The Journal of CSI_Sanders1129

Adventurous Day Part 2!

After a traffic-y jaunt from DC to Columbia, Mom and I got to Merriweather around 630. She took off for home, but Dad and I grabbed some food from the mall and found a decent spot in the parking garage across the street from Merriweather. We chilled for a little while, wandered over around 7, and chilled for a while, aware that some inclement weather was incoming.

There was only one opening group - The Antlers, who I have never heard anything by, but have heard of. They were supposed to start at 8 and Hozier as suppoer to start at 9. However, at 745, someone came out and announced that the Antlers would play early and that after, as the storms were rolling in, they'd go on rain delay. They said that anyone under the pavillion (us, luckily) should stay put in their seats, but that anyone on the lawn should go back to their cars until they gave the all clear and then come back in. Sure enough, the Antlers played from 7:50 to 8:10 and then it started storming. It was pretty crazy for a while, some gusty winds, some heavy downpours, lots of thunder and lightning. Unfortunately, none of the storming did much to alleviate the obnoxious humidity.

Anyway, at 915, when things were starting to clear up a bit, they announced that Hozier would be starting at 935, so 20 more minutes to kill. Don't think it ever actually stopped raining, though.

He played a pretty cool set - only one song I wanted didn't get played and looking at past setlists, it appears that it doesn't usually (In The Woods Somewhere). Anyhow, he played: Angel of Small Death & The Codeine Scene, From Eden, Jackie & Wilson, To Be Alone - during that one, he tried to get people to echo the oh's in small bits, but everyone just kept doing the whole thing, lol - Someone New, It Will Come Back, In A Week, Illinois Blues (Skip James cover), Like Real People Do, Arsonist's Lullaby, Sedated, and Take Me To Church. Encored with Cherry Wine, Problem (Arianna Grande cover), and ended with Work Song at 11.

Got soaked on the way out, had a rainy drive home.

Dad and I were worried about pictures at first, because the lighting for the Antlers wasn't spectacular, but the lights for Hozier resulted in some pretty awesome pictures, as did the relatively mellow nature of the concert. We both got some great shots.
( Pictures! )

It was an adventure, to say the least.

I went 45 straight hours without sleep, everything hurt, but it was awesome.

I spent all of Friday night packing and trying (failing) to nap in preparation for the trip to come, but we left for the airport at like 3 in the morning, arrived just after 330, and I was on my own. It was my third time on an airplane (the other two occurrences both being to Orlando (in 1999 and 2008) and my first time flying alone. I flew Spirit, which is an airline that is tiny, but cheap ($200 round trip from BWI to O'Hare!) and works on the idea that if you are going from Point A to Point B with as little as possible, then they're for you. They charge for anything beyond a personal item - not a carry on, carry on's can be bigger than the 16x14x12 dimensions allowed for a personal item. They don't offer drinks or food for free on the flight, and there's no wifi. Only a two hour flight, though, so who can't live without those things?

Made it through security swiftly (not a lot of people in line for that at 345, it turns out). Chilled for a while with my iPod and a book. Had an egg and cheese bagel for breakfast before the plane started boarding and enjoyed a blissfully quiet flight. Took off at 620 (East Coast time) and landed at 720, Chicago time. That hour difference is small, but noticeable.

One bad thing about Spirit is that they are literally the furthest thing away from everything, so there was quite a journey between the super crowded gate we came off of (after 30 minutes of sitting on the runway waiting to get to it) and the taxi pick up place thing. Found a Starbucks along the way and got some caffeine before I got a taxi to the convention center in downtown Chicago. First time in one of those, too.

Got to McCormick Place at like 9, but you couldn't get onto the floor until 10, so sat around for a while and enjoyed the cosplayers. Found Waldo almost instantly, and spotted a rather creepy AHS clown lurking nearby, too.

Finally, at 10, the mass rush began.

