Pat Hillis: The bartender asked us "Where are you going?" ..And this we told him& "To a cocktail party at the King Edward hotel given for the Canadian Songwriter's Hall of Fame awards"...It sounded so cool !!! It was even cooler when we (Catherine and I) got inside the hotel (around 6pm) and the smiling faces at the media desk allowed us entry when we said we represented the Joni Mitchell website. The King Edward hotel is very grand and its foyer, over the course of the evening, graced the presence of Measha Brueggergosman, Herbie Hancock, Sylvia Tyson, Kim Stockwood and James Taylor, to name a few.. Click, Click, Click...we had our cameras at the ready, and it was fabulous to be there in the capacity of "media" because I felt that sometimes those celebrities actually posed for us. Joni was nowhere to be seen. However, over 2 hours after we arrived, a buzz started happening and suddenly she appeared...she whisked around the reception desk (the entrance we had taken to get in) and quickly walked down the red carpet to the banquet hall, alongside a tall man. I clicked my digital at the first chance of her in the viewfinder and thought that I had missed her because there were a few heads and big camera lenses in the way inside this triangular space I had&however, when I looked at the display, there she was, and I said to Catherine "I got her!"...

Catherine: WELCOME RECEPTION --

I've just got back from the Canadian Songwriters' Hall of Fame welcome cocktail party at the King Edward Hotel (after stopping for a pint at P.J. O'Brien's with my partner in crime, Pat.)

Joni did show up, but at the very last minute, just as the inductees and guests were about to head from the lobby cocktail party to dinner.

We had been milling about taking pictures of various celebrities and wondering who many of them were, and wondering if it might be time to just leave, when there was a bit of a buzz and hum and hotel people asking us, very kindly, to step back behind the velvet rope. We lined up with camera people and photographers from various media with cameras at the ready, when Joni whirled in, accompanied by a very tall man,walked very quickly down the corridor, stopped very briefly to smile and wave and then continued on to the dining hall.

I was about to take a picture as she passed by, but her companion was between her and the cameras and then someone else stepped in between them, so I lost my chance. Pat was able get a picture on her digital.

That was my Joni moment for the evening.

We did see James Taylor, David Clayton Thomas, Sylvia Tyson, Measha Brueggergosman and Herbie Hancock. All of them were interviewed by Rosey Edeh for ET Canada. I did get a chance to ask Rosey if she would be interviewing Joni, but she said that, unfortunately,Joni wasn't going to be doing any interviews.