Open, Open

The hat's about to make its third appearance on this blog in what will feel like as many weeks. I assure you I actually wore it over something like 5 weeks. But hey - when you spend a whole $10 on a hat in Chinatown, you want to make sure you get your Alexander Hamilton's worth. That, and it's been a few shakes too long since I had my hair done. People are beginning to ask when I put the dark in my hair.

All that to say... my hat and I joined our dear friend Kimber for - oh, you know - the US Open Women's Final. I know! This hat of mine has really great friends.

Kimber's uncle kindly gave her tickets to several games, and in a rapid succession of ufortunately/fortunately, wherein Kimber's husband Brett had to work (unfortunately) and I did not (fortunately), I happily accepted the invite.

It did make this the second Saturday night in a row that I ditched Noah for great tickets (Wicked lotto tickets the weekend before with Megan), but it meant Noah was able to catch up with our good friend, Jake, to go see some manly movie I would have refused to see (so manly, in fact, I have forgotten what it was).

I'd never been to a professional tennis match before, so this was a fun first. It was amazing to see really great tennis up close. It's so impressive to see a strategy on the court with the actual talent to execute on that strategy. Placing shots with such precision and control is how I win tennis games in my dreams - I win them in real life with dumb luck and the fact Noah's first serve is powerful, but rather unreliable.

Since it was the championship game, we also got to hang around for the trophy presentation, Clijsters' cute little girl on the court and Mary Carillo's slightly awkward interview with Zvonareva. "So. You didn't win..."

The real highlight of the evening was getting to spend time with this sweet gal. Kimber and I randomly decided to go on a run together one Saturday afternoon and we were fast friends from there. It's not hard to enjoy time spent with this beautiful, bright, driven girl - except that it can make your head hurt trying to figure out how she's managed to fit so much living and so many accomplishments into so few years.

And let us not forget the singing of our national anthem from none other than Chaka Khan. I admit I didn't even realize this is who Chaka Khan was. Of course I've heard the name (you don't get a Cold Stone grab-and-go creation named after you without a little name recognition), but it wasn't until a) she sang that I realized she was a singer and b) I decided to include this photo that I looked her up and learned she's the one responsible for "I'm Every Woman."

Oh yeah, totally stuck in my head now. And I couldn't resist getting it stuck in yours, too.