewhat annoyed at all of the dancing going on around them. It was quite funny. Here is the set list Kurt jotted down during the show, and anyone who knows anything about Steely Dan can imagine how great they sounded. As the encore started I walked up to where I spotted some empty seats on the 2nd row up against the aisle. The security girl at the front pointed me into one of the seats when I told her my tickets were actually for several rows up but I wanted to sit close now that the show was near the end. I was really excited to be so close to Donald Fagan during those last couple of tunes. I consider him to not only be one of the truly great musician/song writers of my lifetime, but to also be perhaps the coolest dude on the planet. The last time I saw Kurt was when he walked right passed me near the front of the stage. I called out to him, but he didn't hear me. After the show Anne called him to see where he was. Kurt was lost in the casino and probably looking to have a beer. Anne said she would meet him later, and in the meantime the girls went with me to the casino floor at the Aladdin and watched me loose a couple hundred bucks in about 15 mins at the craps table. ________________________ |