Three years ago, my daughter, Christy, and I went to New Work to celebrate her birthday. We saw Wicked on Broadway, and both of us went nuts. (For those of you who are scratching your head and saying, “What’s Wicked?”, it’s the story of the Wicked Witch of the West and Glinda, the Good Witch, back when they were young and college roommates. And it’s my all-time favorite Broadway musical, even more than Phantom!)

So finally, Wicked is coming to Salt Lake City in April! Naturally, Christy and I want to go for her birthday at the end of April, so we’ve been making plans to get tickets as soon as they go on sale. Which was this morning. At 8:00 a.m. they went on sale in person at the box office, and at 10:00 a.m. they opened up the telephones and the Internet for sales. They warned that Internet buyers should go ahead and create their login ID so they wouldn’t have to waste time doing that when we want to buy. Since I’m in Kentucky at the moment, I did that days ago.

People started lining up at the box office yesterday. Camped out in the FREEZING cold all night. Started buying tickets at 8:00 a.m. The radio starts reporting that there is a lot of foot traffic in the theater area downtown today.

At 5 minutes before 10:00 I start trying to sign on to the Internet. Can’t get the website to pull up. I call Christy. With both of us trying, she finally got on the website, but it kept freezing when she tried to get the tickets. All this time, I’m trying over and over, and all I get is, “That page cannot be displayed.” Lots of teeth gritting.

Then Christy says, “Maybe we should try to call.” So I start trying to call. Busy signal. Try again. Busy signal. Christy tries. Busy signal. All the while, still getting “That page cannot be displayed” over and over. Redial – busy. Redial – busy. Redial – busy. Major gnashing of teeth.

Finally Christy gets through on her cell phone, while I’m on her work line whining in her other ear. She gets a recording. (I’m still doing the Redial-busy thing.) She listens to a message, then is instructed to press 0. Does. The thing starts ringing. And ringing. And ringing. (And I’m still doing Redial-busy over and over.) It rings for twenty minutes. She tells me on her work phone, “I’ll call you back when I get through.” So I keep the Redial-busy thing going with one hand, and the Refresh thing going on the computer with the other hand.

Then I get an idea and Google Wicked tickets in Salt Lake, and I see that there are Wicked tickets available through other sites. I surf over – and there are a few tickets available. The scalpers have wasted no time. Within two hours of the box office opening, the $100 tickets are going for $316 apiece. Only nubs of teeth left by now.

Then Christy called. They picked up the phone! WE GOT TICKETS! We’re going to see Wicked on Christy’s birthday! YAY!!!!! By then maybe I’ll have dentures to replace the teeth I ground down to gum level.

(This is madness.)