Hey, pay it forward, Jack!

Last Wednesday night my brother, Ralph, and I trekked to the Buffalo Chip Campground in Sturgis for the Rob Zombie Concert.

I know what you're thinking: "What, Barry Manilow wasn't in town?" Believe it or not, despite no tattoos, no piercings and short hair, I've been known to rock in my day. And besides, Rob Zombie is only six years younger than me.

And of course, the tickets were free, which doesn't hurt. I scored four tickets (or wristbands) and picked Rob Zombie over Toby Keith, just on a hunch. I admit I haven't listened to a lot of Zombie, but I have listened to a lot of Alice Cooper and the two are friends (or fiends, if you will) and tour together at times. I had a feeling I would enjoy the show.

I was right. It was a great show.

But let's go back to before the base vibration nearly went through my chest. I had four tickets, but as it turned out, only Ralph and I could attend. After picking up our wristbands at the ticket office, I decided to wait in front to give away the other two. No sense of them going to waste. I thought about selling the other two, but only briefly. The two security guys standing there made it an easy decision not to.I could see the headline in the Rapid City Journal: "Journal sportswriter busted for scalping Rob Zombie tickets." Or better yet, "Former Journal sportswriter busted for scalping Rob Zombie tickets."


Instead, I thought about making the day of couple of concert goers in a non Dirty Harry kind of way. At first, I was thinking about giving them to two young, good-looking babes, but at 54 years old, I didn't want to hear, "Thank you sir, you remind me of my father."

So I waited for a nice-looking couple to pass them on to. It didn't take long and I approached them with the offer. It took a little while to explain and for them to understand that I just had two extra tickets and they were free.

"They're free?" said the man, shocked at the offer. "Yep," I countered. "Enjoy the show." The guy shook my hand like Granny Clampett seeing Cousin Pearl for the first time in several months.

I admit, that felt pretty good. And thanks to Shawn at Hits106 in Laramie for the chance to make somebody's day. You made mine.

I do admit that I had a bit of a selfish motive as well for giving the tickets away. The Powerball that night was about $448 million and in my best Uncle Si voice, I said to myself, "Hey, pay it forward, Jack!"

Well, I did match one number, so that's better than most Powerball tickets that I buy.

It still felt pretty good, even as I went to work broke as usual on Thursday.