Birthday Recap

The Manling's first birthday coincides with the release of the Decemberist's new album!

Speaking of birthdays, mine was actually a really great time. I didn't receive a single gift, which was a bummer, but Mark got me these amazing flowers that were about 4 feet tall, purple, and just crazy looking. I have no idea what they are called. Then, of course, the show!

We ended up having Mark's friend's wife babysit, way up it seemed near the Wyoming border. WE dropped the Manling off, and I had some anxiety that he would be hard to handle. Apparently, he did great: a little aggressive toward the little girls there, and then shy and miserable until he fell asleep. But no real tantrums, thank goodness.

We got to Red Rocks in the broiling sun only to find out that due to the request of Social Distortion that no containers, including the all-important-in-90+-degree-weather water. I was like you've got to be kidding me, and figured that that was the first sign of a very bad time.

The first band, 9 Black Alps, started promptly at 5pm, and ended at 5:30. I wasn't a big fan of them, so we had trekked up to the top to grab the first of the 4 margaritas I ended up drinking that night. I'm not sure what they put in those things (tragi-comic attempt to downplay my complete lack of tolerance anymore), but I was completely hammered by the end of the evening.

The Supersuckers played a vy brief set as well, and gave a shout out to the hometown darlings the Railbenders. I was hoping that Eddie would pull Jim Dalton up on stage to sing a song or 2 but since they were bumped by Tiger Army, I figure they didn't have the time. The highlights for me were "Pretty Fucked Up" and "Bloody Mary Morning," which Eddie dedicated to his wife, who was also having a birthday that day. During this set, L&K arrived and we 4 congratulated ourselves for being baby-free for the evening.

Tiger Army came on next, and despite the extremely long lines to get drinks, I was already pretty drunk. I do remember them playing most of my favourite songs, and that the bassist had a green bass, which I thought was very striking. It was the first time I'd ever seen Tiger Army and it was great! M,S, and M's "gaggle" of friends that he always seems to have, showed up during this set, and more making fun of my light-weightedness occurred.

I was having the time of my life, however. It felt good to be away from the Manling for more than 3-4 hours. This was the first time I had been away from him for that long. I wasn't too anxious about it, although I did keep thinking about how when I was his age, my parents left me with my aunt and I pulled a hot-water percolator onto myself causing major 2nd-degree burns which gave me major scarring since before I can remember anything and that really embarassed me when I was a kid. I figured that odds were severely against something like that happening, but it did keep running through my mind. I think that's why I really decided to drink - to get my mind off of it.

Social Distortion finally took the stage around 9pm. It was so weird to be at an early show, but since we had to drive back up to the North Pole to pick up the Manling, well, Mark was driving, not me, it wasn't really a bad thing. Mike Ness was in rare form, and played lots of oldies and goodies. Best of all, he wasn't in a ranting mood. Definitely one of, if not THE best Social D set I've seen ever.

I was really surprised to see that a good majority of the seats were empty before they played, but the place filled up when they took the stage. I like Social D quite a bit, but I didn't imagine that they'd draw such a crowd. Then again, D, J, J, and R told me that they only came to see Social D, and only came in right before their set, so I guess others felt the same way.

On the way out, we saw Eddie Spaghetti, his wife, and child (Quattro? Was his name really Quattro?) at the Supersuckers merch booth and gave him kudos for great but way too short set, and acknowledging the shout-out to the Railbenders. At least that's what I hope came out of my slurred converstaion.

The venue was exquisite. The weather eventually cooled down to a very tolerable temperature. The stars were shining. I had a nice drunk going. There were a bunch of my friends there. The line-up was a dream come true. All in all, it was in my top 5 Best Concerts Ever, and definitely beats out the other birthday concert I've seen - Material Issue at the Theatre of Living Arts in Philadelphia for my 16th birthday.

Picking up the Manling was the best part of the night though, and I sat next to my sleepy baby on the way home. He'd been asleep for 4 hours before we got there, and it was a good 45 minute drive home. Of course once we were at home and I really really needed to pass out, he decided to wake up and not go back to sleep for what seemed like an eternity. I crammed down a whole pizza and some water, gave him a bottle, and finally just let him crawl all over me on the floor until both of us fell asleep.

It was a great birthday! (I'm not even going to get into how I felt the next day, and I babysat a 5-week old infant!)