My wife Sarah is a big fan of Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, so when they were booked to perform at the KFC Yum! Center in Louisville last Friday night, I knew clear back in December where I was going to be that night. At least it made Christmas shopping easy.

We arrived in Cardinal Country early Friday evening, snagged a decent parking spot in the garage and an over-cooked pretzel inside the arena. Luckily, we were able to venture down to the floor and to our seats before the large herds of people began filtering in, making trips down the aisles only possible when walking sideways.

As I tend to do, I spent a great deal of my time watching the crowd itself. In doing so, I left with two key observations.

My first observation—made even before entering the arena —is that we are shoving open the doors to summer here in Kentucky. I base that theory not only on the fact that I have now burned enough gas mowing my lawn so far this year to get me to Nashville and back in my car, but also based on the attire ladies in the audience were wearing. It is interesting to note that the place where we used to live in Nebraska was bracing for up to six inches of snowfall while this concert was going on.

My second observation is that even though seats for that concert were not inexpensive, a large portion of the audience experienced most of the show through the screen and camera lens of their cell phones. Since we were several rows back on the floor with many folks in front of us, that meant that I was able to witness my share of stage activity via phone screens as well.

In fact, I saw numerous people standing for periods of the concert with their backs to the stage holding their phone up in the opposite direction as they tried to score the perfect selfie while the show that they paid to attend rolled on in the background behind them. That is only a really expensive step or two away from the selfies I have seen from people inside a movie theater showing the world which movie they are attending.

We have reached the point at which it is imperative in 2017 to rush off and flood social media accounts with everything we do and everywhere we go. What concert we went to. Which game we attended. What we had for supper. Which shoe we tied first. How many times we blinked. And on. And on. And on…

Truth be told, I can’t imagine most people’s lives not being more enjoyable if they would put more effort into experiencing the world around them in a panoramic view, and less time trying to document everything through a tiny little screen for social media. I have lost too many pictures, sound clips, documents and assorted files over the years due to failed disks and drives. So for me, I’ll leave my phone on my side and let this little brain of mine store my memories for future enjoyment. If that hard drive crashes on me, all becomes irrelevant anyway.

As for the show itself, we (and most importantly, Sarah) had a good time at the concert. Musically speaking, neither Mr. nor Mrs. McGraw are really my cup of tea, but their band was really tight and their production was very entertaining. Bonus points were scored for the evening by the ease in which we escaped the parking garage. Making it home before the nasty storms rolled into the area capped off a fun and entertaining Friday night.

Derby Day is Saturday and I hope everyone has fun cheering on their pick!