Playin' in the Parking Lot

We used to have a "Walking Club" in the company that went for two 20-minute walks a day -- some for losing weight, some for keeping their cardiologists happy (ahem), and some just to get out of the building a bit. At one time there were 10 or 12 of us, but it's dwindled down to, well, just me.

To keep myself occupied, I started bringing my cheap electric guitar with me, plugged into a little battery-powered headphone amp. I can hear it fine but it makes almost no noise externally, so I can walk and play and not bother anybody. And not embarrass myself, except of course for the general embarrassment of walking around the block playing an electric guitar like a crazy person. But I've gotten over that, and the extra playing time every day has noticeably improved my playing. Besides, once you're over 50, who cares anymore? When somebody asks, I make a little joke about needing to get me one of those new-fangled iPods so I don't have to do all the work...

Anyway, just before the company shut down for Christmas, I was walking back through the parking lot, and a car pulled up next to me and stopped. It was the ultra-sweet, gramma-like H.R. lady, and she rolled down the passenger window and said "Play me something!"

I'd had to take the headphones off to hear her talking, so they were already in my hand. I mumbled something about it only plays through the headphones, and before I knew it, I had handed them to her. I'd been running through "Jolly Old Saint Nicholas", so I started it up, more as a demonstration of how it worked than anything, but since I had the key in my head already, I started singing it, even though I couldn't hear the guitar anymore. (I *presume* I was singing in the same key as I was playing in.)

I ran through the first verse, and she said, "That was *wonderful*!", and handed me back the headphones. Then, "Merry Christmas", etc., and off she went. I was like, whoa, what just happened? But I put the headphones back on and finished my walk.