that was good.

I got dressed up after work to look like I had attitude so I wouldn't get spit on by some angsty high school boy in size zero jeans with prettier hair than mine and eyeliner and a tight hoodie and a red handkerchief tied around his leg (there were sooo many there). When you're at a show alone you're more prone to being judged by strangers, I've found. Because of that I completely missed mewithoutyou and didn't get to buy my ticket to the Jason Mraz show next week. Oh well. I caught the end of dredg and they were good. I like music that makes me feel like I'm on drugs (dredg, Jason Mraz, and long extended guitar solos at the ends of concerts fall into this category), as well as music that makes me feel like I'm somewhere else (trance, imogen, some new age fall into this one, among others), and music that makes me feel powerful (like a lot of rap). The blood brothers' lead singer was the kind of vocalist who'll be out of a job in a few years because his vocal cords will be reduced to three or four microscopic fibers from all the screaming. I could have gone without that, but it gave me a chance to sit down.

Coheed and Cambria themselves were great. Fancy backdrop this time, and sort of a scripty-thing going on in the sense that they opened exactly like their album and played through for a few songs before breaking back into old stuff (so the bassist got to scream after all). I stood in the back on the wheelchair ramp and leaned against the railing, so not only was I safe from flying teenagers, I got something to lean against AND an elevated view. You taller people would not believe what we shorter people have to put up with when we go to concerts. Even at a foot above ground level I was still susceptible to the fro of the 6 foot something guy who decided to stand right in front of me. (why do the tall ones have to have big hair too?) The music was amazing...don't really have much I can say about that. It was really good to feel it. Would have been more substantial if I'd immersed myself in the sweaty crowd, but I wasn't feeling up to it. The one mistake they made was having a scripted exit...they finished the final chord and immediately walked off the stage as a really calming, peaceful, eerie little melody began to play (accompanied by pretty blue lights) that made people think that something else was coming, plus it was all too calming to make people want to scream for an encore. As a result, it was the weakest post-show applause I'd ever seen, and I started to get scared that they wouldn't come back out (even though no one in the room was leaving, because we all knew it was coming). I could sense the fear course through the room as people desperately tried to rouse a cheer from the crowd. After a failed rhythmic clap, someone got a chant going, and that finally did the trick. Phew.

On the way home...wait. Let me start over.
I'll be the first to admit that I was born without an internal compass. I once ended up halfway through Pendleton on my way to LA (but this was six months after I had gotten my license and I hadn't done that much freeway driving, neither did I have good directions to go by, and it was dark so I couldn't see the signs...) and my mom has never let me live it down. However, while I may not be able to tell east from west (my mom says "the mountains are to the east, the ocean to the west," you can never see the ocean, and the mountains are only visible on a clear day, and I'm too lame to look at the sun), I like to believe that I have a *sense* for getting myself un-lost. A good skill to have since I tend to get myself lost on a semi-regular basis. So sometimes I perform an experiment--if I find myself lost, rather than pull a u-turn and try to retrace my steps, I rely on my spider sense to bring me back to civilization (or wherever it is I'm trying to go). This also applies when I'm on foot. And it always works. I can find my way anywhere, it just might not be via the most direct route. It makes me feel better about myself, if nothing else. Reassures me that I won't starve to death if I ever get lost without my Thomas Guide or a cellphone.

I performed this experiment last night, since a wrong turn put me on the other side of Mission Bay from where I needed to be. It was a nice night, and I had CoCa on to prolong the feeling, so I decided not to rush and just follow my nose. It worked, and I got a nice relaxing drive amongst the pretty lights of San Diego and Mission Bay in the dark.

So yeah, it was good.