For the first time in ninety-three tries I wished for any old rendition of Moondance. I would have at least enjoyed a power nap. But this time the entertainment featured a reject from society that found a way to avoid homelessness. Shunned from all cliques, by all critiques, discouraged by teachers, parents, peers and friends honest enough to blurt out that the road to success for him was through the great practice of accounting, our band leader that night must have vowed sometime around his seventeenth birthday that he would show them all what talent really was. To Vegas: doors all closed. "Go farther west and get a job for Christ's sake." He earned twenty dollars a day and a run through the caterer's table as an extra in Hollywood. I'm guessing there was a failed career in sales at the music store. Still, he dreamed and through hard work and perseverance and with all opportunities at fame well over the horizon, Bobby Martin formed a band. Well, maybe he talked his brother-in-law into letting him sit in on a few late-night sets in some back-alley brewery. And when that failed, the bullshit soared and the con was on. Bobby talked other aspiring artists to join a new ensemble and from the toils of the lowly bar mitzvahs and junior high school graduations, Bobby Martin and his big band set out to make a statement and it was at this wedding the first steps to pure stardom would begin.

As we sat poking through another bland Caesar's salad, Bobby strapped on a dime store copy of the Phantom's mask and started swooning to imaginary chandeliers and divas named Christina. The years of frustration and denial boiled in Bobby's blood while those of us privileged to occupy Table One hunted around for another basket of rolls. The three backup singers rolled their eyes while they endured Bobby's plea to "think of me" hoping that the food remained on the tables instead of being launched toward the stage. At the climactic moment, Bobby shook his fist toward the heavens with pressed veins in his neck resembling upside down lightning bolts. Chicken or beef, asked the waiter.

Bobby, now in full carpe diem mode and feeling he had captured the audience for g