The date nights with Mrs. Blather have been too rare for several months now owing to the twin pressures of book deadlines and financial austerity measures. You know, like the wise financial austerity measures our government has put in place to get the skyrocketing budget deficits under control. {pause for hysterical laughter}{additional pause for weeping)

All the Female Offspring Units had babysitting gigs last night so we decided to break out of our rut and head in to downtown Ft. Worth to try a new restaurant. After a fine meal, we decided to walk around the Sundance Square area which on most nights is alive with lights, live music, and pedestrians.

We heard music in the distance so we followed the sound to a large bandstand surrounded by a throng of several thousand 45-to-55-year-old black women seemingly having a wonderful time. We asked a bystander who the band was and learned  it was The Bar-Kays–a group we both instantly recognized as a 70s B-List funk/R&B band that occupied a branch on the pop music family tree somewhere between Parliament and the Ohio Players.

They brought the funk. Which is a good thing. There’s nothing worse that throwing a party and having the guy who was supposed to bring the funk show up empty handed. (Can I hear a “Good God ya’ll.”)

Aficionados of 70s-era funk will recall that The Bar-Kays gave us timeless classics such as “Freak Show on the Dance Floor” and “Shake Your Rump to the Funk.” We listened for a while but moved on after nearly being injured by a couple of large women who were obviously taking the rump shaking exhortation to heart.

In other words, it was a great date night.