My Gomez Adventure

I know I haven't blogged in awhile. I've been more about microblogging via twitter lately. Sometimes I just have a thought that is a single sentence.

Stefanie wants to read about my Gomez trip, so I'm writing it out here. The pic at left is me and Olly after the Milwaukee show. Could I be any happier? He was very nice, though this time I talked more to Blackie than Olly. I tried to get them to play Las Vegas Dealer, but no such luck. Blackie and I talked some about how a lot of the die-hard fans are sick of songs like Girlshapedlovedrug, but the larger crowds seem to love the song, so there's really no way it's going to be omitted from the playlist any time soon.

Sunday was Milwaukee. I drove there Sunday morning, had a little trouble with finding my hotel, but ended up alright. I had to change rooms initially and my duffel bag's shoulder strap broke and I discovered that I had left my cell phone charger at home, but none of that really mattered in the face of finally seeing Gomez again!

I had to walk RIGHT PAST the bus to go to the restaurant and I remember considering walking around the block so as to not appear to be a stalker. I was terrified that maybe they would be ON the bus and see me from the windows and think I was creepy. When I walked past the theatre, I could hear them playing for a sound check inside. The doors were locked from the inside, however, so I didn't even try to sneak in.

I met up with Dani and her husband Will, Kelly and Sarah at the restaurant. Susan, her friend Kat and Jen arrived later. We had a few drinks, ate a fabulous meal and went for the show. Most of the group wanted to sit in the seats, Kelly and I wanted to be in the area in front for dancing, so we went up there. Kelly and I decided to sit for the opening band, but as they were amazing, the dancing area was filling up so I went up front and leaned on the stage while the opener played. They were really good (and cute!). I talked to the keyboardist a bit as they were clearing the stage for Gomez.

Gomez came on and I was literally 3 feet away from Ben (no security bar here, unlike the Vic in Chicago!). Kelly came up and stood next to me, Sarah, Jen and Dani were behind us. The band was really good. I tweeted the set list and took some pics with my camera phone. I had given my regular camera to Kat (who was sitting in the middle back section) to try to take video of the show. Security stopped her a minute into the first song. About 2/3 of the way into the set, I got overheated and had to leave the front. It was either that or throw up all over the place (this time I made it much longer than Chicago so yay me). I got my camera back from Kat and sat down about five rows back from the front. I was able to take videos of about five or 6 songs. I loaded one onto youtube so far (win park slope). Jen left before the encore and after the show I bought the opening band's CD from the merch table. I talked to a few more of the members when I bought the CD as they were running the table. I met back up with Susan and Kat and we decided to go for a drink. Jen walked right past us, kind of without seeing us and didn't join us for the drink.

We went to this neat bar and stayed for about 30 minutes. Dani made me go over and have the guys from the opening band sign my CD. When we left the bar, the band still hadn't left. There was some misunderstanding so Dani, Will, Kelly and Sarah left. Susan, Kat and I waited around a bit and got to talk to Ben, Olly, Blackie and Ian. I never saw Tom come out of the backstage area (but I did see the opening band come out too). I told Ben, Olly and Blackie that I was going to see them in Louisville. Olly remembered me on sight (which was so cool). Ben said "Thank you" about 3 times for my traveling to see them, he seemed really touched that someone would go see his band in multiple cities. I got a picture with Olly. I don't know why I didn't get one with Blackie. Ian and I never talked. Olly told me he thought there was an in-store performance in Louisville, but he wasn't sure.

Monday, I drove to Hanover, Indiana, which is the middle of fucking nowhere. Jen called later that day and apologized for kind of blowing us off. She got sick from the alcohol. It was really sweet and unexpected. I really like her a lot.

I spent Monday with my college roommate and her husband in Hanover basically doing nothing because I was exhausted from Sunday and the drive. Tuesday we drove to Louisville and went out to lunch before I dropped them off at the airport. Janie and her husband Mike flew to London on Tuesday for a 10-day trip. I spent the afternoon with my college friend Terena. Went out to dinner with her and another friend John. We decided after dinner to play Risk in my hotel room. Risk was a popular game among my college friends. John and Terena in particular were highly competitive with each other. I was just happy to hang out with them. The time that we were together at Centre, I remember laughing so hard my stomach hurt on nearly a daily basis with my group of friends. It was exactly that way Tuesday night, we had so much fun!

