Actually this happened in front and center of the whole scene. Requested by Hans.

AHQ was on tour in Catlett, VA, I don’t remember when. We love Catlett, we always have a wonderful time there. I’m still rather bitter that Tapestry ’05 went there without me.

Anyway, we were singing in the conference wing of the Choice Books building. They had set up a sound system in there and packed the place out. The sound was fairly robust, it wasn’t bust-your-eardrums by any stretch of the imagination, but it wasn’t quiet either.

At that time we were usually opening with “Keep in the Middle of the Road,” which has a nice loud and high tag. We came to the end of the song and while we were hanging there crushing that last chord, I noticed a kid sitting down front. He was around 6 years old, had red hair, and was shifting around in his seat with his head cocked to the side while grimacing and PLUGGING HIS EARS!!

It was all I could do to maintain my quarter of that last chord. I came perilously close to just busting up laughing right then and there!

The church at Catlett has a wonderful tradition. Whenever they have a group or choir in for special music, at the end of the program they take a few requests from the crowd and have the group do a few of their songs again. That night one of the requests was “Keep in the Middle.” I couldn’t help it, so I told them the story of the kid plugging his ears. I think they liked the story about as much as I did!