Enuff Z'Nuff in Chicago
Jun. 16th, 2006 10:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
leighblackI should probably write up a recap from last weekend. I still feel like crap though, so this is going to be shorter than normal.
Why did I decide to drive 6 hours to Chicago on Sat and then drive right back home on Sun? I don't know. Because I do things like that. Because I wanted to see my Chicago girls. Because I wanted to see Chad again. Because I needed to see Enuff Z'Nuff again. Because I needed a third weekend of drinking. Who knows? In any case, I arranged to get off from work, borrowed my dad's car (because I don't think mine would make it), grabbed all my spare change and hit the road early on Saturday morning.
Have you ever driven from St. Paul to Chicago? I have - tons of times. And it's never very exciting. Except that this time there was more road construction than there should legally be. And there were a million fucking slow people driving in the left lane. So, it took me a lot longer than normal to get to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
xiolablux's place. Thankfully, I had the brand new The City Drive CD with me, so it made the drive a little more bearable.
Jim-Bob was already at Julee's, so - once she got ready - we picked uplittleweirdgirl and headed off to Hamburger Mary's. (Side note: OMG! We're getting one here! Score!!!) Which was super yummy! And messy. And for some reason, Jim-Bob had half a head of lettuce on his burger. I really, really wanted a Tasty Meat T-shirt, but decided that I should probably save my money for alcohol later in the night.
We went into a bit of a food coma while chilling out at Julee's, but eventually we got ready to go out. To Ikea. Well, it was on the way to the show, and Jim-Bob wanted to go, and so we went. I was entranced by the floor-to-ceiling bookcases, but otherwise wasn't too excited about it. I'm not really a furniture person. Jim-Bob bought some Swedish delicacies, and after some difficulties with the Self Checkout lane, we were once again on our way.
EZN were once again playingout in the Industrial park Chicago City Limits, where I saw them open for White Lion last year. They were opening up for Vixen this time, but the less said about them, the better. We got to the bar just as Supermercado were about to begin, so we had pretty good timing. Frank & Judy were already there, so we were talking to them when Chad found me. For some reason, he seemed surprised that I was there, even though, you know, I told him I'd be there. Stupid boys. He apologized for not being able to get me on the list, which I told him wasn't a big deal. He proceeded to rant and whine about things for quite a while. I needed a drink after that, so I headed to the bar for the first Jack & Coke of the evening.
Supermercado was definitely interesting. Their drummer is insanely good!! I was hanging out with Chad & Erik (EZN's actual fill-in drummer), watching them watch him, and that was kind of fun. When Matt from Supermercado did his thing with the sparkly cape, I asked Chad if he thought Taime would go for that look on the upcoming FP tour. He just laughed at me.
An actual crowd formed in front of the stage while EZN was getting ready to go on, but I still managed to get a spot at the front. The guy standing next to me looked kind of familiar and he thought I looked familiar so we started talking. Turns out he was at the EZN/Vixen show at home a couple weeks before and had also decided to drive out to Chicago. But I also totally remembered meeting him at the Poison/Vince Neil/Skid Row show a couple years before, and at a Skid Row show at The Rock. I get around too much sometimes. Anyhow, he assumed I was "with" someone in the band, so I cleared that up and we talked for a while. AND, our very favorite Chicago person Bootsie (!!) was standing a couple people away from me! (okay, only a few of you will get that)
EZN finally went on. Chad made faces at me. Monaco was wearing that silly vest still. And Chip did his marching thing. Which I got on video! (I sooooo need to make an icon of that!) I know no one believes me, but they really are a GREAT band and I do love seeing them play live. Especially with Chaddy, of course. =) Monaco was acting especially silly, which was very entertaining.
Monaco doing his guitar face thing
Chip being Chip
I seriously think this is my favorite live photo I've ever taken of Chad
Many, many more photos and video here!
We were standing around after their show, and Stef came back from the bar and said that Chad had just gotten overtaken by a crowd of unattractive people. I went over to rescue him and ended up taking photos for people. They cleared out and I looked at Chad to ask "Are we drinking now?" "Oh yeah!" First round was on me: Jager shots, a Jack & Coke (#2) for me and straight Jack for him. Chad asked about how the show was and if I'd gotten any more video. Again with the rock boys needig validation that they don't suck. He ended up taking me "backstage" with him (reality: a room about the size of a closet) where he showed and told me things that I'm not allowed to repeat. We were back there for so long that Julee sent me a text to find out where I was & to make sure I was okay. Cute!