I headed for the autograph lines first. Jason Momoa (Kahl Drogo on Game of Thrones) was my first goal. He was supposed to start signing at 10, but he did not show up until like 1115. Apparently, he'd gone to the gym for his daily workout and he'd gotten held up somewhere along the way and Chicago traffic did nothing to speed the situation along. Missed the one panel I wanted to see because of the delay, but eh, what can you do?

He finally showed up, though, and I got him to sign my Game of Thrones script (signed by George R R Martin (I won it in a Barnes and Noble contest that I have never had any recollection of entering)).

From there, I wandered around a bit, as I didn't have anything I needed to do until 1 something.

Met Doug Walker (Nostalgia Critic) at the Channel Awesome booth. Got a poster signed and a picture with him.

Headed to the Thrilling Adventure Hour booth and purchased the TAH Concert Film and Beyond Belief #1 (so I didn't have to spend a week badgering my comic shop for it, yay!)

Wandered back toward the autograph area and saw that Finn Jones (Loras Tyrell on Game of Thrones) had finally arrived. He was supposed to be there at 1030, but this was going on 12 and we never did get an explanation for his considerable delay. Got him to sign the book, as well.

Did some more general wandering - finally tracked down the booth selling Dragon Age stuff (Sanshee) and bought a set of pins (though sadly only 1 of the 2 sets, as the other was sold out). Around this time, the messenger bag I'd been lugging around gave up on me. One of the metal hook things just straight up snapped on me, so I had to finagle the strap into a knot around the handle that would hold up for the rest of the day - threw off the balance of the thing, though, so it killed my shoulders, that was fun.

Photo-Op with the Thrilling Adventure Hour was the next thing I had to do, that was at 1. Lined up a little early, wasn't too far back in the line. They were all super super super nice. They asked what else I was gonna do at C2E2 and I was like 'I'm gonna see your shows tonight, flew all the way from Maryland to see you guys!' which they were happy to hear. I'd been awake for 21 hours at this point, which they seemed impressed by, as well. Asked what I wanted to do for the photo and I was just like 'I dunno,' and they were like 'Goofy? Awkward high school photo? Serious?' I went with goofy and got this:


From there did some more aimless wandering, thought about getting food, but lines were all too long.

Bounced back to the Channel Awesome booth to get a better picture than the one I'd taken before.

Tried to get in line for Marc Evan Jackson/Timothy Omundson autographs, but they'd capped the line before I got to it.

Killed time until 230, when the Game of Thrones Photo-Op was happening. Jason Momoa was late to that, too, which set back his Photo-Ops, Finn Jones' Photo-Ops AND the GoT Photo Ops, so that was more standing in lines, and a much more fly-by experience than TAH had been. Here is that picture:


Had more time to kill and had done everything I'd wanted to by this point, so more aimless wandering until it got late enough to leave. Spent a good twenty minutes trying to get the useless Curb App to work, never did get it to, finally ended up just grabbing one of the cabs around the convention center, had a really awesome driver for that leg of the trip, he gave me a quick tour of stuff we passed along the way and I explained why people were wandering around in crazy costumes.

The Thrilling Adventure Hour show was at a place called the Chop Shop in Wicker Park. The first show didn't start til 8, but I got there around 530ish, I think. Headed up to the bar to grab some food - ended up with a tasty burger and fries, a hard cider, then a rum and coke. Chatted with the dude next to me for a while (he was taking some crazy church history class (studying to become a pastor, I think?)) and loitered around until they opened the doors downstairs for the show.