About 11:30 that night, while we're still playing, the fire alarm goes off in the hotel. We went outside and the three of us found the whole situation hilarious while everyone else who had been dragged out of bed did not. A very drunk woman came up to me and kept saying, "Jesus. I'm sorry. Just in general." She had pulled the fire alarm and was later arrested for it. John, Terena and I found the whole situation hilarious. We went back to my room and the game was finally over around 2:30.

I slept until 1 and didn't get dressed until 3. I moved photos and videos from my camera to my laptop in the afternoon, then coordinated with Terena, Ryn and another college friend, Ryan (a girl named Ryan) for us all to go to the in-store. Ryan drove over from Lexington (90 minutes) to come hang with me and go to the concert. She had never heard of Gomez before, but she and I haven't seen each other since I graduated, so it was a nice reunion. Of course, this was also the first time meeting Ryn in person. We were late to the in-store so only heard 3 songs, but it was a good performance. I talked to Olly for 2 seconds after and then the four of us (me, Terena, Ryn and Ryan) went to dinner before the show.

The show in Louisville was great. There was a balcony and I decided to go up there because there was no place on the floor to really lean, no chairs to sit on, and I knew I wouldn't be able to stand for 2.5 hours. So I went up to the balcony and at various times one or two of my friends who attended with me came up. At one point, Ryn and I were up there. I sat down for the time between the opening band and Gomez. This young girl (like 23) came and stood in my spot against the railing of the balcony. Ryn was like, hello I'm holding this spot for my friend. The girl was like, "This isn't 4th grade, you can't hold spots." So, there was some arguing, I decided I would just go downstairs, so Ryn decides to follow me. We get halfway down the stairs and the girl left the area anyway, so we went back.

The balcony was along the side of the stage, not across from it, so I couldn't see Tom unless I leaned way over the railing. But the show was really good and they were more upbeat than they were in Milwaukee. I forgot to bring my extra camera battery so I was unable to take any video. I only got a few pictures before the battery was flashing at me, so Louisville was more about enjoying the music for me than capturing it for posterity. I bopped along in one place to most of the songs, but If I Ask You Nicely was one I really let loose too, which was great.

Close to the end, 2 people who had been closer to the stage left. I went over to their spot and took it so I had a great view of the stage. Then they started playing Detroit Swing and it was awesome! Lots of the people on the balcony were really into the show and were dancing. Not as many on the floor were as into it.

Unlike Milwaukee, the crowd was screaming for more between the last regular song and the encore. Ben came up on stage and said something like, "Wow. I guess you really like us!" which was awesome.

After the show, I had to sit down. I was drenched from head to toe. I was dancing right up to the end in Louisville, whereas in Milwaukee, I was standing still to take better video with the camera. Ryn got a set list and she and Ryan came up. I went down and asked Dave if there were any more setlists. He said no. I asked if there was anything else. He found one of Tom's guitar picks and gave it to me. It has a G Gomez logo on it, and I love it. I am obviously easily pleased.

We were one of the last people to actually exit the building. We're heading to the car and Ryn's kind of dragging her feet. Turns out she's never actually met the band. So we turn around and stand about 100 feet from the bus. There's no backstage at this venue, so they came on through a side door which was right next to their bus. They had the area blocked off with one of those "caution" tapes so we couldn't get closer to the bus. I asked one of the roadies, Jerry, if they were going to be coming out. He said if we waited they would come out, so we did. Tom came out after about 10 minutes. He was obviously EXHAUSTED but very nice. Ryan had a sharpie marker with her, so he used that to sign stuff for us and about 4 other people who waited. One guy had 2 set lists and I was like, that's not fair! And he goes, oh it's for my son. I was like...dude, your son isn't HERE. But I let it go. The only paper I had on me was the receipt for the tickets. Terena told Tom that I had come from Minneapolis, so he asked for my name and signed "To Charlotte, with love, Tom" and I was touched. He was really nice and posed for a few pictures. When he was done signing, he called the sharpie a stylo (asking "whose stylo is this?") which was just adorable. None of the other guys came out, but that's ok. Considering Tom has a reputation of occasionally being a dick, I was quite pleased with how nice he was. Especially for how tired he was.

Thursday I spent with my friend Kristy from high school. We sat out by the pool at my hotel and I got sunburned on my face, forearms and the tops of my feet. I went out to dinner with Terena and hung out with a couple other friends from college. Fortunately, they left early Thursday night and I just packed up and left the next morning around 8. I got home 12 hours later.

