DIAMOND IS FOREVER

Hello again, hello...

A picture speaks a thousand words, so I'll keep this post brief and just let you soak in this ultra-cool picture of Neil Diamond. I have tickets to see him play at MSG tonight, but Louise can't make the show 'cause of work, and nobody else I know seems eager to pay $70 to see a sexagenarian songbird serenade an audience with "I Am, I Said" while dressed in a 1970s gold-sequined outfit and a girdle to hold his gut in. Go figure. My plan was to get hammered with Louise and then see the show, but now I don't know what to do. Here are my options:

DARTMAN'S OPTIONS FOR THE NEIL DIAMOND CONCERT

1) Go to a homeless shelter and find someone who is a huge fan of THE JAZZ SINGER and JONATHAN LIVINGSTON SEAGULL and offer them 50 cents and three bottles of OLDE ENGLISH to go to the concert with me.

2) Get drunk at a TGIFriday's, put on my "Kentucky Woman" T-shirt, go solo to the concert and then wallow in depression throughout the show as I realize how pathetic it is to be alone, drunk, 33 and singing "Song Sung Blue" with a crowd that is basically twice my age.

3) Scalp the tickets and use the money to by a super-intelligent chimpanzee. We'll become instant best friends, I'll teach him to love Neil Diamond (and malt liquor) and we'll get drunk every night and listen to "You Don't Bring Me Flowers" over and over again until we pass out.

I don't plan on running tonight. I do plan on drinking. As for sleeping, I accidentally cut off my eyelids yesterday while trying to trim my lashes, so I don't think slumber (or blinking) is in the cards for me for quite a while.