The Journal of CSI_Sanders1129

So, had an eventful few days.

Mom, Zach and I headed out on Wednesday around 11. Made it to OC right at 3, after a stop for lunch, which was awesome timing because that's when Check-In started. We stayed on 15th street, which is pretty much right at the point where the streets of hotel meet the streets of boardwalk entertainment. We did, however, manage to find a hotel that still proudly advertised that it had 'COLOR TV!' and 'AM/FM RADIO!' which... yeah. Not surprisingly, they had no Wi-Fi, but luckily my phone still worked so I wasn't entirely internet deprived. The room had furnishings roughly circa 1999ish. With a giant boxy TV that was indeed in color. The room was also tiny.

However, they did have an awesome pool. Which they also proudly proclaimed on their sign along with color TV and radio. It goes to 10 feet. You still can't dive, but it's awesome nonetheless. We forewent the beach on Wednesday, it was 3:30 or so by the time we got settled in the room and everything and we decided to just got to the pool for a while before heading to the boardwalk.

After some failed attempts at trying to get my brother to swim (and by swim, I mean float) that were not successful (I have theorized that he was like, born without buoyancy or something) some guy started playing a guitar and singing songs. Awesome! This is now a concert post! He played a lot of cover songs - Third Eye Blind, Zac Brown Band, Jason Mraz, Matchbox Twenty, John Mayer, Josh Turner, Luke Bryan, Dierks Bentley, Aerosmith, and a lot more. His name was Blake Haley, and is a link to hsi website.

After the unexpected concert was over, we headed back to the room to change and then hit the boardwalk. We walked down a few streets to hit up an arcade we always went to when we were little that was still pretty fun. Walked a few more streets, made a few stops, grabbed some pizza for dinner (that took forever to get, the place was so crowded) and then continued on our way. Stopped for ice cream at Dumser's aka my Dad's favorite ice cream place ever. Got to the end, chilled for a bit and then headed back to the hotel on the tram. Watched like 5 minutes of Royal Pains and crashed out at like... 11.

Woke up at 7 on Tuesday. Shock to my system. Umbrella rental place on the beach didn't open til , so we grabbed breakfast at the hotel restaurant next door. Which was significantly more fancy than a. our hotel and b. that it used to be. It used to be called the Santa Maria, but they tore that down and replaced it with some fancy Courtyard Marriott thing that looks nice (and has Wi-Fi!) but is also ridiculous expensive. OC has no right to be that expensive. Anyway. After 9, we hit the beach. The water was freezing and it got deep too fast to boogie-board, so we mostly spent the time chilling on the beach. After a while Zach got bored so we headed back to the pool for a while. No free concert this time, but still fun and relaxing. Zach bailed on us after that - but Mom and I headed back to the beach and then back to the pool before we headed back inside.

Once we were cleaned up, Mom and I walked down a few streets to Phillip's for an awesomely tasty dinner. Brought food back for Zach, watched a few episodes of NCIS on TV and then headed back to the boardwalk. Wandered a bit and grabbed Thrasher's fries and then ended up getting stalked by seagulls and then feeding seagulls which was fun, if also kind of terrifying (especially when a GIANT one sits there staring at you, kind of unnerving). Didn't stay out long, got back into the room before half-time of the Ravens first pre-season game, which we quickly switched off of. Watched Burn Notice, watched Suits and then crashed out.

Woke up at 7 again this morning, we were ready to go by 9 and checked out. Drove up a few streets to get popcorn and taffy to take home with us, but Mom saw some store she'd been looking for that she'd thought closed, so we chilled until 10 when the opened. Wandered a few stores and grabbed the snackage and we were on the road by like, 10:10.

Made it home before 2, which was good because Mom and I worked tonight.

I am hopelessly sunburned. I slathered my face in aloe and silvadine burn cream enough to get through work, but owwww. So not cool.

A few beach pictures are under the cut!

( HERE )

Dad and I left around 3:40 or so to get gas and food before we started the trek to DC. Got stuck in traffic that landed us there at like 6. Which at least meant sitting in a sporadically air-conditioned car instead of wandering around outside teh Verizon Center in 90some degree weather. It also gave me ample opportunity to read the book I'd brought and unlike last time we had to go to DC, the concert wasn't cancelled, so yay.

Got in at 6:30, grabbed a drink, chilled til 7:30 when the show started. We were about 7 rows back in teh center section, so that was cool. We did have an annoying, really tall swayer in front of us )me) he whole time, so that was not fun to take pictures around. My arms hurt from having the camera high enough to get over her head. Luckily, I spent my childhood perfecting the talent of walking on my toes (which will likely come back to bite me later in life but still has it's advantages now) so that helped. But still.

Jake Owen was up first. An alarming amount of people didn't bother showing up to see him play, which made me kind of mad since he's actually a well-known country guy and not some random band tagging along. He played: Anywhere With You, Yee Haw, Wide Awake, The One That Got Away, Startin’ With Me, Trip To Heaven, Barefoot Blue Jean Night, Something About A Woman, Don’t Think I Can’t Love You, and Eight Second Ride. Some of those are from his upcoming CD, but he was still good. He was really nice, too, and was off the stage a few times. Not near us, cause we were in the middle of an aisle in the middle of a section, but still. He dragged one couple up onto their really weird stage for part of Don't Think I Can't Love You. They were happy. And got hugs. He was done at like, 8:15 or so.

Keith Urban started at 8:45 and played til 11. Please note that he played more than 10 songs in that range of time unlike some people (*cough*Johnny Lang*cough* <-- is still bitter). Right.

Setlist: Put You In A Song, Days Go By, I Told You So, Only You Can Love Me This Way, Long Hot Summer, Stupid Boy, Silly Love Songs (Paul McCartney Cover)/Making Memories Of Us, I’m In*, Blue Jeans On*, You’ll Think Of Me*, You Gonna Fly/Boondocks (Little Big Town Cover), Til Summer Comes Around, Sweet Thing, Kiss A Girl, Without You, Love Somebody Like You, Are You Sure Hank Done It This Way? (Waylen Jennings Cover), Who Wouldn’t Wanna Be Me?, With Or Without You (U2 Cover)/American Girl (Tom Petty Cover)/It’s A Long Way To The Top (AC\DC Cover), You Look Good In My Shirt. Encored with Tonight I’m Gonna Cry and Better Life. The three *'d songs he did out on the mini-stage not far behind us which was cool. Somewhere toward the beginning he saw someone with a sign that said 'Nicole said it was OK to kiss me!' and he was amused and called her down. And he was always in the crowd, too. On Kiss A Girl, he pulled 3 people, a guy and 2 girls, up on stage to sing along. During one song, Who Wouldn't Wanna Be Me? I think, he went out into the not-floor seats and sang there for a while. He gave someone his guitar - the strap on it said 'I went to a Keith Urban concert and all I got was this stupid guitar'  lol. Toward the end, he intro'd the band - who all sang little cover snippets - and that was cool, too. Shot off massive amounts of confetti and then it was done.

While we spent like 45 minutes in the garage trying to get out and didn't get home until just after 1, it was pretty awesome and we got some good pics. I've also determined that I, like, actually need to learn how to properly use my camera instead of pressing buttons and changing settings until it takes decent pictures.

Alright, so. I've been house/dog-sitting since last night after a crazy, crazy, crazy work night. I'm blaming the full moon for the 3 deaths, 7 babies(!) and 70 discharge charts I had to do.

Dad and I left at like 3, got downtown by 4. Line was... pretty long even by then, as expected for Gen Admission (ick)), but was ridiculously long by the times the doors opened at 5:30. I spent the hour and a half reading a Burn Notice novel, so I was happy. Dad was bored. At one point, one of the security guards (a friend of ours, we see him at a lot of concerts and Dad sees him at Ravens games all the time) showed up talked for a few minutes. He said he'd see what he could do for us seat-wise, but we weren't expecting anything to come of his offer. Got in with no problem once the doors opened. Dad and I headed in, saw the security guard waving from the front - he'd saved us two front row seats on the side. Awesome! (Also, it gets better!)

Chilled til just shy of 7, when the first (and pretty much irrelevant to me) band started. Unwed Sailor. They don't sing. They play like there should be a song and you sit there waiting for the guy to start singing, but it never comes. I almost fell asleep (because I brilliantly stayed up til 5:30 reading) and was glad when they were done.