We finally went back out and headed to the bar. Monaco was out there and I turned to say hi to him. His eyes got all big and he got a big goofy smile as he said "Hi Leigh!" and gave me a big hug. He told me that he couldn't believe I drove all the way out there to see them and that I was a rock star. Oh yeah. Definitely drunk. =) He also thanked me for posting all the photos and video from the Minnesota shows. It was Chad's turn to buy the round this time. (Jager shot #2 and Jack & Coke #3 for me) We hung out with the Supermercado guys a little bit, but they were too close to the stage and we really, really didn't want to hear/see Vixen, so we retreated to the back of the bar with Chip. He also greeted me with a big smile and a hug. (*awwww* They're such great guys!)
I bought another round of drinks for Chad & I (Jager shot #3 and Jack & Coke #4) and the night becomes somewhat of a blur at this point. There was a lot of talking, hugging, mugging for cameras, playing with my haird, stories about Donnie Vie, drinking and the such.
Photos with my boys:
Chad & I
Monaco & I
Me and Jim-Bob
Photos with my girls:
Julee and I
Me and Stef
Me and Julee again
At one point, Chad grabbed my camera and started flipping through the photos. And editing them. "Oh, you can't post that one! That one's good. I hate photos where I'm singing and my mouth is wide open. I like this one!" He told me that he trusted me to only post the good ones. We also talked about working on his website together, since I still own chadstewart.net. I don't know about that though. He did comment about how Monaco always looks good in photos and I said "That's cause Monaco's hot!" and Chad gave me THE weirdest look. I still don't understand that one.
Matt from Supermercado wandered by and bought us a round of shots. (Jager shot #4) Chad decided that it would be awesome fun to play Golden Tee and I tagged along to watch. I tried to pry more info about the FP tour out of him, but his vague hints were so off the wall that I have no idea how to put them together. All I know is there's going to be lots of merch, they will be wearing uniforms and they will have the uniforms for sale. Chad gave me cash to buy us another round of drinks, but we opted for no more shots. (Jack & Coke #5) There ended up being quite a crowd of people around the Golden Tee machine. Vixen had stopped playing and were hanging out at the merch booth. Strangely, Monaco was acting a little fangirly with them, butting into photos and such. When he came over to our group, I teased him about trying to make it with the Vixen chicks. He was all "yeah, right!" He was sooooo wasted. It was adorable!
Chad went off to talk to Chip and for some reason, I started playing Golden Tee. And I wasn't bad. =O In fact, Stef commented that I was doing better than Chad. He didn't seem amused by that when he came back. It totally started to aggravate my poor carpal-tunnel damaged wrist, but I was drunk and it didn't really matter, so I kept playing for a while. There was some chaos, and discussion that we might bring Chad back with us to take him to the airport for his 5am flight, but it all got worked out eventually. Chip was still going to take Chad since they had some discussing to do, and it was getting to be time for them to leave and time for the bar to close, so we all started saying goodbye. I thanked Chad like a million times for everything and told him I'd see him soon.
Jim-Bob and I finally got a very toasted Julee out of the bar and into the car. I took a little nap on the way home, but actually felt fine. Which was amazing for how much booze I drank. Thank goodness Jim-Bob was okay though, because Julee was completely out of it. She managed to stumble into her apartment and passed out. I said goodbye to Jim-Bob as he was driving back home yet and then crashed out on Julee's sofa.
I absolutely HAD to be back home the next afternoon for my cousin's graduation party, so I got up much earlier than I wanted to. 11am. =) Julee somehow managed to get up too, although she was hurting quite a bit, so I could say goodbye and give her a hug before I left. The drive home was even worse and took much, much longer! But it was okay because I'd had a blast with all my friends and I was really, really glad that I drove down for the night. I must remember to thank my boss at Hallmark for giving me the weekend off so I could go. Because I would have hated missing out! I miss my Chicago girls!! We spend too much time apart.
Why did I decide to drive 6 hours to Chicago on Sat and then drive right back home on Sun? I don't know. Because I do things like that. Because I wanted to see my Chicago girls. Because I wanted to see Chad again. Because I needed to see Enuff Z'Nuff again. Because I needed a third weekend of drinking. Who knows? In any case, I arranged to get off from work, borrowed my dad's car (because I don't think mine would make it), grabbed all my spare change and hit the road early on Saturday morning.
