Franz!!!!
..oh, and Death Cab

I think this was the fourth time in the past month I was in Chicago..more than any time last year....

Well let me tell you, today was an amazing crazy day..I wanted to wake up early to get some errands accomplished, well you know just as well as i do, that never happened...so i made my way on over to the OG, hoping to be clocked in early and leave early as well - there were 8 11:30's scheduled and only two people between open and then..so in reality i was trying to help them out. so i get there and i already don't want to be there..i see the managers all around mindy and i walk around them all and ask to be clocked in, as i turn the corner mindy says her usual, "was that a full sentence, let's try that again" remark..to which i snap back with, "why yes, 'can i be clocked in' is a full sentence last time i checked, though it may have poor grammer, needing to replace the 'can' with 'may', in today's world it gets the same message across.." ..at which time Matt the manager says not until 1130 when i am scheduled, unless they need me now, which thewy don't so not till 1130....and the way he said it i just went off..i flipped out, said fine and started to rip my apron off storming out, as i passed by the host stand i told them the managers wouldn't clock me in so i wasn't coming back..and if somebody would have been watching me they would have seen my whip out my phone as soon as i walked out the doors...yeah, i was calling in.

that didn't go over so well, Matt of course was the manager i had to talk to, he didn't understand why i wqas calling off, i didn't want to get into how i think he's a fucking assbag so i really didn't say much, silence is always the better option when negotiating..he told me that it would have to be documented and i told him to go for it, and as he was saying good bye i just hung up...

afterwards i got my oil changed, texted rachann to let her know we could leave whenever since i called off, and she had actually skipped class, so it was all good..we met up shortly later, me beating her to her house somehow even though she said she was ready, and then us backtracking to my place to get the tickets..but we were on the raod in no time.

i had to make a stop at the St. John police department to settle a dispute with them, and then we made our way over to Rockin' Red Robin to enjoy a nice pre-concert dinner. I was very much in the need for my terryioki chichen sandwich with steak fries and ranch..we had an appitizer of the buffolo wings which weren't that spicy, but makes your sinuses clear up whenever you would take them to a table...and i actually showed our waitress how to work the aloha system, she didn't know you could actually split up items into multiple pieces..amazing, that was one of the greatest things about Aloha!

so then it was onto the Aragon, we rocked out to such tunes as Aaron Carter, 2gether, and an Old School Pity Party CD, yeah. we made good time, only hitting traffic on apart of the LSD, but after that it was clear sailing. now parking was the other thing..we drove around for just a bit until we found a spot realitivly close..i started to walk south, rachann was heading north..this is where it gets good..i tell her i swore i just passed the Aragon on my left side, she tried to explain to me i did, but i had turned left three more times or something..which is how we started out going, but my last pass was with the Aragon on my left, we never turned, but we parked...so she put her faith in me and we walked..and as we were walking i was distracted by two things, a funny store name (i forget now but it had something to do with drugs and free or something) and this lady too big to fit into what she was wearing staring us down as we passed her...

now these distractions would end up being the reason for what was about to happen..so we kept walking south..and now i'm gathering the sense this is not the right direction...things look familiar, but only in passing, this is not where we are supposed to be heading..street names ring a familiar tone, all because they are close to where we should be, bbut not this way..so then Rachann is getting pissed, saying i have a horrible sense of direction getting us lost and she takes a right then starts walking north..we find the Riv and i know exactly where we are..but i'm trying to piece it together..i had started in beleiveing Rachann that we needed to walk north from my car, but it really didn't make sense..we went south quite a bit, and i knew we had gone down too far south on the one road, so who was right...

we got to the Aragon, got frisked, and got in...we made our pit stop because once we got to the front of the crwod there was no leaving out posts. we caught the end of the opening band, The Cribs..i couldn't get an accurate reading of the band, only catching their last song, their finale performance.i mean from what i saw it was good...but we didn't catch anything that led up to that...whatever, we moved up close to the front, closer than where we were a couple weeks ago.

Franz was next to play, which i thought was a horrible move on the part of the people in charge, and you'll see why. Now granted most of the bastards there were to see Death Cab, I wanted to see my Franz...so i was just happy to be as close as i was and catch the entire set. they played some new stuff, some of the more popular stuff from their new album, and one brand new song that i didn't even know, and of course they played their classics off the last album. in my opinion the only thing that could have made their set better is is they would have played "All for you Sophia", but they hit every other song, Matinee, Micheal, and they encored with This Fire...amazing. and one thing i especially liked was even though their light show wasn't huge, it was definitly well cherographed with the songs.

so then a minor break only to changed over the sets and it was time for Death Cab...so here's the deal - with Franz you got poppy music that gets people bouncing, dancing, rocking out, having an awesome time...so now that you got them all hyped up, you bring out..Death Cab? their slow piano melodies got the crowd to sway, and that's about as much movemnt you saw from anyone..laaaaaaaaame. the most movement from the crowd came from the girls standing by me when this really big guy just decided to spread apart the two girls and squeeze in front of them. i could not beleive what i just saw..but i was happy when i saw that the girls weren't going down without fight, they started bouncing around and wwould bounce right into the back of the guy - i thought he was gonna start throwing punches after that..then the girls devised up a little plan to squeeze their way back in, just as they were parted, they came in together in a classic pinchers move and slid in front of the guy, therefore pushing him back to where he belonged.

so the concert concluded soon enough and we were on our way out...but where to go...we felt it as the safest bet just to travel back the same way we came in, even though it seemed like a lot of backtracking. so we walked down and around and came back up, and well what do you know, i was right the entire time...we had parked just north of the Aragon with it on my left side as the last landmark i remembered, incredible. it seems as if the drug store was right there on the corner, as i looked to my left at that building, the Aragon was on my right, i crossed the street none the wiser..as for Rachann not noticing the huge Aragon Sign to our rights..beats me

so we get to the car and we are thirsty, so i find the first conveinance mart which seemed to be a little bit out of the way..we get in, grab our goods, and the clerk is all friendly, asking us things, talking, but then he asks how the concert was..and Rachann and i both don't verbalize this til we leave, but are thinking how does the guy behind the counter know we were just at the concert..i mean we were only buying waters, we didn't have on any band propoganda on, it was really wierd..so as we get out i pull out onto the road and the em effing Aragon was two blocks away..

we didn't maker any stops at any bars, we both weren't up for it really...and i just drove back...i did make a stop at the truckstop in Lowell so i could take a little nap...i woke up an hour or so later feeling great, but shortly after getting on the road i was frickin' tired..i knew i couldn't take another nap so i pushed myslef to stay awake, telling myself i would consider naps at different checkpoints...i tried to keep myself awake, but it wa a drive, quasi-alone, with a bit of sleep, so my mind was all over the place..and i knew sleep was the only thing that was going to clear it, especially of the horrible thoughts it was conjuring up in there. at one point it was so bad i told myself after i filled up at the Flying J at the 37 - 465 junction i was going to go to sleep no matter what.

Well things changed when i got to the Flying J..I filled up and was damn determined to make it home...i do remember at one ponint during the drive that Rachann told me if I needed her to drive she would..then she rolled over and went to sleep..made it back to bloomington, i passed out as soon as i got home, and there you have it.