I didn't really get tired until about 3:30. Fifteen minutes later, a state trooper pulled me over. I was going 83 in a 65. I was in Wisconsin. They always give tickets in Wisconsin. BUT the trooper was really nice and only gave me a warning. He was really cute too. :)

Gomez is playing Des Moines, Iowa in July and I'm 90% sure I'm going to go see them. It's a Tuesday, so I'll probably do a half day at work, drive down (it's about a 3-hour drive which is nothing compared to the 12 hour one yesterday!), stay overnight and drive back the next morning and go to work in the afternoon. :)

Man, I love this band!

The last time I went to Kentucky (August 2005), I remember how good a trip it was and how nice it was to be appreciated as a person. I don't have any friends locally. I work, go home, go to bed, go to work, go home et cetera ad nauseum. With Gomez fans, I've met some amazing people and there's just this instant understanding. I get the same thing from my college friends and my high school friends. I hate being up here away from all of them. I was very sad to leave.

On the other hand, when I got home, the temperature was around 70 degrees compared to mid-80s with high humidity.

Maybe I'll visit in the spring next time...early spring.

I want to be a mom just so I can sing this song to my kids when they're potty training.

I also watched the movie "The Other Boleyn Girl" last night.

I didn't know that three mannequins were getting such high-profile movie roles.

I watched Wednesday's episode of Craig Ferguson last night. His only guest was Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Of course I knew who he was, but didn't know a lot about him.

He is an amazing man. The interview was enlightening and not your run-of-the-mill late night talk show interview. I highly recommend you watch each part:

Part One
Part Two
Part Three

He said one of the most profound things about the inter-connectivity of people. To paraphrase, he said that he wouldn't be human if he had not been connected to other people. He wouldn't know how to walk, talk or think if it weren't for other people. That had never really occurred to me. We are all connected, we are all human and we are all, at the core, good. I know, it sounds like some stupid mumbo jumbo new age crap, but I was pretty blown away by the entire interview.

It gives me hope for the future, oddly enough. We will get through this. I guess that means I have faith.

I watched Obama's speech last night. The first time I have ever watched a state of the union address that I can recall. It was really good (too much clapping, imho, but it's to be expected). Hell, I even teared up a few times when he started talking about how things are going to get better. I hope so. I really do.

The Republican "response" was a JOKE. I know I'm not alone in that. I actually gasped outloud when he commented that the government was wasting money in the stimulus package on "something called" volcano erupting. Um, WHAT? Really? THIS is what you find to be wasteful? I don't live anywhere near a volcano. I was only 3 when Mount St. Helens erupted but I remember it VIVIDLY. He went on and on about how "Americans can do anything." Yeah, a lot of us can, but there's a whole lot who can't.

You would think after the trouncing the Republicans got in the last election that they would try to figure out how to win their base back. The response speech shows that they are completely clueless as to how to influence people. The entire speech was purely pandering to the most rabid, non-critical-thinking people in this country. Even Fox News couldn't spin it as a good speech!

A friend of mine compared him to Kenneth the Page from the show 30 Rock, and I thought the comparison was apt. It is unfortunate that those with strong southern accents are automatically thought of as stupid or ignorant. I have quite a number of friends from the south, and the prejudice against southerners is something they have to deal with quite a lot.

I watched a documentary over the weekend that Nancy Pelosi's daughter filmed on the campaign trail with the Republican party in the last election. I was shocked at the unapologetic ignorance that so many displayed. Obama was right, a lot of those people cling to their guns and religion out of fear. It was quite an eye opener. It's not just the southerners that she highlighted. There was the infamous woman from right here in Minnesota who got national attention after calling Obama an "A-rab". Seemingly normal people just spewing such HATE towards people who live in cities, who don't go to the same church as they do, such ignorance of basic economics....

I have friends who are staunch Republicans, and I feel bad that those ignorant people get the most attention from the media as typical conservatives. I know that most people who identify themselves as conservative are not hateful people. I used to be conservative. Mostly because of the abortion issue (I'm Catholic), but for a lot of other reasons. I identified with the Republican party in my youth. I even voted for George W. Bush in 2000.

From the beginning, with the dispute over vote counts in Florida, and as the war in Afghanistan and Iraq spiraled out of control, and the corruption became so obvious and so many in the Bush administration were so...smug about their war profiteering, I knew I could never support such a party.

As far as the abortion issue, I just came to the realization that despite all their talk, there has never been any actual effort by the Republican party to ban abortion. They talk the talk but they never have walked the walk. This epiphany led to realization that whether abortion is legal or illegal, there will always be women who will want to, for various reasons, terminate a pregnancy. We can have those women have the option of the procedure performed by a trained professional in a sanitary environment, or we can have women get sick or die from botched procedures. So while I could not imagine a situation in which I would willingly have an abortion myself, my conscience cannot say that I should force my morals on someone else, or force women in bad situations (rape, incest, economic situation) to have the child anyway.

