The Little Things Give You Away
So I have that cool type of insomnia that only comes with that special visit from Aunt Flow. It's characterized as being the most painful and annoying time of the month, with those special cramps that make you want to throw up all over yourself (especially when you drank on an empty stomach the night before). All I can say in this visit's defense is: at least I'm not pregnant (not that I thought I was, but just in general). Mixed with regret and anxiety, I'm probably in the "coolest" state of mind right now. It takes a strong person to admit when they are wrong (not that I'm by any means strong), but I guess I might be getting there. Motion City Soundtrack said it best when that man with the crazy hair sang, "What doesn't kill us makes us who we are". I'm believing in that phrase more and more each day. With all the drama that has been sent my way, it's the only way I've been surviving the last few weeks.
Friday, I went to Orlando for the Honda Civic Tour with Panic!, Motion City, The Hush Sound, and Phantom Planet. Being one of the strangest line ups I've ever encountered, I was skeptical from the start. I only bought a ticket because I'd never seen Phantom Planet in concert, and since they are my favorite band, I figured I should see them sometime in this lifetime. (Luckily, I got to see them in gainesville.) So Katherine and I caravaned our sweet little butts down to Orlando (stopping in true Jimmy fashion at the most sketch ass gas station for a potty break). We stopped at her house to get freshened up before the show and have some delicious griilled cheese (thank you Carlos, I mean Mr. Medina). And thank goodness we ate something because we got stuck in Orlando (I-4) traffic for an hour. An hour! I think we might have had to go maybe 10 exits. Ridiculous. Anyway, we made it to Pleasure Island (which I still think was a poor decision on whoever named downtown Disney's part). We made it to the House of Blues. Right away we were met by a giant crowd of Alex Greenwald fans circled around him. I was a little confused. I wasn't sure why he was hanging out by the merch table before the show (or why he was so sweaty). I guess I was naive enough to think that he was like that from sound check? Who knows? A girl in love will believe whatever she can convince herself of (especially when she's premenstrual). Katherine and I were kind of overwhelmed, so we just hung out by the crowd trying to figure out our next move. While we were waiting Sam walked up, looked around, I looked at him, we made eye-contact, and he asked "Where is he?" Me being the good samaritan I am helped out this poor bandmate of Alex's and said "He's in there" and pointed to the merch table crowd. Sam replied "It's probably safer out here" and I said "You are probably right". I am so dumb. After my Sam encounter, Darren walked by. Looked at me, I smiled, he looked kind of baffled. I should have just cleared up his confusion at that time with a simple "Yes, it's me, your prom date from Gainesville, I just dyed my hair blonde. What are you guys doing after the show, because it'd be really cool to hang out with you. Whatever happens happens. There will be no hard feelings in the morning. I promise," kind of thing, but no, I just followed Katherine to the bar for her to get a drink. We walked back to the front of the venue, and again tried to figure out where to stand (after enduring more curious glances from Darren). *side note: I just wish guys would take a chance. Aren't they supposed to make the first move. I even made it easy for him, I looked cute, I smiled at him multiple times, I wasn't in a big group of girls. Was is so hard for him to approach me? Besides don't rockstars like it when you pretend like you don't know who they? UGH it's so frustrating. Whatever.* So we wandered around the club. Finally, we settled on a spot by the back, by the merch table, but not close enough to be involved in all the craziness surrounding Phantom Planet's apparently successful set. The Hush Sound went on. I danced like an idiot. I had a good time. This one guy passed me. We made eye contact. I smiled. (It's almost like a theme of the night). He had tattoo sleeves. Whatever. He never talked to me the entire night either, even though he made several "attempts" at it (including staring at me the entire night and moving into my spot when the "shit hit the fan"). Motion City came onstage. At this point I was REALLY confused. I couldn't figure out why Phantom Planet hadn't gone on yet. I am so dumb. (Another theme of the night.) Whatever. I was excited for the lead singer's notorious random stories. I think it's so cool that I'm not the only person who tells random, pointless stories. However, I was sadly disappointed when the best he could come up with was that he was depressed over the last episode of the first season of "Veronica Mars". He didn't know who was at the door. (After I found out that I'd missed Phantom Planet, I wanted to be vindictive and tell him that it was Logan and spill all of the Season 2 secrets, but I didn't. I was too heart broken. Coincidentally, I found out I'd