Diamond is a girl's best friend

Most of the time I wonder why anyone would want to be my friend, much less read my random blog. But then I do something so blow-your-delicate-mind awesome, that I can't imagine why everyone isn't flocking to be my Be-Fri.

Like when I went and saw Neil Diamond in concert on Saturday night, fulfilling a lifelong dream and most 55-year-old white women's fantasy. (Sorry mom, accidentally your demographic.)

As the concert began, my heart was so full of love for Brother Love himself that I could hardly breathe. He pelted out some great favorites, like "Sweet Caroline," "Forever in Blue Jeans," "I am ... I said," and "Love on the Rocks."

Unfortunately, he played some new material (yawn). And he played so many songs with a strong Southern Baptist flavor that Dave's coworker and I had to agree that he must be a "Jew for Jesus." Also, despite my familiarity with Mr. Diamond's repertoire, I wasn't aware that ALL his songs can be summed up in the following words: "I'm a lonely 67-year-old man who misses New York and craves the attention of drunk women."

And I must admit that the cheese factor was more than I had anticipated and craved. There was a vignette performed for "You don't bring me flowers," which was a bit much even for my campy tastes. And by the third singalong of the last refrain of "Sweet Caroline," I was wishing I had to use the restroom.

But the best part of the whole night was watching a young, black usher watching the whole spectacle with such a puzzled grimace on his face. I'm sure he was wondering why a bunch of old, white women were shaking their things to a bunch of songs he'd never heard. I half felt embarrassed to be part of such a shameless display of cheesiness, and half wanted to indoctrinate him into the Gospel of Neil.

I went up to him afterward and asked him if it was the worst night of his life.

"No," he said, "Those last two songs weren't so bad." (Referring to two songs from his new album that had a strong gospel feel.)

"And that one song is on that Disney show - 'That's so Raven.' That's cool!"

Aw, Neil. You can sway even the toughest critic.