coldplayas
I am writing this in the morning, because A is at his grandparents' house and I need to write this down to purge it from my system. I am eating "shimin-sheol" (cinnamon cereal) and having a cuppa, and am staying quiet because D is still asleep. I could be doing any number of things on my "morning off," but it's impossible to get to sleep again with all that's in my head.
We went to the Coldplay concert last night, at the Nissan Pavilion outside of Manassas VA. The trip there, though the company was great, was a nerve-frying 4 hour crawl-along, ending at the ONE entrance to the pavilion way after the opening act was over (Rilo Kiley). Note to self: never ever visit Manassas again on a Friday afternoon.
We arrived, and were so excited that our seats were 3 rows away from the pit, so about 30 yards away from the stage--a great omen, since our seats to the U2 concert in Philly were similarly spaced, and that was by far the best concert experience of my life. The stage was HUGE, the entire place was packed with people, a sea of mostly-white faces as far as you could see. I talked to a friend next to me, Kate, and I heard "Miss Newcomb?" in a deep but boyish voice behind me. Out of the 30 thousand people there, one of my former students was right behind us. "I'm in college now," he said, and all I could think about was the fact that he was one of the first kids to get a C in my class at the private school I worked in. Awkward!
The concert started, and I was a little annoyed at myself for not wearing higher shoes, because the people in front of me were pretty tall--2 brown-haired girls, a New Jersey-looking guy in a backwards baseball hat, and then with a beer or two, a shorter pock-faced guy in a paisley shirt. Several people from our row kept coming and going throughout the concert, like some kind of selective exodus, and knocked over D's beer on the ground. Bad start, but the music was great.
At first things were ok, nothing more than a bit more movement from the row in front of me than normal, where it became obvious that baseball-hat guy was on some very strong drug (Viagra, we wondered later?), and paisley-puss (as D later called him) was slightly more aware. The girls looked like they were just interested in Chris Martin, and singing along like the rest of us. Then the guys started moving in.
What followed was probably the single-grodyest scene I have witnessed in my life. Paisley was pawing over the tall girl, then the short girl, with Baseball joining in on the groping and semi-kissing, but being pushed away by the short girl, who kept singing the lyrics to everyone like they were a conversation she was having. The girls were clearly uncomfortable one minute, then willing victims of the grope-fest, as their "dates" swapped back and forth in front of me. Eventually there was a sort of threesome right in front of my seat, obscuring everything on the stage, and I yelled something like "for pete's sake!" with my hands out, to everyone who could see this event unfolding. I moved over next to my best friend, who had a clearer view over this guy's head--an Asian guy who looked like he was by himself, and trying to enjoy the concert but not having much luck with his neighbors' expansive swaying and slow-mo club dance moves.
In the beginning of all this, D said that these guys reminded him of the complete losers in Sideways, much older than the girls and trying to score. Then they reminded me of the two guys on Saturday Night live who would dance up to women together with their heads bopping to the side at the same time. But then, after what must have been 5 excellent songs I can't remember at all, Pasley started literally humping tall girl from behind, and Baseball was pointing to them to show short girl, and making "why aren't you doing this too" motions to her. It would have been funny if this was a sitcom, but I just wanted to puke, and turned away to try and focus on the concert that I had paid for.
D took another tack: he decided to fake-laugh hysterically, maniacally loud, while pointing at the people in front of us. Everyone turned around to stare at him, and it was a semi-quiet part of the concert too, while he continued to cackle and point. Baseball turned around with his glazed-over stare, and pointed at D, and they did this sort of mirror-image pointing while Baseball started to realized that D was laughing AT him and his pal, not because he was drunk or whatever.
Things calmed down for a minute or two, then the band did a small set at the front end of the stage, of a great song from the new album (can't remember the title, but he's talking about waiting for his love), and then Johnny Cash's song, Ring of Fire. It was great. The groping continued, however, and I tapped the Asian dude on the shoulder and asked him if he wanted to come up to our row, so he could get away and see something better than this horrific spectacle.
I looked around, and Baseball, who had given up Short Girl as a bad job, was looking around for some more prey, after dancing rather close with a clearly old woman at the end of the row. Baseball turned around, and was looking my friend Kate up and down like a piece of meat, and was motioning to her that she should be tempted by him. Then he reached up to touch her shoulder and I snapped into Detention-Giving Teacher Mode and smacked his hand away, and pushed him back shouting "DON'T TOUCH HER! GET AWAY!"
At first he looked like he wanted to hit me, but then he turned around and left the row entirely. D went down to talk to the beefy security guard, who came back and found that Paisley and his recently-humped date weren't even in the seats named on their tickets. I was shaking and I wanted to cry. When Tall Girl and Paisley Puss left, we all cheered.
They returned at the last song, which was somewhat too late according to the security guard to do anything about it.
We discussed this gross spectacle for quite a while, sitting in the car waiting for traffic to ease up.
It was 2:15 in the morning when we finally got home, and luckily I had dreams completely unrelated to our experience, only to wake up feeling like I had to take a purging shower. Or at least, put it all in my Blog, and hopefully rid myself of the dirty feeling by spreading it to all my dear readers.
My best friend and I, incidentally, are convinced that going to big events together is a cursed experience. Our last concert we attended together was the Baltimore Symphony. Literally five bars into the first piece, a woman behind us began to snore in a very manly way. She continued to snore, harmonized by another snoring patron of the arts, throughout the first half of the concert. At intermission, we got up and asked to be moved, and got free tickets three rows from the front. We could see every hair on the violinist's bow. It was eventually great, but again, I don't recall anything terribly positive. Like now.
