Back in April, the Kennedy Center announced that it was going to give Bill Murray the Mark Twain Prize for Humor. I got it in my head that, gosh darn it, I want to go and see this. Why do all the hoity-toity types get to go to these kinds of galas and we peons have to stay home? So I thought about it and figured that if I join the Kennedy Center I’d have a chance to get the tickets early. Wrong. I was way down on the category of members who had a chance at the tickets. I logged in on the day they were to go on sale for me and I saw something like four seats available. I hit refresh and they were gone.
Undeterred, I decided to find the tickets on-line. Clickety clickety clickety and voila, I found them. The price was high, not exorbitant, so I bought them. Hey, it’s Bill Murray. I love that guy.
Bill is a Cubs fan and there was a great deal of concern that if the Cubs had to play a Game 7 on its way to the World Series, he was not going to show up. But the Cubs won and Bill came. He is there with his family in the balcony set off by the red curtain. We were sitting across from them so we could see every reaction he had.
Matt wore his black tie tux and I wore a gown. Boy, were we overdressed. I could not believe how casually people were dressed. Some people were in jeans. Whatever, I like wearing gowns. 
We had pretty good seats, way up in the balcony but no one in front of us, so we could see clearly.
There were stars testifying to Murray’s wonderfulness: David Letterman, Sigourney Weaver, Miley Cyrus (for God’s sakes, what a mess she is), director Ivan Reitman (Ground Hog Day), Jimmy Kimmel and others. Bill was funny. He was clearly uncomfortable getting an award. When he gave his speech, he was trying to understand why everyone said he was beloved and he wondered what that means. What it means is that we simply enjoy watching him do what he does best. We watch his movies, no matter what they are, because we find that in the end, he is interesting even if the movie may not be. So we had lots of fun and we saw Bill Murray get his prize.
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