More Ramblings

First up -- the Faith Hill Ellen story.

When I was in New York City a couple of weeks back, I was at our studios at Jazz At Lincoln Center. It's a big building, there's always a lot going on that I have no idea about, and I don't particularly know my way around.

So my buddy Harriet pops in to see me one day, and we were walking around the building, and she comments on all the people wearing "Ellen" credentials. I had been riding the elevator all day with people loading in gear for something, but I hadn't particularly paid attention to what. Then I notice that some of the gear cases laying around are marked "Ellen." That was Wednesday.

So Thursday, I walk into a big area that has a lot less equipment in it than the day before, and I notice the big monitor up on the wall. It's an in house camera, turned on in the theater where Broadway Meets Country was done. Beautiful room with a gorgeous looking out over Columbus Circle, and the South West side of Central Park. And on the "stage" area they are building a set with a desk and chairs. Ellen's set. They were still putting the stage together as I left the building that afternoon around 2 (headed to get pizza.)

So as I'm handing my visitor's badge back in to the security, I tell him I'm done for this trip, headed back to Nashville in the morning. And he says "You aren't staying for the tomorrow's big tapings?" Umm... that would be a big no, my big day was that day. (CMA Nominations / Chesney Show.) Ellen, Schmellen.

So fast forward to Friday morning and through the email comes a press release from Warner Brothers that Faith is in NYC and going to debut her single on Ellen. Hello, she was going to be just down the Hall from the XM studios, and I didn't even know it. Missed opportunity there!

Anyway, that's my "almost" brush with Faith.

I also have a completely un-related story to share about how the other half lives. My daughter, who's 10, cheers for the 5th grade football team at her school. She's in a private Christian school, partially because we wanted her to have that small, safe environment here in the big city, but also partly out of necessity, based on the high population of immigrants in the area we used to live in -- I wanted her to go to school with children who spoke English, not who had to be taught to speak English.

At any rate, the school she's at, which is a very good school academically, is very much a working class private school. No porche's in the parking lot or superstar parents. The biggest celeb I've seen in the carpool lane is the Warren Brothers' tour manager -- and I only know him because they had that reality show for like, 10 minutes.

Anyway -- last weekend our team played at what I knew was a very nice, larger, private school. I knew it must be nice because I knew Alan Jackson's daughter's go there. You might recall a year or so back, he auctioned off a car to donate the money to the school.

Let me tell y'all -- that school does not appear to need charity. There are ivy league colleges that aren't that nice. Pristine. Immaculate. They had shuttle buses just to transport parents from the parking lot to the football field, which was like a 3 minute walk. It was nice to see how the rich and famous educate their children.

Their football team kicked our ass too.