Mat Kearney (<3) was up next. I was mostly there for him, honestly. He hasn't been around since I saw him at Recher in... 2009? Yeah. And that was an awesome, amazing concert. He played Fire & Rain, Nothing Left To Lose, Undeniable, Breathe In Breathe Out, Closer To Love, Here We Go, Runaway Car, All I Need, and Hey Mama (which is the single for his new CD, Young Love). During Runaway Car (I think, anyway), he stood on the rail (that isn't normally there) like he did at Recher the last time I saw him. Apparently, he does this a lot. It was a wide gap, and as he later claimed "my jeans were too tight to make that one," and he nearly fell. Shook it off and started running around the crowd. He'd jumped down on the other side of the pavilion, circled around the back, and came up right next to us. He stopped right next to me and I got an awesome, awesome hug. He tossed an arm around my shoulder and sang for a little before he jumped back up on stage and kept going. I spent the rest of his set grinning like an idiot (Dad and Security Guard friend teased me endlessly for this) but I did score the setlist. A delusional part of my brain took this as being remembered from the last show, but that was... a while ago and entirely unlikely. <3 <3 <3

Back on track. Owl City started around 9, played til 10:30. Set-list - from keeping track, cause they weren't using paper set-lists or else I would have obtained one - is as follows:

The Real World, The Tip Of The Iceberg, Deer In The Headlights, Swimming In Miami, Umbrella Beach, Rainbow Veins, Tidal , Honey & The Bee, The Bird & The Worm, Lonely Lullaby, January 28 1986, Galaxies, Angels, Meteor Shower, On The Wing, Hello Seattle, Plant Life, Alligator Sky and Yacht Club. Encored with How I Became The Sea and If My Heart Was A House.

Most of those are from the new CD, All Things Bright & Beautiful, which came out on Tuesday. So I didn't know some of them, but it still was pretty awesome. Every time he stopped to talk to us he started laughing and was like "This is cozy! Aw, you're so cute, Baltimore!" We stuck around for a while afterward hoping to catch Mat - didn't bother trying for Adam Young (Owl City (who kind of reminds me of Kendall from Big Time Rush, and kind of also Brian Kinney from QaF) due to the swarms of people with that idea. Never managed to catch Mat and eventually had to give up.

Security did an awesome job of keeping people out of the aisles (always awesome!) and most of the people there were too young to be drunk, so that was also a plus. Got some awesome pictures and had a blast, event if it was toasty for a while.

So, I've gotten this: 

(Danno making an air-heart at Steve after hauling his broken ass up a cliff)

This:

(Balthazar snarking awesome things at Dean about certain other angels who give a crap about killing 50,000 people)

And now this adorableness (even if it the RPS version):

(MGG offering Shemar a Birthday kiss? He also does this adorable reaching out thing before the .gif starts)

All within, what? Ten days? Fandom is being awesomely giving lately.

So, my break is now officially over and I'm back in Frostburg now. Picked up my textbooks a little while ago and found myself rather surprised. While I knew in theory (and in paycheck) that I had 19 books for 4 classes, I apparently didn't quite understand what 19 books really amounted to.

For those that are interested, it amounts to something like this:



Also, Aesop's Fables (B&N Classics Series) = Done.

Today I bring you some completely awesome and creeptastic pictures courtesy of Opacity. Totally recommend checking out the other stuff there. (Thanks to KMKMLM for pointing it out :D)

So, Day 2/2. Checked out of the hotel at like 10 something and then started driving. We stopped at a Panera Bread for breakfast/lunch because I was craving it almost as bad as I was craving a Starbucks coffee at B&N. Then stopped at Kohl's because, well, Mom said we had to. I got an awesome jacket thingy and some new jeans, though! Yay! Ugh, got back to State College around 1:15 or so. Most people were out on some scavenger hunt. They were kind of insane since most of the stuff was in or around the Penn State campus... which you'd really have to be nits to be near with the Parent's Weekend going on. A good few of us opted against the insanity and chilled outside the building with Josh. They let us in a little bit early and let us shop in the PRS store. Got a really awesome t-shirt - Further WIthout Fear, with the verse from the Rhime of the Ancient Mariner poem that Ryan love son the back --

Like one that on a lonesome road
Doth walk in fear and dread,
And having once turned round walks on,
And turns no more his head;
Because he knows a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread

-- But yeah. They told us that Ryan was sick - he'd been sickish yesterday and Sergey, too - and he probably wouldn't be there until the Group Photo/Goodbye, so his last lecture was canceled and his group split into the remaining lectures. From there, they sent us all of to our last lectures.

Lecture #3 - Sergey and Josh on Evidence Analysis. They played some video clips and some audio recordings about some odd evidence and then talked about a few of their absolutely bat-shit insane clients. Michelle was there, too, and she is not allowed near the technology lest it self-destructs apparently. They were all really funny.

When that wrapped up, it was time to do the Group Photo/Goodbye stuff and while everything was getting set up outside, Sergey told us all that Ryan wouldn't be coming back today at all. He said Xander was at home watching him and that once everyone left he'd go back and make Ryan green tea and noodle soup. So at least Ryan's not totally suffering. Took the picture, got quick pictures with Michelle and another one with Sergey (who, btw, smokes. Ick. -_-) and then Mom and I had to leave - since she had to drive me back out here and then go home. So much driving O_O.

Made it back here by like 5:30. Stopped for dinner and was just informed Mom made it back home safely. So yay!

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Oh, if anyone wants to see pics that are not randomly linked to words, the photobucket album from which I am linking them is accessible via clicking on the picture below. A couple of them are blurry, but only because I didn't feel like deleting them. :3

In epic planning fail, this weekend was Parent's Weekend at Penn State which meant hotels were not easily locatable. The one Mom and I ended up in was in Altoona, which is like almost an hour from State College, PA. Not a fun drive, really. Though pretty. We confused the poor old GPS to death because they must have like changed the roads or something since the last time the maps got updated. It was like 'Recalculating... ... ... Recalculating... ... ... WHAT THE HELL YOU PEOPLE ARE DRIVING ON NOTHING!!! *power off*'

But, anyway. We made it from Altoona to State College B&N by like 11:45 only to discover that Ryan's book signing (go buy it) was not at 12, as originally advertised, but at 2. So. We had like 2 hours to kill. Fun.

Chilled for a while, ended up driving aimlessly around town for a little while in search of a Panera Bread (found one, but it was packed because it was near the PSU campus) and then just went back to B&N. By then the line was pretty long so we joined in and waited. I GOT MY JAVA CHIP FRAPPUCHINO OMG DELICIOUS HNNNG. Ryan showed up a little after two and did a quick Q&A sessionbefore he started signing. Took a while but eventually got up to the front (and god damn there were like 300+ people there see?). Ryan, Michelle Belanger, and Stefan Petrucha (dude who helped Ryan write the book - mostly transcribed what Ryan dictated and edited accordingly in bits when Ry was too busy) were at the table thingy. Sergey, Eilfie, Katrina and Josh were all chilling around the area, too. I had 2 books. One for me and one for cynical_sweater to get signed and while Ryan was signing those, Michelle was like 'Ooh, I like your tattoos! (Aequitas/Veritas) Good values to have.' And Ryan was like 'Huhwhat? Oh. Boondock?' 'YESSS.' <3 Got some haphazardly taken pics with them then got shuffled out of the way. Got Katrina to sign/get a picture, then Sergery and Josh and Eilfie. :D We hung around until the line was mostly gone because somehow in the tattoo conversation the books missed her in the signing process so I was hoping to catch her. Didn't.

Headed over to the new PRS headquarters and got signed in and everything. Had to chill for a while as other people showed up. Thus began the tour (led by Chris, old friend of Ryan's from high school and PRS crew). She led us around the offices - which are really cool. Tech room. Josh's office (and Josh!). Paranormal Insider TV Room/Chillaxing room (Xander has a bed in there, too <3). Katrina's Office (and Katrina!). Sergey's Office (and Sergey!). Conference room. Ryan's Office (no Ryan, he wasn't there so we weren't allowed in). Kitchen Michelle was just out of frame there - a vampire eating a sandwich, as Chris introduced - and Xander has foodbowls in there <3. Eilfie's Office (and Eilfie!). Library. Seance room.

Thus ended the tour. We were then sent back outside while the others groups finished up their tours. There were maybe like... 30 of us? Idk. Not too many, really. From there, we got sent off to the various lectures we'd signed up for.

