I'm getting old

On Aug. 9, 1975, a young woman in Orange, Calif., gave birth to her second child.

Nearly 34 years later, that child realizes that 1975 was a long time ago, and he's getting older by the day.

I'm turning 34 in a little more than a week, and while I don't exactly feel bad about that - I realize I hit the wall a few years ago - it's still a little bit of a shock that I'm getting up there in age. I mean, I used to think 34-year-old athletes are over the hill, still do, and sometimes I'm shocked when I come across an athlete in, say soccer or baseball, that I perceive to be old and washed up only to realize that he is a year or two younger than me. That's pretty sad.

Anyway, to try and celebrate the passing of another year I'm having a birthday party. Originally, I wanted to have some fun with it. I was going to have it somewhere with karaoke and have all of my guests sing at least one karaoke song, but while that is a fantabulous idea, the thought of having nobody show up for fear of singing in public was apparently too much for me to handle.

Instead, karaoke is optional (boo!). Mrs. LB put on the invitations for the guests to not bring presents because I want to get together for some fun, not to collect presents, but I did toy with the idea of giving guests the option of buying-out their karaoke performance by bringing a small gift. Instead, I nixed that too. If people want to bring gifts, fine, but that's not a requirement. Neither is karaoke, sadly.

However, I will take the lead and sing at least one karaoke song in an attempt to get others to join me. Now, I'm not the most outgoing person in terms of getting up in front of a crowd and being the center of attention. In fact, I'd just as soon not be in front of a crowd like that. But I have a strange fascination with karaoke. I've only done it once but it was fun. I guess it's cool to have fun with it, singing and all. I have a horrible singing voice so it's pretty cool to poke fun at myself every now and again.

Anyway, what I wanted to do was to have some blog involvement. I wanted my trusty readers to submit songs they'd like for me to sing karaoke to. I figure I'll open it up to suggestions and then put it to vote. Afterward, I'll sing the top vote-getter or two, record it and put it here on video for you all to see.

I don't have any ideas as to what sorts of songs to sing. The one song I sang was to my girlfriend back in '98, well, I think I was courting her at the time. Not sure we were together. I sang AC/DC's "You Shook Me All Night Long" to her. She was a bit mortified by it - mostly because I kept pointing at her while I was singing ("YOU!" LB points to mortified female friend "shook me aaaalllll niiiight looooong!!!!") - but it worked because we still talk about that night after 10 years of marriage.

So what you got for me?

Nominate as many songs as you like. I'll put up one of those voting polls next week and then we'll figure this karaoke thing out.