The only unfortunate thing was that they kicked us all outside between the shows and then let us all back in. Thought for sure I wouldn't get back in the front row, but managed it. Show 2 started at 10, ended a little after 11. Hung around for a while and got my comic signed by Marc Evan Jackson, Mark Gagliardi, Ben Acker, Ben Blacker, Scott Adsit, Timothy Omundson, Craig Cackowski and Autumn Reeser (missed John Ross Bowie, Hal Lublin and Janet Varney). Got pictures with Marc Evan Jackson, Mark Gagliardi and Timothy Omundson before heading out. Got 2 signed posters, too, one for each ticket (though each is missing some signatures? one is missing John Ross Bowie, Craig Cackowski and Timothy Omundson and the other is missing Ben Acker and Scott Adsit)

Tried the Curb App again with no success, ended up just grabbing one that was going by for the trip back to the airport. By this time I'd been awake like 32 hours.

Got to the airport around midnight, got my boarding pass and discovered security was closed until like 330. So, 3 hours of waiting in the bafflingly freezing main part of the airport, where there was a shortage of any food or beverage places. Read for a bit, tried to nap, but it was too fucking cold. Ended up eating up my data plan chatting with a friend in Hawaii for a while to keep sane (though I suspect I wasn't, given the craziness of that saved conversation). Finally got through security (sadly food/beverage was out of reach until 430). By this point, I was hella sore (from the bag and the walking and possibly the shivering?) and the hike back to the Spirit gate was torture.

Longest four hours ever, at that point.

Tried to sleep, couldn't. Tried to read, couldn't. Tried to internet, couldn't. Music was nice, but not enough. Food helped a little, at like 5, but that's around when he chaos started, too.

See, BWI must not have a lot of Spirit flights, but holy hell O'Hare had a ton. And Spirit only had 2 gates. Planed must have been coming in early or late or in the wrong order because they kept shuffling the departure gates around. There were two girls working the gates, who were running around like crazy the whole time I was there.

Also, I have no idea how I was more aware and coherent than 95% of the other airport patrons. Seriously, I was up to 42 hours by the time my plane started boarding, and somehow I could rattle off the altered gates for like 6 different flights. It's not like they weren't announcing it every five freaking minutes, but every minute or so someone would walk up to the gate their boarding pass said they should be at and you could just see the panic on their faces when a different place was listed. Sheesh.


Finally got on the plane at like 810 (a good 40 minutes after we were supposed to start boarding). Ended up in one of the slightly bigger seats because I'd asked to swap my middle seat for an aisle (yay!). We were supposed to land in Baltimore at 11:01, but despite leaving late, we got in at like 10:50. Up to 44 hours now. Made the hike away from the Spirit gates again.

My parents were there to pick me up, but instead of just meeting me somewhere outside, they parked on the opposite end of the airport.

By this point, I was sort of hysterical. I needed to sleep and everything hurt and I thought I was so close and then the car was like so far away. I lost it a little, there.

Finally got in the car and finally got home and had a long shower and then I crashed out from 1 to 9, woke up for food, stayed up til 3, and then crashed out again until 1.

All in all, it was fun, but if I go next year I am getting a hotel.

So, first concert all year. First concert since... November? Whenever Straight No Chaser was.

It's been fucking pouring all day long, so we left a little early. Made it downtown by like 5:30, which is when the gates were set to open. Took a few minutes to get in. Chilled til 7.

Opening act was Andrew McMahon, who is also the lead singer from Jack's Mannequin (things I did not know). He played: Dark Blue (JM), Resolution (JM), High Dive, Bruised (JM), Cecilia and the Satellite, I Woke Up In A Car (Something Corporate), and Synesthesia..

