I should be tired of this song, but I'm not.

I've heard Crane Wife 3 about 8 times the past 2 days. It's still an amazing song and I still enjoy it every time I listen to it.

Well this weekend was a blast. Friday, after I got to St. Louis, I hung out with Pete briefly and spent the night at Steve's and reread 300. Saturday morning after everyone was awake and what not we, we at this point being Me, Steve, Mary (Steve's lady) and Frank (Steve's roomate) assembled at the van and then went to retreive Petus and Kaelin (Pete's lady) {Note: I really don't know how to spell her name, and for what it's worth I wasn't even aware that Kaelin was a first name as the only experience with the name Kaelin that I had before meeting Pete's girlfriend was from Jenifer Kaelin, some girl in my cousin's class in high school}. It was 7:40. The ride to Chicago was unspectacular, except for Frank vomiting in the van and the subsequent cleansing with lysol. