All the little ants are marching

(photo by guest blogger Adam Chittum)

I'm SO not a deadline blogger. Guess it's a good thing I don't work for a daily anymore.

Adam and I went to the Dave Matthews concert last night at SANDSTONE (sorry, but I refuse to call is "Verizon Wireless Amphitheater"). Two teachers that I work with came along with us. I really did want to post the photos last night, but come on, it was a school night.

Who do you think I am? Superwoman? I think not. My butt's usually in bed by 9:30 on school nights, and we didn't get home from the show until right at midnight. It was bedtime for bonzo at that point.

The show was incredible, as expected. Dave took the stage about 8:20 and played for two and a half hours. There was an amazing full moon rising just to the right of the stage, and the weather was perfect.

The first two songs were off the "Crash" album, and the band proceeded to play a great mix of its stuff. They played enough jams to please the Adams of the crowd, and enough singles to please all the hipsters in attendance.

They closed the encore with "Ants Marching" off the "Under the Table and Dreaming" album, and boy, did it get the crowd going with the air drums.


Here, Manal (left) and Matt (center) show off their mad airdrumming skills during "Ants Marching." The guy on the right is a friend of Matt's but I only met him last night and I can't remember his name. (Police are saying alcohol might have been involved.)


Here's us before the show. The opening act, Umphrey's McGee was on stage. It's really too bad that so many people were there just to see Dave. Umphrey's is a great band, and they played a good little set. Unfortunately, by the time we got in and settled, we only got to see about 15 minutes.


I'm pretty sure this photo of Random Drunk Guy was taken about 10 seconds after he ralphed right there in the grass. That's arm's not around his back to show affection, folks. It's holding him upright.

There was a tiny bit of a snafu as we went through security. I was SURE that the frisking process would not have unearthed my tiny Digital Elph, but lo and behold, I went through the line with the most thorough screener, skilled in the art of detecting secret-good-for-sneaking-in-cameras pockets in backpacks. I thought I was going to have to go all the way back to the car. Damn. Damn damn.

Luckily, Adam was already inside the gate, so I just passed it through the fence to him, and got right back in the security line. The second time I went through (with a different screener) the lady didn't even LOOK in my bag. Gaahhh.

One last thing about the concert. Here's a lesson in bathroom line etiquette. To truly appreciate this story, you need to know that a beer cost $8 at the venue. I was about the 15th person in line, with 15 more people behind me, including a woman was superduper pregnant. Some other chick walked up to the line and announced: "I'll give you five bucks if you let me cut in line."

SOME JACKASS ACTUALLY LET HER DO IT AND TOOK THE FIVE BUCKS.

Shouldn't you pay EVERYONE behind that point in the line $5? AND, I'd at least ask for $8 so I could buy a freakin' drink.

You should have seen all the pissy women (who really had to, well, you know) in the line. It wasn't pretty.

Oops, 9:30. Time for bed.