Matt Nathanson and Gavin DeGraw are co-headlining this tour, so they trade off who's up first and tonight was Matt's turn, so he came on about 7:45 and played til about 9. He did: Kill the Lights, Annie, Car Crash mashed with Iggy Azalea's Fancy, Run, Mission Bells, Room @ the End of the Word mashed with a little bit of Whitney Houston's I Wanna Dance With Somebody, Kinks Shirt, Laid, Wedding Dress with a Raining In Baltimore (Counting Crows) intro because it, you know, was. Then Suspended, Faster mixed with a little of George Micheal's Faith, his new one, Headphones - he ran around for this one, got a high five. Added in an extra song with Little Victories for Robin Williams, ended with Come On Get Higher mashed with You're The One That I Want from Grease for some reason. He was his usual talky, goofy self. Just as Room @ the End of the World started (my favorite out of the songs he played tonight) our usual trouble found us - here comes a Security guy asking about the cameras. We both have Nikon Coolpix things with pretty good zooms but are not "professional cameras" by usual concert standards, and the venue specifically sent an email the other day giving the usual 'no video, no detachable lenses' spiel - I had to stop in the middle of the concert, get out my phone, find the damn email and prove it to the guy before he left us alone. Ughhhhh.

Gavin was up last, came on stage around 9:30 and played til just before 11. He played: Leading Man, Chariot, Sweeter, Heartbreak, Follow Through, We Belong Together, Best I Ever Had, Where the Streets Have No Name (U2 cover) straight into Everything Will Change, Radiation straight into Rich Girl (Hall & Oates cover), then Soldier, In Love With a Girl, Finest Hour, I Don't Wanna Be, Make a Move, and ended with Not Over You.

Made it out surprisingly quickly and we were home by like 11:30.

( Pics Below The Cut )

So, another day, another concert.

We left for this one a little later than Dad strictly wanted to, and this was followed by several irksome moments on the ride down (gas station had no gas, slowest driver ever, back-ups on the beltway (because hello Friday rush hour)), but we still made it to Columbia by like 5:40. Grabbed some food at the mall across the street and still had like 30 minutes before the first opener started. We were sitting on opposite sides of the pavilion this time. First time we've done that. We've sat apart before, but this is the first time it's been that far apart. Only way we could get decent seats - as it was, the show was completely sold out.

First opener, Event Corps, was up first. Started at 7, played til 7:30. Don't know what they played, I kind of zoned out during their set.

Second opener, The Neighborhood, started at 7:45 and went to 8:30. I'd never heard of them and I remain fairly unimpressed. Also, they are the first band I've ever seen that barely had any lights. The stage was dark quite often, sporadically lit by flashy white lights. Not helpful for picture taking. Nor was the asshole in front of me - she must have had a press pass cause she'd disappear off with her giant camera for the beginning of the sets (general rules for press is 3 songs, so they're not irritating everyone), but when she came back she turned into this horrible annoying beast. She was in the front row, I was right behind her. When she first showed up, I was like 'Oh, good, she's tiny, she won't get in the way'. Wrong. She was the only person in the front row standing. She was the only person in the first few rows standing. I ask you, if no one else around you is standing, shouldn't you maybe be a little more considerate and sit the fuck down like everyone else? They do assign seats for a reason - if you wanted to be jumping up and down like a lunatic, try the GA pit. Ugh. People. So, all that set really managed to do was frustrate me.

Then, Imagine Dragons. This was apparently the biggest headlining show they'd ever done (and it sold out, whoot!) but for a headlining show, they don't play very many songs. They started at 9 and played til 10:20ish. Venue curfew is 11, which most bands hit, or at least get close to. They had decent lights, most of the time, aside from a few purple/blue lit songs that my camera didn't enjoy too much. Gor a few decent pics, at least. Anyway, setlist: Round and Round, Amsterdam, Tiptoe, Hear Me, Cha-Ching (Til We Get Older), Rocks, It's Time, Lay Me Down, Demons, Hang Me Up To Dry/Stand By Me (Cover), Underdog, On Top of the World, Radioactive, and encored with Nothing Left To Say. Sadly, my favorite song - Bleeding Out - was not among the 14 songs they did. And some of those songs are short. :(

Here are a couple of pics!

Dad and I left for Merriweather around 330, made it down there by 430. Had to head down absurdly early cause Dad won a meet and greet through the fanclub thingy, but only for one. Which, only fair, after I subjected him to Big Time Rush the other week... He headed over after grabbing a bite to eat, while I chilled at the mall a while. Lame mall, btw. Or maybe I just needed reminding how much I hate malls? Either way... I spent most of my time in Starbucks, reading World War Z.