Ideally, no one would ever be raped, there would be no sexual abuse, and no one would ever have sex until they were in a committed relationship and both mentally and financially ready to have children. We don't live in an ideal world. Enough babies come into this world unwanted. I think the solution to the problem is education about effective birth control and the importance of waiting for sex until one is ready. I did some amazingly stupid things in college, I was lucky enough to have never been put in the situation of an unwanted pregnancy.

I was LUCKY.

So many women are not.

hello economic crisis

In the past six months, I have gone from a total news junkie to someone who completely avoids almost all semblance of real news.

I just hear so much crap at work from customers who have lost their jobs, I can't stand to even care about what's going on in the world. I still subscribe to the daily paper (I'd feel guilty if I canceled it, knowing newspapers are having such a hard time right now), but very rarely read it.

I don't know what's wrong with me, but I don't even read fark.com anymore. Even funny headlines about crappy news stories can't get me through. It's like things are so crappy, I can't even find the crappiness funny anymore.

Instead, I focus on pop culture and other mindless things. I'm too depressed to do much else.

but if you solve it, you will remember all of it

My favorite song from one of my favorite albums of 2008.

The album version is like a wall of sound, so many layers, I just love it. But this acoustic version is pretty cool too.

You can tell the economy is pretty crappy because while in the past I have had four to five cranky customers a day, lately I have been having really mean and nasty people. Obviously they are stressed over not having money, but the language they use is pretty appalling. One guy told me my husband needed to shut me up. It's laughable now, but in the moment I wanted to tell him to shut the fuck up. I came so close to going off on quite a number of customers today. I obviously really need a break.

It snowed last night and will snow again Friday. So much for my hope that winter was over.

I finally got curtains up in my bedroom, so my room is pretty dark now at night, which I love.

Speaking of bed, I am going now. Really. Tearing myself away from the computer as I type this....

Happy Valentine's Day

It's funny how viral an idea can be on Facebook. I'm not sure who among my FB friends started it, but there's this meme where you write compliments about people from your friends list, tag them, and let them guess who matches which compliment. My friend Erin tagged me in one and when I read it, I was feeling slightly dark (you know, V-day upcoming and all), and her kind words just set me over the edge.

But really in a good way.

It just kind of hit me that I am really loved. I know that sounds silly, but I never had thought about it too much. One of the joys of rock bottom self-esteem is that you never take things at their face value. There's always a hidden agenda.

When someone goes out of their way to write nice things about you, it's such a rush. I'm still a bit teary over it.

So, I did one of my own last night. It took me a while, but it was worth it because by the end of it, I was feeling so positive about MYSELF. These are people who I care for and who care for me. Before last night, I would probably have written "seem to care for me" but I am fairly certain that there is genuine feeling there and that is such an amazing gift.

No, I don't have a Valentine. I don't even have a potential Valentine. But I'm more than ok with my current lot in life. I haven't felt like this ever.

Now, if I could just stop crying with happiness and get about my day.....

So Tek is resigned to the Red Sox and A-Rod admitted to using steroids (or whatever) in 2003.

Spring training starts this week and it could not come soon enough! I am so ready for baseball, this winter has been killing me with the baseball withdrawal.

I am getting a nice hefty refund back on my taxes which makes me pretty happy. Nevermind that it doesn't take me out of debt, just makes me able to be slightly more comfortable. Right now, waiting for the refund, I'm barely treading water. I have about $100 to my name. That refund cannot come soon enough!

you wanna dance, i'll bet you do

Lady Sovereign - I Got You Dancing

The funeral was uneventful. I felt like I was in a room full of familiar-looking strangers. There's talk of a family reunion this summer. How will I manage to get out of it? I'd rather not see any of those people ever.

We've had some nice warm weather here this week, the snow is melting during the day and turning into ice overnight. Oh it is SO my favorite time of year....who doesn't love the prospect of bodily injury every time they walk out the door?

In the past week, I have changed the furniture in my living room at least four times. I ended up putting it back exactly the way I had it. I was perfectly happy with it, my mom decided I should try something new and rather than argue with her, I gave in. She didn't like any of the changes either, so allowed me to put it back the way I had it without comment.

I had hoped to spend this long weekend getting more cleaning done than I did. Oh well, maybe next time. This song gets a lot of radio play around here lately and it's a great song to clean to. The video...well. Misguided is too kind a word.