Have you ever driven from St. Paul to Chicago? I have - tons of times. And it's never very exciting. Except that this time there was more road construction than there should legally be. And there were a million fucking slow people driving in the left lane. So, it took me a lot longer than normal to get to
xiolablux's place. Thankfully, I had the brand new The City Drive CD with me, so it made the drive a little more bearable. Jim-Bob was already at Julee's, so - once she got ready - we picked up
littleweirdgirl and headed off to Hamburger Mary's. (Side note: OMG! We're getting one here! Score!!!) Which was super yummy! And messy. And for some reason, Jim-Bob had half a head of lettuce on his burger. I really, really wanted a Tasty Meat T-shirt, but decided that I should probably save my money for alcohol later in the night. We went into a bit of a food coma while chilling out at Julee's, but eventually we got ready to go out. To Ikea. Well, it was on the way to the show, and Jim-Bob wanted to go, and so we went. I was entranced by the floor-to-ceiling bookcases, but otherwise wasn't too excited about it. I'm not really a furniture person. Jim-Bob bought some Swedish delicacies, and after some difficulties with the Self Checkout lane, we were once again on our way.
EZN were once again playing
Supermercado was definitely interesting. Their drummer is insanely good!! I was hanging out with Chad & Erik (EZN's actual fill-in drummer), watching them watch him, and that was kind of fun. When Matt from Supermercado did his thing with the sparkly cape, I asked Chad if he thought Taime would go for that look on the upcoming FP tour. He just laughed at me.
An actual crowd formed in front of the stage while EZN was getting ready to go on, but I still managed to get a spot at the front. The guy standing next to me looked kind of familiar and he thought I looked familiar so we started talking. Turns out he was at the EZN/Vixen show at home a couple weeks before and had also decided to drive out to Chicago. But I also totally remembered meeting him at the Poison/Vince Neil/Skid Row show a couple years before, and at a Skid Row show at The Rock. I get around too much sometimes. Anyhow, he assumed I was "with" someone in the band, so I cleared that up and we talked for a while. AND, our very favorite Chicago person Bootsie (!!) was standing a couple people away from me! (okay, only a few of you will get that)
EZN finally went on. Chad made faces at me. Monaco was wearing that silly vest still. And Chip did his marching thing. Which I got on video! (I sooooo need to make an icon of that!) I know no one believes me, but they really are a GREAT band and I do love seeing them play live. Especially with Chaddy, of course. =) Monaco was acting especially silly, which was very entertaining.
Monaco doing his guitar face thing
Chip being Chip
I seriously think this is my favorite live photo I've ever taken of Chad
Many, many more photos and video here!
We were standing around after their show, and Stef came back from the bar and said that Chad had just gotten overtaken by a crowd of unattractive people. I went over to rescue him and ended up taking photos for people. They cleared out and I looked at Chad to ask "Are we drinking now?" "Oh yeah!" First round was on me: Jager shots, a Jack & Coke (#2) for me and straight Jack for him. Chad asked about how the show was and if I'd gotten any more video. Again with the rock boys needig validation that they don't suck. He ended up taking me "backstage" with him (reality: a room about the size of a closet) where he showed and told me things that I'm not allowed to repeat. We were back there for so long that Julee sent me a text to find out where I was & to make sure I was okay. Cute!
We finally went back out and headed to the bar. Monaco was out there and I turned to say hi to him. His eyes got all big and he got a big goofy smile as he said "Hi Leigh!" and gave me a big hug. He told me that he couldn't believe I drove all the way out there to see them and that I was a rock star. Oh yeah. Definitely drunk. =) He also thanked me for posting all the photos and video from the Minnesota shows. It was Chad's turn to buy the round this time. (Jager shot #2 and Jack & Coke #3 for me) We hung out with the Supermercado guys a little bit, but they were too close to the stage and we really, really didn't want to hear/see Vixen, so we retreated to the back of the bar with Chip. He also greeted me with a big smile and a hug. (*awwww* They're such great guys!)
I bought another round of drinks for Chad & I (Jager shot #3 and Jack & Coke #4) and the night becomes somewhat of a blur at this point. There was a lot of talking, hugging, mugging for cameras, playing with my haird, stories about Donnie Vie, drinking and the such.