Headed over myself (luckily without getting drenched by the random on and off all day storms), and headed in without issue. Stopped by to see how the meet and greet was proceeding - they were getting ready to go in for that - and then went to my seat to chill.

This is one of few concerts where Dad and I weren't sitting together. It was the only way to get good seats. We did it for BTR, but that's cause I got mine through the meet and greet and he just bought a regular ticket. We're doing it again for Imagine Dragons next month, but that's more of a sit on opposite sides of the pavilion thing as opposed to opposite sides of the section. Sucked for Dad, though, he got the end seat away from the stage, despite my offers to switch. Dad came back right before the opener started, said that the meet and greet went awesome (aside from all the swooning women) and that he was really nice and actually stopped to talk for a minute or two as opposed to some of there 'here's your hat, what's your hurry' ones we've had.

After an intro from the local country radio station queen, Dustin Lynch started things off at 7. I'd... never heard of him before, but he was pretty good. I think this was his setlist: Dancing in the Headlights, Yeah Yeah Yeah, She Cranks My Tractor, Hurricane, Dust on the Bottle (David Lee Murphy cover) and then Rock Your Body (Justin Timberlake cover) (which was appropriate since JT was playing in town tonight, too). Cowboys And Angels and then Wild in Your Smile.

He was done by like 735 and they were set up for Little Big Town like 10 minutes later. They played
Little White Church, On Fire Tonight, Bring It On Home, Pavement Ends, Sober, Front Porch Thing, Your Side Of The Bed, The Chain (Fleetwood Mac cover), Self Made, Tornado, Pontoon and Boondocks.

Keith Urban started at 9 and went til about 1045. He started with this instrumental openy bit, but then dove into Long Hot Summer and Sweet Thing. Then I Told You So and Stupid Boy, then one of his new ones, from the CD that comes out next month, called Even the Stars Fall 4 You, You Gonna Fly (with Little Big Town), Without You and Kiss a Girl (with Dustin Lynch). Then he ran up into the crowd on our side, up by the lawn, and did a little snippet of The Who's Won't Get Fooled Again, and then went straight into Days Go By, and ended on a snippet of Rumor Has It (Adele) sung by one of his band members. He did Once In A Lifetime up there, too, and came back to the stage after that. He did Better Life with a bandmate snippet of Some Nights (fun.), and then You'll Think Of Me, and Little Bit of Everything, which is another new one, then Who Wouldn't Wanna Be Me and Somebody Like You. Encored with Tonight I Wanna Cry, done on the piano, mostly acoustically. Then a bandmate snippet of Locked Out of Heaven (Bruno Mars) and ended with You Look Good in My Shirt.

It was pretty cool. Nice and calm and not too many drunk people or any of the other annoying concert things. Dad had a few problematic people on his end, which, combined with the fact that his camera was acting all sorts of batshit crazy, resulted in a little frustration. Glad I took... 495 pictures to compensate for that. And killed both of my batteries for the first time ever... Knocked that down to less than 200, though.

( More Pics... )

Well, first of all, today marked one year since we got Colby! It also would have been Buddy's Birthday.

Anyway. Concert. Dad and I left around 4:30, made it to the venue by like 5:15, grabbed a bite to eat at the mall across the street where we park (despite the 'no event parking' signs, because they're stupid (seriously, a) we eat at the mall before we go to the concert, and are therefore mall customers, b) we park in the furthest spots away (which are never occupied except on concert nights) and c) there are a ton of concert people parking there, so clearly everyone opts to ignore the pointless signs).

