Karaoke

When I first heard this word, "Karaoke," I thought it was some kind of exotic food. A special fish dish to be exact. My sister had told me about it because it was the new "thing" down at the "R Bar." She explained that it was a microphone hooked up to a screen or television that had subtitles running along the bottom of the screen to remind you the words of the song if you should happen to forget what they were. "How do they decide what song to play?" I asked.

"That's the GREAT part," she squealed. "YOU pick the song. They have tons and tons to pick from."

Now at this point I grew a little concerned. The fact that my sister, now in her mid thirties, was so excited about this "karaoke" thing kind of creeped me out. I had never been the brazen kind. I mean for God's sake I shook like I had a seizure disorder when I walked down the aisle at my own wedding! To take the stage and sing, while completely sober, didn't seem to be the thing for us to be doing. Spending quality "sister" time never meant shaking your bootie on a stage while singing an old Bon Jovi song....did it? However, my sister was very convincing and I found myself down at the "R Bar" along with the town's finest.

The place was packed and we had to wait awhile for our turn. I let my sister pick the song. I got my not so skinny after giving birth to kids butt up on that stage and waited for the music to roll.

"It's raining men...hallaleujah, it's raining men ah ah ahhhh," came blasting out of the speaker. In her infinite wisdom and celebration of her newly divorced self, she had picked a Pointer Sisters song. What could I do? Throwing caution to the wind, I shook out my hair, put my glasses on top of my head, started shaking whatever I had that still moved and sang into that microphone like it was a hot line to heaven. To top it all off, I did this COMPLETELY SOBER. The song drew to a close and with a final giration of the hips, both of us took our bows from a suprisingly boisterous audience and came off the stage.

"Wasn't that fun?" panted my sister.

"It was!" answered. " But it is definetly not something I want my husband to see me do. It might give him ideas!!!" Sis just laughed and headed up to pick out another song for our next round. Seems as though Karaoke went from being a special fish dish, to a singing sensation, to a sister's bonding night. I think I like the last one the best.