it's days like these that keep me on my winning streak

Just a few things I want to jot down before I go to bed. We went to see The Swell Season tonight and it was FANTASTIC!! Amazing. Words really can't describe it. I'm super stoked that they'll (soon) have the show recording available to download. AND THEY MENTIONED BILL HICKS. Which is like totally unexpected in any circumstance really, but especially in the middle of their show. I may have screamed very loudly in excitement.

Also, my brain is apparently very very broken because the whole time Glen Hansard was talking about the head vs the heart and logic vs emotion and turning off emotion and just living without feeling, all I could think about was how that would be a perfect song to write a broken Ianto fic about. =/

ANYWAYS. It was also Andrew's birthday surprise and he really was surprised and that was awesome! He and taylorea haven't really gone out since Henry was born, so it was nice to be able to get them out and do something non-baby for a little while. =)

SO, yes. A GOOD NIGHT. Except that I'm really kinda wired. Maybe I should take you home and watch Lucy. Getting up in 4 1/2 hours is going to hurt.

Rory! I still have your phone charger! =(

Hello from the land of the Wings and the Tigers! I am here in sammipunk's living room watching hockey and things are good. Except that the Wild just lost their game. They're going to succumb to the Minnesota sports curse, aren't they? =/

I really have nothing more to add. Today has been pretty laid back, even when my flight out of O'Hare was late.

- The Minnesota Wild won their division for the first time ever!! This is awesome and I am SUPER exicted!!

- I got to see Henry for the first time in 2 1/2 months, since I am finally not sick and he is settling in at home. It was also quite nice to visit with taylorea for a while.

- My 1969 CD showed up! So did my Amazon UK order, with all three new Torchwood books and my cherished John Barrowman CD. ♥

- The new Madonna video is super hot, even if it makes zero sense. While I was hitting the iTunes store to buy the video, I decided to check for the sexay Matt Nathanson video for "Come on Get Higher." They finally had it, so I now own a copy for myself. Yum!

- I think I now have everything together for our Torchwood party tomorrow. If I ever doubted that I was crazy, these party preparations have confirmed it.

- I spent my entire drive home from work with the window rolled down and Cobra Starship cranked on the radio while singing at the top of my lungs. Man, I love spring!

Is it really going to fucking snow again on Sunday? *sigh*

Tonight there was karaoke. And it was good. (no, really) I needed to get out since it's been a while. And the best part? An appearance by taylorea! *huggles*

What I sang (as a reminder to myself, as I see a playlist in my future):
The Wreckers - "Leave the Pieces"
Anna Nalick - "Breathe (2 AM)"
Trisha Yearwood - "Believe Me Baby I Lied"
Letters to Cleo - "Here and Now"
Madonna - "Ray of Light"
Marvelous 3 - "Freak of the Week" with seimaisin, since we HAD to sing the only Butch song they had

And now, off to bed since my alarm is going to ring in less than five hours. Yuck.

So we went to see 3:10 to Yuma and it was a touching love story and also very hi-larious. Of course, this all may have been because we were the only ones in the theater and there was snarking going on. ;)

Poor Alan Tudyk. Had the great lines. Didn't have a good ending. Sound familiar?

THE FUNNIEST PART OF THE WHOLE THING??
You know at the end, during the credits? When the lead actors have assistants and drivers and makeup people? And they're credited as "Assistant to Famous Actor Dude"? Well, Christian Bale and Peter Fonda's people were credited as that. But Russell Crowe's people were credited as his CHARACTER'S NAME. Yes, "Driver to Ben Wade." WTF?? Is he so method that everyone MUST call him by his character's name? So confusing, yet entirely hilarious.

Also? There was an apostrophe mishap in the credit's. Don't they have people's to check that kind of thing?

Also also? Let it be written in pen upon your calendars. Saturday October 27th. Midnight showing of Slither at the Uptown Theater. Oh yes! We will be there! You should be too!

Dear Borders,
Stop taunting me with your "all CDs are 11.99" coupon! You're not playing fair!
No love, me

If you know me in real life, you probably know how much I despise the Fine Line as a music venue. It has a horrible setup to see the stage and I'm pretty much always annoyed by the assholes in the crowd. So I was kind of dreading this show as much as I was looking forward to it. Happily, I ended up having a fantastic time!

seimaisin, stardiver, northatlantic and myself started out the evening at Pizza Luce. Which was delicious. Except that Mo and I got build your own pasta with a spicy garlic sauce which was not at all spicy. We left Luce thinking the Fine Line wouldn't be too busy and we were totally wrong. It was well over an hour before the music was going to start and it was already packed! It ended up being a sold out night. Good for Matt!

We found a nice spot over by the beer girl dude that had a nice view of the stage and a bonus spot of wall to lean against. Of course, we still ended up with jerks around us. I had a couple in front of me who hadtobetouchingthisclose for the entire show. And they kept backing up into me whenever I tried to move back a little farther to get away from them. =/ They finally moved over and things were much better. Mo ended up with another spacially-challenged guy in front of her. I don't get it.

Cary Brothers was on first, since Kate Voegele wasn't there. I'm not sure what I was expecting from him. His CD is kind of quiet and I thought his show would be kind of, well, boring. It was anything but! First off, he's kind of gorgeous. Always a nice bonus. And he's really funny! It was pretty obvious that he's feeling the pressure of competing with dirty mouth Matty while they're on tour. So he let out a random string of profanity for no reason whatsoever. Which ended with an afterthought of "cock" that I was highly amused by. Also, he did a kick ass cover of "If You Were Here" by the Thompson Twins, from Sixteen Candles. Rawk!