But, yeah. Wandered through the gates around 6:15, thankfully with no ridiculous hikes (though the path from the street to the gates makes for a wonderful drunk test course when leaving, especially when no one turns the lights on). Chilled until 7 when the first opener, Nic Cowan started. He only played a few songs, but he was pretty good. He sounds better live than on CD, I think. Dunno what he played, really.

By 7:35 the other opener was up, Levi Lowrey, a little more bluesy. He play a little longer, 8:10ish, I think. They'd both played in front of this weird curtain thing, which was weird.

Zac Brown Band started at about 8:40. Played til 10:30, which was a pretty lengthy set. 22 songs total. They played an into for a few minutes until the curtain dropped, and then started into Jump Right In, and then The Wind, As She's Walking Away, then Where The Boat Leaves From into a cover of Bob Marley's One Love, then Free with an Into the Mystic cover (Van Morrison). From there: Natural Disaster, Toes, Day That I Die, and a Ants Marching (Dave Matthews Band cover), and then Colder Weather. From there, they did an acoustic set out on the stage extension thing which included a cover of Seven Bridges Road (Eagles), their song Martin, then David Gray's Babylon, and James Taylor's The Frozen Man. Then it was back to the main stage for Keep Me In Mind, one of their really new songs = Day For The Dead, Knee Deep, Metallica's Enter Sandman, Goodbye In Her Eyes and Chicken Fried. Came back from the encore dressed as crazy black-lighted skeletons for Led Zeppelin's Kashmir and Charlie Daniels' The Devil Went Down to Georgia, which was well and truly epic.

Took us forever to get out of there, but made it home by 11:40 or so. Got some great pics despite some sucky lighting (and more distance than I've had at the last few shows, being right up by the stage).

Tonight was Get Your Preak On at Pier 6, a pre-Preakness party starring Phil Vassar. Not particularly invested/interested in Preakness (or any of the other horse races), but PV is one of few country people I hadn't seen yet.

It stormed like fucking mad right before we left for the concert, so ick. Lefta round 6, made it down there by 6:45, doors were already opened (yay for not-GA seating). Chilled for a while - watched people struggle to find their seats (the A1 row throws sooo many people off, but it's ridiculous) and were surrounded by people in the wrong seats (seriously, you literally CLICK ON your seat when you pick your ticket, you have to have SOME IDEA). But, anyway, I digress...

The opening act was a band called Old Dominion, whom I had never heard of. They were pretty cool, though. Started at 7:45, played 11 song in 45 minutes. Don't know many of them - they did do a song called Day One that was pretty awesome. They also did The Band Perry's song (co-written by one of their guys, though) Better Dig Two and their song Chainsaw, too. Some of their own songs included Crazy As It Is and Wake Up Loving You.

Phil Vassar started around 9? With no set setlist for any of his shows, they pretty much played whatever the hell they felt like playing, mixed with some requests from the audience. The first few songs, everyone stayed in their spots. Pier 6 is usually really strict about keeping people out of the aisles and stuff, but after the first few songs, there was a rush on the stage, and we all kind of realized that there was literally no one from security around. I should point out that the place was only like half-full, which has never happened before in any show I've been at there, so... I'm thinking they decided to go for a skeleton crew and they just said 'fuck it' when everyone started leaning on the stage. It seems like PV encourages that, so... yeah. Managed to get up to the stage, too, which resulted in some awesome pictures and a couple of handshakes as PV ran down the line. Also got my ticket signed. Rather, squiggled on, because it's not really anything moderately resembling letters? Someone else started the signing by removing teir bra and tossing it to him? Everyone else was a little more dignified and just held out tickets/shirts/hands/etc. Also, damn, the man likes climbing all over/jumping off of his specially reinforced piano. Anyway, yeah. Managed to mostly keep track of the setlist:

For A Little While, In A Real Love, Carlene, Bye Bye*, Six Pack Summer, Love Is A Beautiful Thing, Just Another Day In Paradise, Last Day Of My Life, Black & Whites (I think, anyway?), I'm Alright*, That's When I Love You, Love Is Alive, My Next 30 Years*, Amazing Grace, Highway To Hell/Jesse's Girl (done by his band while he took a quick break), added Little Red Rodeo on when he came back out, I'll Take That As A Yes (The Hot Tub Song), (dunno this one...). Encored with covers of Billy Joel's Big Shot and Piano Man.
* = written by PV, but generally known associated with Jo Dee Messina, Tim McGraw, and Collin Raye.

