something like a phenomena
Friday evening I headed down to the cities, dropping steph off partway. We rocked the old school jams on the way down, probably frightening the cars we passed. It was my first time driving in the cities and I was nervous. I had mapquested directions, but heard mixed reviews about the area in which I was going. Turns out the negative ones were correct; it was totally the hood. Not the best to have a little white girl by herself in unfamiliar territory in such a neighborhood. Luckily, with the exception of some yelled comment about my booty, all turned out to be safe. The reason for my venture into that area was a viedo shoot for a really great band from the cities, called small towns burn a little slower. I took a liking to them when I saw them play up here in the beginning of february. They were shooting their very first video, completely out of pocket and with a professional director (has done numerous videos for the soviettes, ones for nofx, lagwagon, etc...) and needed some extras. I thought it would be an awesome experience and aside from it being great just to be hearing the band again and hanging out, I thought it would be cool to see things from behind the scenes. As expected, there was a lot of waiting around and not doing anything. On the plus side, I saw someone I had met in duluth last summer and ended up hanging out with him and his two friends so I didn't have to fly solo after all. Good thing too, because when I tried to make small talk with some people when I first arrived they weren't friendly. dumb scenesters. Eventually I did end up getting into some crowd shots. It was great. We were filming at their friends' house so it wasn't too large and everyone got to rock out. It was a lot of fun.
Unfortunately the directions mapquest gave me from the shoot were a million times more difficult than the ones to it. It wasn't too far, but it there were umpteen million turns/exits/merges (which definitely should have been called exits). I took at least three wrong turns, the first of which was still while in the shady area, only now it was 1:30 am. While trying to find my way back my car started making this terrible grinding noise and I thought 'holy s*&#, did somebody do something to my car?!?' Thankfully no, i was just my brakes making a weird noise. Which probably isn't a good thing either, but not nearly as bad as something being tampered with. It stopped after I started going faster. After getting lost around uptown and stressing over finding my way back to the right highway, I finally got back on track and met my mom in bloomington. It was so great to see her again - it had been since christmas break! She had been nervous about her navigation too. I get my fear of driving in cities from her.
We woke up on saturday and went to the mall of america. I have been there twice before, once when I was eight and once when I was sixteen. We weren't exactly in a shopping mood and didn't leave with much but managed to spend most of the day there. Ate a nice meal and rode the new rollercoaster that spins as it is going up and down. It was day two of the video shoot and would have meant more involvement and probably the fun night, celebrating finishing it, but I didn't know if I should go or not. I really wanted to but didn't know if I could navigate my way back there after all of the mishaps the night before and also felt bad about leaving my mom, especially after I got in so late the night before. I flip-flopped over the decision a bunch of times before finally deciding not to go. I was a little disappointed, but I thought that I really should spend the time with my mom, especially seeing as she drove 4 1/2 hours to see me. We ended up staying in and playing pop culture trivial pursuit. you do what you've got to do. It was still a good time. I just hope that I made it into a single split second of the video and I will be happy. really hope so. that would be so amazing.
The next morning we slept in a little before packing things up to check out. Being easter, not a whole lot was open, but we went to the rainforest cafe for lunch. I got a delicious cajun pasta dish which I somehow managed to get sauce in my eye. It burned so much, and when I went to the bathroom to wash it out some lady turned on the other sink, causing the sink I was using to lose pressure and stop so I was left waiting with a searing eyeball until she finished washing her hands. We bummed around a little afterward, went to ikea, got gas, took some rad photos in my grandma's leftover seventies sunglasses, then it was time to part ways. I went to terese's place (only one wrong turn on the way) and we went to hard times cafe and met her cousin and friend for some dinner. Crazy girls. We headed over to first ave for the yeah yeah yeahs show and scored some ace spots about three people from the front. Katie and her sister met up with us about an hour later but bailed when things started to get crazy. There were some extra smelly mofos there last night, worse than normal. The show was awesome. Karen o is amazing. She was wearing a silver shortsuit, chuck taylors, and black and blacklight orange streaks under her eyes. Nick Zinner reminds of a Time Burton character. He is a Tim Burton character in my mind. I like it. There was this really cool moment where karen had her arm extended, microphone in hand, and brian was drumming away and their shadows were looming large behind them. Really cool image. It was a show that made you want to dance, but in a concert atmosphere with everyone piled in on top of each other, so it ended up taking on some really weird sexual tones. a big sweaty orgy. There was a bottle broken on the ground so were were all dancing on this crunchy glass. I was right on this sweet gay couple, who were much better and more pleasant smelling than much of the rest of the crowd. I crashed at Terese's and hit the road for d-town this morning.