Photos with my boys:
Chad & I
Monaco & I
Me and Jim-Bob
Photos with my girls:
Julee and I
Me and Stef
Me and Julee again
At one point, Chad grabbed my camera and started flipping through the photos. And editing them. "Oh, you can't post that one! That one's good. I hate photos where I'm singing and my mouth is wide open. I like this one!" He told me that he trusted me to only post the good ones. We also talked about working on his website together, since I still own chadstewart.net. I don't know about that though. He did comment about how Monaco always looks good in photos and I said "That's cause Monaco's hot!" and Chad gave me THE weirdest look. I still don't understand that one.
Matt from Supermercado wandered by and bought us a round of shots. (Jager shot #4) Chad decided that it would be awesome fun to play Golden Tee and I tagged along to watch. I tried to pry more info about the FP tour out of him, but his vague hints were so off the wall that I have no idea how to put them together. All I know is there's going to be lots of merch, they will be wearing uniforms and they will have the uniforms for sale. Chad gave me cash to buy us another round of drinks, but we opted for no more shots. (Jack & Coke #5) There ended up being quite a crowd of people around the Golden Tee machine. Vixen had stopped playing and were hanging out at the merch booth. Strangely, Monaco was acting a little fangirly with them, butting into photos and such. When he came over to our group, I teased him about trying to make it with the Vixen chicks. He was all "yeah, right!" He was sooooo wasted. It was adorable!
Chad went off to talk to Chip and for some reason, I started playing Golden Tee. And I wasn't bad. =O In fact, Stef commented that I was doing better than Chad. He didn't seem amused by that when he came back. It totally started to aggravate my poor carpal-tunnel damaged wrist, but I was drunk and it didn't really matter, so I kept playing for a while. There was some chaos, and discussion that we might bring Chad back with us to take him to the airport for his 5am flight, but it all got worked out eventually. Chip was still going to take Chad since they had some discussing to do, and it was getting to be time for them to leave and time for the bar to close, so we all started saying goodbye. I thanked Chad like a million times for everything and told him I'd see him soon.
Jim-Bob and I finally got a very toasted Julee out of the bar and into the car. I took a little nap on the way home, but actually felt fine. Which was amazing for how much booze I drank. Thank goodness Jim-Bob was okay though, because Julee was completely out of it. She managed to stumble into her apartment and passed out. I said goodbye to Jim-Bob as he was driving back home yet and then crashed out on Julee's sofa.
I absolutely HAD to be back home the next afternoon for my cousin's graduation party, so I got up much earlier than I wanted to. 11am. =) Julee somehow managed to get up too, although she was hurting quite a bit, so I could say goodbye and give her a hug before I left. The drive home was even worse and took much, much longer! But it was okay because I'd had a blast with all my friends and I was really, really glad that I drove down for the night. I must remember to thank my boss at Hallmark for giving me the weekend off so I could go. Because I would have hated missing out! I miss my Chicago girls!! We spend too much time apart.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 04:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 04:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 04:14 pm (UTC)And I had no idea you had tattoos! The skull one is cute! :
no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 04:34 pm (UTC)Really? I have 6 of 'em. The skull is the old FP logo.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 06:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 04:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 04:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 04:41 pm (UTC)(tee hee... old joke... heee... Matt.... "green crotch"......)
no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 04:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 04:46 pm (UTC)But yes - I had a great time - so glad I dragged my ass there. We'll have to plan a road trip out to your part of the world for FP!
no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 04:55 pm (UTC)I'm glad you were there too! (Even if I did catch your cold) YES! The show on July 23rd is on the bar's website now, so I'm considering it official. Except that we know how those boys are about cancelling dates. =/
no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 06:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 06:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-16 10:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-17 02:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-17 04:12 am (UTC)What's funny is that that one pic of Chad that you say is your favorite, I have one of him that looks almost EXACTLY like that. It's from either LA or Vegas...I can't remember to be sure.
I'm crossing my fingers on those dates. If they stay the same, then it looks like I'll be missing the Poison/Cinderella show here. Oh well, I do love my FP boys.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-17 04:28 am (UTC)I don't know what to tell you. I hope the dates work out too! But, uhhh, this is Faster after all, so who knows? I could have a really full house that weekend! =)