The best part? Okay, so when we were in the car on our way to pick up Dre, "Your Love" by The Outfield came on my iPod. I commented about how that song always makes me think of Butch Walker now since it was on some mix CD that was playing on repeat during his shows in the Spring, so I heard it like a dozen times in a week. And then Cary Brothers played it at his show!! Weirrrrrrrrrrrrrd. Jaime was recording video (which you can watch here) and you can hear me laughing hysterically. I believe there was a comment made about how it could be the new "Jessie's Girl," which we've heard at like 5 concerts this year.

Matt Nathanson came out and his show RAWKED! Just amazing! I'm upset that I've never gone to any of his shows before. He played almost all the songs on his new CD, some of his older stuff and a fantastic assortment of covers. Including "Don't Stop Believin'" and "Starfish & Coffee." And he played "Jessie's Girl"! I'm convinced that song is stalking us!

Someone in our group (who shall remain nameless...) made a comment about how Matt was certainly "front and center this evening." If you've ever played the pointing game with me, you know what this means. And he was! At that point on, I had a hard time not staring at his crotch. It was just so...there.

The crowd was actually pretty fun! Amazing for that crappy place. They actually seemed to be our people for once. Usually we're either in a crowd that's half our age or one that we have nothing in common with. They were singing along and shouting out names of random songs and stuff. Matt got to the point where he couldn't understand people and claimed they were just shouting random crap like "Lysol Carpet Cleaner!" Which also highly amused me. His potty mouth was somewhat under control for the evening. So he wasn't quite as obscene as usual, but still hilarious.

I ended up buying two Matty Nay CDs and a T-shirt that I didn't really need. I had to pretty much physically restrain myself from buying the super hot track jacket he was selling. Poor Cary Brothers was actually selling his own merch and I felt bad enough that I was going to buy a CD, but decided not to wait in line.

( I took some photos! )

I have some more photos posted here. I didn't shoot any video, but Jaime did. You can see it on her YouTube channel here!

Cock.

*snicker*

My quandry on which TV show to watch next has been answered since I got the first 6 episodes of The Young Ones today. DO WANT.

It's kind of difficult to get 8 different people to the State Fair from several different places, but it can be done. I think everyone is accounted for now for tonight. I am very excited to 1) buy an "Absoloutely Sventastic" shirt and 2) have an apple cider float. Oh and see Weird Al, of course! Since we're not going to have a lot of time tonight, looks like seimisin and I will be heading back to the Fair on both Saturday and Sunday. Wheeee!

I really want to like The Alternate Routes CD, but I'm not really feeling it. It's a little, err, boring. I guess. Maybe just a little too calm. I like my alt-country to have some bounce to it at least some of the time.

I pretty much despise everyone in my office today. That's not likely to change at any time this week.

I really miss my dog since he's been at the cabin with my mom all month. But he came home yesterday! I can't wait to go see him tomorrow. He'll probably just look at me like "what?" and go back to taking a nap.

Don't forget that tonight is the Team Boobylicious Silent Auction! You can also bid online until 4pm today, if you can't make it. But you really want to make it down to Hubert's to see soyouthink shave her head, don't you??

Other things upcoming that I plan to be at:
Aug 27 - "Weird Al" Yankovic at the State Fair (my birthday outing!)
Sep 01 - Houston Calls at The Triple Rock
Sep 07 - Cowboy Mouth at the Fine Line
Sep 11 - Jon McLaughlin/Sara Bareilles at the Varsity Theater
Oct 05 - Matt Nathanson at the Fine Line
Oct 06 - Shooter Jennings at the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake IA
Oct 11 - Stephen Kellogg & The Sixers at the Varsity Theater
Oct 17 - Josh Ritter at the Cedar Cultural Center
Oct 26 - Shooter Jennings at The Cabooze
Nov 24 - Motion City Soundtrack at Myth

Anything else coming up that I should be at? This summer kinda sucked for concert action, so it's good that late summer/fall has a lot going on.

Also, I know I've told some people about this, but I should probably make an actual announcement. Since not everyone can make it to the Weird Al show, I'm having an actual birthday party too. Not on my bday since some people will be out of town. It'll be on Sun Sept 9th at my parents house, so we can utilize their spiffy new backyard patio area. I'll be making tons of Lebanese food! All the locals are invited! (well, the out of towners are invited too, but I don't think anyone would come up here) Just let me know if you're coming so I can plan the food accordingly. Don't worry, I'll post another reminder closer to the actual day. I know it's still a few weeks away and how can you be expected to remember this far in advance??

Tomorrow is Nathan Fillion's return to One Life to Live! I'm way more excited about this than I should be. Also, he just signed on for some indie movie. And, of course, the Collector's Edition DVD of Serenity comes out on Tues! These things almost make up for his upcoming stint on Desperate Housewives. Almost.

Dear Gus, this Lifehouse CD sucks! I do believe I'll be bahleeting it when I get home.

Yes, hi. Hello there! I just thought I should post that I'm home now. I drove home in the blasting heat and TRAFFIC this afternoon and then spent about 6 hours at the Irish Fair with a whole bunch of my favorite people. And boys in kilts. And boys with Irish accents. A good day overall! Tomorrow will be more of the same, with the added excitement of Gaelic Storm. Yay!

Also, I got an inflatable mace. It's awesome! I'd post a photo but I'm too exhausted to go dig out my camera.

I used the word Tardis in casual conversation today. I'm already worried about myself.

Obligatory post: Yes, I'm okay.

I'm on the other side of the city from the bridge. I've been stuck at Hallmark all night without access to anything but what I could get from the 'net on my phone. Which just freaked me out because I had little idea of what was going on. Thank goodness lafemmezilla is okay!! I was a little freaked out since I know she drives that way back from work.