missed Phantom Planet during "Broken Heart". Weird.) Anyway, so he wanted us to cheer for the bands that had gone before them....Phantom Planet and the Hush Sound. Finally, it made sense, and Katherine said "I think Phantom Planet went first", and I said "There's no way." So she asked the annoying teeny boppers in front of us (Btw the show was packed with them, so annoying) if it was true. True to teeny bopper form (and because apparently girls of any age can't be nice to each other) she replied in the snottiest voice "Yeah, they were the first ones on," in a tone that said "I am so jealous that you are the coolest girls here so I'm going to be a bitch and act like you are simultaneously making me waste my breath by answering your question and that you are the dumbest people I've ever encountered." And true to Premenstrual Abby form, I excused myself to the bathroom to mourn in private. Since I was all ready depressed, it only makes sense for my night to get worse. Unluckily for me, Brody and Spencer* decided to embark on the journey to Orlando for the show as well. Luckily for me, I didn't have to deal with their crap until after Motion City's set. Anyway, Brody decided, seeing as how Spencer had been being a jerk to me since I learned of this awesome coincidence, that he was going to talk to me between sets. Being true to Spencer form, Spencer found a new way to be a douche bag. Seeing that Brody was conversing with me, and being the biggest pansy known to man kind, he decided to involve some random mom and ask her to get Brody away from me by saying that she was "missing him over here". Knowing that there was no way a mom wanted anything to do with Brody, I looked around just in time to see Spencer talking to her daughter and take Brody back to their group. Not knowing when to quit, Brody came back over and continued to talk to me. I mentioned something about how he shouldn't piss off his boyfriend further by talking to me, so of course he got pissed and stormed off. Panic! came on, and I couldn't be happier to hear "Nine in the Afternoon". I resumed my dancing extravaganza, but was joined shortly after by Brody again. We were talking. It was nice. Of course it couldn't last. Out of nowhere, Spencer grabs Brody's arm and drags him away from me. Well, I can't let someone be mad at me for no reason, so I proceed to ask Spencer what his problem is. Why is he so mad at me? Apparently, true to my form, I don't know when to quit, and get bitched out by Spencer (more or less). The two of them leave the show, and I burst into tears not knowing what else to do. I've never known anyone to hold so much animosity towards me for no reason. I still don't know what Spencer's problem is. Apparently, it's supposed to equate to how much my friends hate Brody, but my friends would let me talk to Brody. They wouldn't drag me away from someone who I clearly wanted to talk to. Meanwhile, I'm pretty sure tattoo sleeves saw the whole thing go down, and when I turned around from my confrontation with Spencer, he was in my spot. So I ran to the bathroom, which was embarrassing because I had to run by Alex G. and Sam. (I had talked to Alex earlier and mentioned something about missing their set. He was nice about it and wanted to know if he could do anything to make it better, and I said if I had any bars on my phone I'd have him call my friend in D.C. because she loves him...you are welcome Stephanie....of course it'd have been better if that had actually happened.) After composing myself, I returned to the show for the rest of Panic!'s set, and Katherine and I danced our butts off. (The last theme of the night.) It was very Georgia Nicholson-esque. All that was missing was a Disco Viking Inferno.
After all of that, I guess I learned that you should never leave anything to chance. If you want something, go for it. I guess I always knew that, but every experience I have makes me realize it more and more. I need to go back to the mindset that I had last fall: Do what you want, don't care what people think, pretend like you'll never see them again, because more likely than not you won't, and if you do, they won't remember the dumb stuff you did, and if they do remember, it will be funny by the time you see them again, at least I hope so. At the very least, pretend like you are drunk all the time. That way if you do anything embarrassing, you can just blame it on the alcohol. Also, I need to stop letting the dumb stuff bother me. People are douche bags. I have good friends who don't treat me like shit. Remember the good and forget all the bad. If someone is mean to me, I can't let it get to me and ruin my night. I can only control myself and the way I react to the douche bags in life. I'm tired of being the bigger person, but one day I'll get whatever's coming to me. Hopefully, it will be something nice, and if it's not, I'm sure I'll make the best of it. I always do (or at least try to). I also learned that big shows are dumb. If you have to pay more than $20 for a concert, it probably won't be worth it (unless it's Talleyrand, then it will always be worth it). Anyway, that's all. I'm out.