Unfortunately the directions mapquest gave me from the shoot were a million times more difficult than the ones to it. It wasn't too far, but it there were umpteen million turns/exits/merges (which definitely should have been called exits). I took at least three wrong turns, the first of which was still while in the shady area, only now it was 1:30 am. While trying to find my way back my car started making this terrible grinding noise and I thought 'holy s*&#, did somebody do something to my car?!?' Thankfully no, i was just my brakes making a weird noise. Which probably isn't a good thing either, but not nearly as bad as something being tampered with. It stopped after I started going faster. After getting lost around uptown and stressing over finding my way back to the right highway, I finally got back on track and met my mom in bloomington. It was so great to see her again - it had been since christmas break! She had been nervous about her navigation too. I get my fear of driving in cities from her.
We woke up on saturday and went to the mall of america. I have been there twice before, once when I was eight and once when I was sixteen. We weren't exactly in a shopping mood and didn't leave with much but managed to spend most of the day there. Ate a nice meal and rode the new rollercoaster that spins as it is going up and down. It was day two of the video shoot and would have meant more involvement and probably the fun night, celebrating finishing it, but I didn't know if I should go or not. I really wanted to but didn't know if I could navigate my way back there after all of the mishaps the night before and also felt bad about leaving my mom, especially after I got in so late the night before. I flip-flopped over the decision a bunch of times before finally deciding not to go. I was a little disappointed, but I thought that I really should spend the time with my mom, especially seeing as she drove 4 1/2 hours to see me. We ended up staying in and playing pop culture trivial pursuit. you do what you've got to do. It was still a good time. I just hope that I made it into a single split second of the video and I will be happy. really hope so. that would be so amazing.
The next morning we slept in a little before packing things up to check out. Being easter, not a whole lot was open, but we went to the rainforest cafe for lunch. I got a delicious cajun pasta dish which I somehow managed to get sauce in my eye. It burned so much, and when I went to the bathroom to wash it out some lady turned on the other sink, causing the sink I was using to lose pressure and stop so I was left waiting with a searing eyeball until she finished washing her hands. We bummed around a little afterward, went to ikea, got gas, took some rad photos in my grandma's leftover seventies sunglasses, then it was time to part ways. I went to terese's place (only one wrong turn on the way) and we went to hard times cafe and met her cousin and friend for some dinner. Crazy girls. We headed over to first ave for the yeah yeah yeahs show and scored some ace spots about three people from the front. Katie and her sister met up with us about an hour later but bailed when things started to get crazy. There were some extra smelly mofos there last night, worse than normal. The show was awesome. Karen o is amazing. She was wearing a silver shortsuit, chuck taylors, and black and blacklight orange streaks under her eyes. Nick Zinner reminds of a Time Burton character. He is a Tim Burton character in my mind. I like it. There was this really cool moment where karen had her arm extended, microphone in hand, and brian was drumming away and their shadows were looming large behind them. Really cool image. It was a show that made you want to dance, but in a concert atmosphere with everyone piled in on top of each other, so it ended up taking on some really weird sexual tones. a big sweaty orgy. There was a bottle broken on the ground so were were all dancing on this crunchy glass. I was right on this sweet gay couple, who were much better and more pleasant smelling than much of the rest of the crowd. I crashed at Terese's and hit the road for d-town this morning.