For lecture #1, I picked Sergey's. It was on the History of Spirit Photography and it was really neat. I'll probably post about it more later. Xander showed up toward then end of it and got lots of belly rubs. (God, I miss my dogs!!)

For lecture #2, I picked Ryan's (and Stefan's). Which was lucky since he got stuck at the bookstore for a while and then couldn't do the one on Sunday (will explain in next post). He basically just talked about the book and stories about writing the book and stuff that got cut out and details and stuff. It was really interesting and seriously funny at times. (He and Chris broke into some church in South Carolina with a screwdriver looking for evidence of a haunting when they were in HS and are pretty much not allowed in that town anymore?)

From there, we all headed out to Damon's for dinner. OMG FOOD THAT ISN'T FROM THE CAF AT SCHOOL!! <3 YUM. Ended up sitting with Stefan Petrucha amongst several other PRS goers. Ryan and Sergey and most of the others were at the table in front of us, Josh was at the table behind us. Ryan kept stealing Sergey's food, lol. They had some serious technical difficulties on set-up, but eventually they got Ryan's laptop (it has Xander as a background, aww <3) set-up and hooked up to the projector thingies in the room. They showed us one of the new potential openers for the show 9set to Red Right Hand? xD) And then screened an episode (called They Only Come Out At Night). It was pretty damn good, and I will refrain from spoilering you all. I think it's one of the ones that air on 10/17. Then they played a few random clips (one of their episodes is going to be a total crack-fest, I warn you all now, lmfao...) and then another episode called ... Dead Room? I think. Pretty sure that was what it was called. That one was amazingly done and very powerful. Apparently Ryan has been trying to re-vamp how the show gets done, trying to break pattern and try new things (like the new theme and such). I'd say it's working.

After dinner, we all headed back to the PRS headquarters. Mom and I were in seance group one and we all sat around in a circle in the dark dark dark seance room. A few people stood around a tipping table and one brave volunteer went into the spirit closet to stare into a creeptastic mirror. Pretty much nothing happened, except that people's stomachs growled and some of us felt like our heads were really heavy. Michelle (the host of the seance thing) said that we'd p[retty much just covered how exciting Dead Time usually is.

Once that was over, we headed out. We had an hour drive back to Altoona and we were both pretty exhausted by the time we got there. Z.z

Signed stuff! --->

1. So, I'm about 95% moved into my dorm room. My roommate hasn't shown up yet - guess she's coming tomorrow. We started packing up the car at like 9 this morning, ended up changing things around until 10 because there was just so goddamn much stuff to bring. Phew. Got out to Frostburg a little before 1 (Phantom Stallion: Run Away Home = Done. Last book in series T_T/:D) and got checked in and got my keys (one for room/closet, one for mail) and then started unloading. We were, however, smart enough to bring a handtruck. Still, it took us five trips and we ended up breaking my printer. Oops. Got as settled as possible and then went out to get Mom and Dad checked into the hotel they're staying at until tomorrow, went and had dinner at Ruby Tuesday (and admired the totally adorable waiter who is also a student at FSU, and also a Junior. Cool) which was awesome and delicious and deliciously awesome. Ugh, then checked out the mall/Walmart that's a few miles away. We were hoping to find a Verizon store because our phones wouldn't connect to the internet but there wasn't one and Dad fixed them a little while later. We got a few of the things we'd had to leave home due to space in the car and a new printer and a couple things we'd forgotten. Came back to the dorms and got all set up. It's all pretty much done now, except that I need another powerstrip and we need a longer cable wire for the TV. And I need to find another poster - in fact, here, have a poll:[Poll #1612151]
But, anyhow. I have breakfast plans with the parents for the am, the roommate should show up sometime tomorrow and I guess I'll just have to hope she's amenable to the room set-up cause there's not a whole lot we can really do to change it. I also have to go get my books for classes on Monday, think I'm going with my cousin to do that. I have dinner plans with an old friend from high school whose dorm is 2 floors below me, and she has people I should meet, so that'll be interesting. And I have to go to a floor meeting tomorrow night (at least I think it's tomorrow night, I need to check that xD) So yeah. This has been a crazy crazy week.

Oh, and...

( pics of the dorm! )

Also, I miss Buddy. A lot. T_T