*Names have been changed to protect the parties at hand.
Friday, I went to Orlando for the Honda Civic Tour with Panic!, Motion City, The Hush Sound, and Phantom Planet. Being one of the strangest line ups I've ever encountered, I was skeptical from the start. I only bought a ticket because I'd never seen Phantom Planet in concert, and since they are my favorite band, I figured I should see them sometime in this lifetime. (Luckily, I got to see them in gainesville.) So Katherine and I caravaned our sweet little butts down to Orlando (stopping in true Jimmy fashion at the most sketch ass gas station for a potty break). We stopped at her house to get freshened up before the show and have some delicious griilled cheese (thank you Carlos, I mean Mr. Medina). And thank goodness we ate something because we got stuck in Orlando (I-4) traffic for an hour. An hour! I think we might have had to go maybe 10 exits. Ridiculous. Anyway, we made it to Pleasure Island (which I still think was a poor decision on whoever named downtown Disney's part). We made it to the House of Blues. Right away we were met by a giant crowd of Alex Greenwald fans circled around him. I was a little confused. I wasn't sure why he was hanging out by the merch table before the show (or why he was so sweaty). I guess I was naive enough to think that he was like that from sound check? Who knows? A girl in love will believe whatever she can convince herself of (especially when she's premenstrual). Katherine and I were kind of overwhelmed, so we just hung out by the crowd trying to figure out our next move. While we were waiting Sam walked up, looked around, I looked at him, we made eye-contact, and he asked "Where is he?" Me being the good samaritan I am helped out this poor bandmate of Alex's and said "He's in there" and pointed to the merch table crowd. Sam replied "It's probably safer out here" and I said "You are probably right". I am so dumb. After my Sam encounter, Darren walked by. Looked at me, I smiled, he looked kind of baffled. I should have just cleared up his confusion at that time with a simple "Yes, it's me, your prom date from Gainesville, I just dyed my hair blonde. What are you guys doing after the show, because it'd be really cool to hang out with you. Whatever happens happens. There will be no hard feelings in the morning. I promise," kind of thing, but no, I just followed Katherine to the bar for her to get a drink. We walked back to the front of the venue, and again tried to figure out where to stand (after enduring more curious glances from Darren). *side note: I just wish guys would take a chance. Aren't they supposed to make the first move. I even made it easy for him, I looked cute, I smiled at him multiple times, I wasn't in a big group of girls. Was is so hard for him to approach me? Besides don't rockstars like it when you pretend like you don't know who they? UGH it's so frustrating. Whatever.* So we wandered around the club. Finally, we settled on a spot by the back, by the merch table, but not close enough to be involved in all the craziness surrounding Phantom Planet's apparently successful set. The Hush Sound went on. I danced like an idiot. I had a good time. This one guy passed me. We made eye contact. I smiled. (It's almost like a theme of the night). He had tattoo sleeves. Whatever. He never talked to me the entire night either, even though he made several "attempts" at it (including staring at me the entire night and moving into my spot when the "shit hit the fan"). Motion City came onstage. At this point I was REALLY confused. I couldn't figure out why Phantom Planet hadn't gone on yet. I am so dumb. (Another theme of the night.) Whatever. I was excited for the lead singer's notorious random stories. I think it's so cool that I'm not the only person who tells random, pointless stories. However, I was sadly disappointed when the best he could come up with was that he was depressed over the last episode of the first season of "Veronica Mars". He didn't know who was at the door. (After I found out that I'd missed Phantom Planet, I wanted to be vindictive and tell him that it was Logan and spill all of the Season 2 secrets, but I didn't. I was too heart broken. Coincidentally, I found out I'd missed Phantom Planet during "Broken Heart". Weird.) Anyway, so he wanted us to cheer for the bands that had gone before them....Phantom Planet and the Hush Sound. Finally, it made sense, and Katherine said "I think Phantom Planet went first", and I said "There's no way." So she asked the annoying teeny boppers in front of us (Btw the show was packed with them, so annoying) if it was true. True to teeny bopper form (and because apparently girls of any age can't be nice