Ended at like 10:45, which is 15 minutes before the venue curfew, so I thought he'd play until then, but no. Managed to get out and get home pretty quick, too.

Picture taking was awesome this time. Pier 6 is waaaaaaaay better lit that Rams Head and well, we were just as close, pretty much, but yeah.

Dad and I left around 4, made it to Merriweather (again) just before 5 (traffic on a Sunday is soooo much better than on a Friday). Grabbed dinner at the mall and wandered for a bit before heading across the street to the Pavilion.

Had to pick up tickets at Will Call, and gates were supposed to open at 5:30, but that came and went. Didn't get in til just after 6 (I suspect sound-checks ran late, given the testing123 thing that was going on and the lack of stereo-music playing) and then even when we did get in, they didn't let us down to the seats til nearly 6:20. Finally got seated (awesome on the rail seats, yay!) and had to wait til 7.

Some girl named Kristin Kelly was opening. Never heard of her and wasn't impressed. Dunno what she played, only played 30 minutes.

Little Big Town was the other opening act, they started at 7:45. They were cool. Fun and silly. Their lighting was not conductive to picture taking (red is an awful, awful back-lighting color, blast them). They played: Front Porch Thing, Little White Church, Bones, Yor Side Of The Bed, Sober, Born This Way (Lady Gaga Cover), Bring It On Home, Tornado, Self-Made, Pontoon and ended with Boondocks. Played til 8:45 or so.

Rascal Flatts started at 9, played til about 10:30. They were cool, even if they did a lot of moving around. Hard to get pictures of. The catwalk thingy out in the pit helped a lot, as did the raised bits of their stage. They played: Banjo, Summer Nights, Fast Cars & Freedom, These Days, Come Wake Me Up, and Hot In Here. Took requests from the audience and played snippets of My Wish, I Melt, and Prayin' For Daylight. Then Stand and Why Wait. Into snippet covers of Lean On Me (Bill Withers) and Open Arms (Journey), into Broken Road, drawn out (but impressive) drum/guitar solos that led into Me & My Gang, then Life Is A Highway and Here's To You. Encored with What Hurts The Most and then did a mash-up of Boston's Foreplay/Long Time with Kansas' Carry On My Wayward Son and Free Ride by the Edgar Winter Group (I think?) which was just awesomely awesome.

Got some good pics, got home fairly quickly.

So, the puppy's doing well. We ended up naming him Colby and we figured out that his birthday is roughly April 11, which means he's 13 weeks and a few days old already. He's really smart - he's known sit literally since the day we brought him home. He's good at down and decent at leave it and roll over. He stays sometimes (still working on that) and for some reason shake is just not registering at all. He's pretty good for walks (now that he's finally figured out that he's supposed to walk not spin around and sit on your feet (that was a fun few days)). Nash seems to like him most of the time (he has grumpy moments, but so do the rest of us). He's sleeping in a crate in my room, and luckily he sleeps through the night (even if that means waking up at 7am), so yeah. My nocturnalness is suffering (except for this week when I'm dog/puppy/house-sitting for my cousin. I'm back and forth during the day, but spending the nights not at home). Our other dog, Luna, isn't a fan - she mostly just ignores him and tolerates his presence (but she's 12 years old, so we'll cut her a break for being grumpy). He falls asleep on car rides (which is awesome because Nash hates them (he makes this awful high-pitched sireny sound, so fun)).

Anyway. Pictures.
( PICTURES )