Years of experience has taught me that the week before Thanksgiving — not this week coming up, but last week — is pretty low stress, unless of course you’re the cook, when you resurrect your Martha Stewart alter ego and get to work being Martha, thankful that Thanksgiving comes but once a year.
For the rest of us, who get to do nothing when it comes to Thanksgiving other than show up with a three bean casserole — that’s the stress-less week I am remembering. I did Martha for years, but now I do Homer Simpson — show up and eat.
That being the case, I had naturally thought this past week would be stress-free, the kind I like. Monday went according to plan. Then Tuesday I woke up to news that Van Morrison had announced he would play one show on February 17, 2026, in San Francisco. The announcement included a notice that a pre-sale would occur on Thursday, starting at 10 a.m. my time.
It’s not unusual for me to get on a plane to go see Van, so my immediate reaction was “Who’s kidding who, I’m in.” However, in all my years of seeing Van in concert (going back to the second Ice Age), I’ve never seen him in San Francisco, so this is a bucket list item. Right near the top.
The only downside: The tickets for the show were on sale through Ticketmaster, the definition of stress. If you are trying to buy a ticket the minute they go on sale — a procedure I subject myself to every time I buy a ticket to see Van — it’s a rough ride. You get on the site early, watch the clock count down, and at 0:00, the site bumps you off, and you have to start all over again, cursing like trooper. You get back on, and now the screen is telling you that no tickets are available, to try later. You think, how can this be, it’s only 10:04. Surely they can’t be sold out in four minutes. You persevere, keep refreshing the screen, and eureka, a screen comes up to say there’s a seat way off to the side; either that or up in the balcony, and you click on it, just glad to have a ticket, any ticket. This is the routine for a general public sale. There’s going to be a general public sale for this show, but not until Friday. I am aiming for the pre-sale on Thursday, and all signs look good. I have the password and I’m ready.
Thursday morning at 9:50, I’m at my computer, watching the countdown clock, and a couple of seconds after 10 a.m., the Ticketmaster screen tells me the sale is on. I click and get offered a ticket six rows from the front, dead center. I click on it, and it’s mine if I can pay and get authorized in the next seven minutes. Piece of cake. I shouldn’t have stressed out.
Not so fast. A few hours later, they announce the show has sold out and that a second show has been added on the next night. Tickets for the second show will go on sale on Friday. This time no pre-sale. That means I have to compete against the entire world.
I didn’t tell you that there are 960 seats in the theater. This is small for Van Morrison. He is popular in San Francisco, having lived there for years, so this second show is going to sell out just as quickly as the first. Thursday night, in anticipation of Friday’s sale, the Ticketmaster dread consumed me.
Friday morning arrives. I sign on to Ticketmaster with 15 minutes to go, as though the extra five minutes is going to improve my chances of getting a good seat. Despite skyrocketing stress levels, I like how optimistic I am that I will get a good seat, when reality is that at best I will get something in the back.
10 a.m. sharp comes, I click on the Buy button, and the dreaded circle of death appears on my screen. I watch it and wait, and wait, and wait, and finally, a box appears saying there are no tickets available in the quantity I have requested. Having requested only one ticket, I know this is nonsense and refuse to accept that answer. I go back and click Buy again, and this time, my screen shows the seating chart and which seats are still available. They’re all in the general area of my seat for the previous night, but today, they’re going for twice the price and then some. They’re called Platinum seating, designed for the rich, of which I am not. I keep refreshing the page, stressed to the max, hoping for a miracle, and with each refresh, I am sadly coming to the conclusion that I would be not be going to night two. Trying not to be too bummed out about it, I keep hitting refresh, because what else do you do when you are a Van Morrison diehard? You refresh. And there it was, unbelievable, an offer for a seat at the normal price. I was so flabbergasted at my good luck that I clicked on it without even looking where the seat was located. (I did look before purchasing, and think how pleasantly surprised I was to find it wasn’t in the back row.)
I was in! And just like that, the stress went down to three-bean-casserole level. That I won’t have to visit Ticketmaster for the foreseeable future calms me.
I mean, really. If Ticketmaster is going to hold a sale for Platinum people at exorbitant prices for the first 15 minutes, that’s fine, but would it hurt them to tell the rest of us that they’re holding a pre-sale for the wealthy, so don’t bother signing on at 10; wait until 10:15. Of course, they’d never do that. They don’t need to, and if their policy is to make ticket purchasing as stressful as they can make it, they’ll do it. Me complaining is never going to change it. I’ve long since known that if I want to see Van in the United States, I’ve got to put up with the stress — it’s all part of the Van Morrison package.
Today’s bill of fare is from Mark Knopfler with Van …
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