to each other) she replied in the snottiest voice "Yeah, they were the first ones on," in a tone that said "I am so jealous that you are the coolest girls here so I'm going to be a bitch and act like you are simultaneously making me waste my breath by answering your question and that you are the dumbest people I've ever encountered." And true to Premenstrual Abby form, I excused myself to the bathroom to mourn in private. Since I was all ready depressed, it only makes sense for my night to get worse. Unluckily for me, Brody and Spencer* decided to embark on the journey to Orlando for the show as well. Luckily for me, I didn't have to deal with their crap until after Motion City's set. Anyway, Brody decided, seeing as how Spencer had been being a jerk to me since I learned of this awesome coincidence, that he was going to talk to me between sets. Being true to Spencer form, Spencer found a new way to be a douche bag. Seeing that Brody was conversing with me, and being the biggest pansy known to man kind, he decided to involve some random mom and ask her to get Brody away from me by saying that she was "missing him over here". Knowing that there was no way a mom wanted anything to do with Brody, I looked around just in time to see Spencer talking to her daughter and take Brody back to their group. Not knowing when to quit, Brody came back over and continued to talk to me. I mentioned something about how he shouldn't piss off his boyfriend further by talking to me, so of course he got pissed and stormed off. Panic! came on, and I couldn't be happier to hear "Nine in the Afternoon". I resumed my dancing extravaganza, but was joined shortly after by Brody again. We were talking. It was nice. Of course it couldn't last. Out of nowhere, Spencer grabs Brody's arm and drags him away from me. Well, I can't let someone be mad at me for no reason, so I proceed to ask Spencer what his problem is. Why is he so mad at me? Apparently, true to my form, I don't know when to quit, and get bitched out by Spencer (more or less). The two of them leave the show, and I burst into tears not knowing what else to do. I've never known anyone to hold so much animosity towards me for no reason. I still don't know what Spencer's problem is. Apparently, it's supposed to equate to how much my friends hate Brody, but my friends would let me talk to Brody. They wouldn't drag me away from someone who I clearly wanted to talk to. Meanwhile, I'm pretty sure tattoo sleeves saw the whole thing go down, and when I turned around from my confrontation with Spencer, he was in my spot. So I ran to the bathroom, which was embarrassing because I had to run by Alex G. and Sam. (I had talked to Alex earlier and mentioned something about missing their set. He was nice about it and wanted to know if he could do anything to make it better, and I said if I had any bars on my phone I'd have him call my friend in D.C. because she loves him...you are welcome Stephanie....of course it'd have been better if that had actually happened.) After composing myself, I returned to the show for the rest of Panic!'s set, and Katherine and I danced our butts off. (The last theme of the night.) It was very Georgia Nicholson-esque. All that was missing was a Disco Viking Inferno.
After all of that, I guess I learned that you should never leave anything to chance. If you want something, go for it. I guess I always knew that, but every experience I have makes me realize it more and more. I need to go back to the mindset that I had last fall: Do what you want, don't care what people think, pretend like you'll never see them again, because more likely than not you won't, and if you do, they won't remember the dumb stuff you did, and if they do remember, it will be funny by the time you see them again, at least I hope so. At the very least, pretend like you are drunk all the time. That way if you do anything embarrassing, you can just blame it on the alcohol. Also, I need to stop letting the dumb stuff bother me. People are douche bags. I have good friends who don't treat me like shit. Remember the good and forget all the bad. If someone is mean to me, I can't let it get to me and ruin my night. I can only control myself and the way I react to the douche bags in life. I'm tired of being the bigger person, but one day I'll get whatever's coming to me. Hopefully, it will be something nice, and if it's not, I'm sure I'll make the best of it. I always do (or at least try to). I also learned that big shows are dumb. If you have to pay more than $20 for a concert, it probably won't be worth it (unless it's Talleyrand, then it will always be worth it). Anyway, that's all. I'm out.
*Names have been changed to protect the parties at hand.