We went to the Coldplay concert last night, at the Nissan Pavilion outside of Manassas VA. The trip there, though the company was great, was a nerve-frying 4 hour crawl-along, ending at the ONE entrance to the pavilion way after the opening act was over (Rilo Kiley). Note to self: never ever visit Manassas again on a Friday afternoon.
We arrived, and were so excited that our seats were 3 rows away from the pit, so about 30 yards away from the stage--a great omen, since our seats to the U2 concert in Philly were similarly spaced, and that was by far the best concert experience of my life. The stage was HUGE, the entire place was packed with people, a sea of mostly-white faces as far as you could see. I talked to a friend next to me, Kate, and I heard "Miss Newcomb?" in a deep but boyish voice behind me. Out of the 30 thousand people there, one of my former students was right behind us. "I'm in college now," he said, and all I could think about was the fact that he was one of the first kids to get a C in my class at the private school I worked in. Awkward!
The concert started, and I was a little annoyed at myself for not wearing higher shoes, because the people in front of me were pretty tall--2 brown-haired girls, a New Jersey-looking guy in a backwards baseball hat, and then with a beer or two, a shorter pock-faced guy in a paisley shirt. Several people from our row kept coming and going throughout the concert, like some kind of selective exodus, and knocked over D's beer on the ground. Bad start, but the music was great.
At first things were ok, nothing more than a bit more movement from the row in front of me than normal, where it became obvious that baseball-hat guy was on some very strong drug (Viagra, we wondered later?), and paisley-puss (as D later called him) was slightly more aware. The girls looked like they were just interested in Chris Martin, and singing along like the rest of us. Then the guys started moving in.
What followed was probably the single-grodyest scene I have witnessed in my life. Paisley was pawing over the tall girl, then the short girl, with Baseball joining in on the groping and semi-kissing, but being pushed away by the short girl, who kept singing the lyrics to everyone like they were a conversation she was having. The girls were clearly uncomfortable one minute, then willing victims of the grope-fest, as their "dates" swapped back and forth in front of me. Eventually there was a sort of threesome right in front of my seat, obscuring everything on the stage, and I yelled something like "for pete's sake!" with my hands out, to everyone who could see this event unfolding. I moved over next to my best friend, who had a clearer view over this guy's head--an Asian guy who looked like he was by himself, and trying to enjoy the concert but not having much luck with his neighbors' expansive swaying and slow-mo club dance moves.
In the beginning of all this, D said that these guys reminded him of the complete losers in Sideways, much older than the girls and trying to score. Then they reminded me of the two guys on Saturday Night live who would dance up to women together with their heads bopping to the side at the same time. But then, after what must have been 5 excellent songs I can't remember at all, Pasley started literally humping tall girl from behind, and Baseball was pointing to them to show short girl, and making "why aren't you doing this too" motions to her. It would have been funny if this was a sitcom, but I just wanted to puke, and turned away to try and focus on the concert that I had paid for.
D took another tack: he decided to fake-laugh hysterically, maniacally loud, while pointing at the people in front of us. Everyone turned around to stare at him, and it was a semi-quiet part of the concert too, while he continued to cackle and point. Baseball turned around with his glazed-over stare, and pointed at D, and they did this sort of mirror-image pointing while Baseball started to realized that D was laughing AT him and his pal, not because he was drunk or whatever.
Things calmed down for a minute or two, then the band did a small set at the front end of the stage, of a great song from the new album (can't remember the title, but he's talking about waiting for his love), and then Johnny Cash's song, Ring of Fire. It was great. The groping continued, however, and I tapped the Asian dude on the shoulder and asked him if he wanted to come up to our row, so he could get away and see something better than this horrific spectacle.
I looked around, and Baseball, who had given up Short Girl as a bad job, was looking around for some more prey, after dancing rather close with a clearly old woman at the end of the row. Baseball turned around, and was looking my friend Kate up and down like a piece of meat, and was motioning to her that she should be tempted by him. Then he reached up to touch her shoulder and I snapped into Detention-Giving Teacher Mode and smacked his hand away, and pushed him back shouting "DON'T TOUCH HER! GET AWAY!"
At first he looked like he wanted to hit me, but then he turned around and left the row entirely. D went down to talk to the beefy security guard, who came back and found that Paisley and his recently-humped date weren't even in the seats named on their tickets. I was shaking and I wanted to cry. When Tall Girl and Paisley Puss left, we all cheered.
They returned at the last song, which was somewhat too late according to the security guard to do anything about it.
We discussed this gross spectacle for quite a while, sitting in the car waiting for traffic to ease up.
It was 2:15 in the morning when we finally got home, and luckily I had dreams completely unrelated to our experience, only to wake up feeling like I had to take a purging shower. Or at least, put it all in my Blog, and hopefully rid myself of the dirty feeling by spreading it to all my dear readers.
My best friend and I, incidentally, are convinced that going to big events together is a cursed experience. Our last concert we attended together was the Baltimore Symphony. Literally five bars into the first piece, a woman behind us began to snore in a very manly way. She continued to snore, harmonized by another snoring patron of the arts, throughout the first half of the concert. At intermission, we got up and asked to be moved, and got free tickets three rows from the front. We could see every hair on the violinist's bow. It was eventually great, but again, I don't recall anything terribly positive. Like now.
2 Comments:
I think I'll just link your post, so I don't to write about it...you covered everything, except how fun Coldplay was to watch...or maybe I did have a better view. I'm sorry that we couldn't have those losers arrested for their behavior.
thanks for the link ;) , "I can laugh about it now but at the time it was terrible..." so true!!
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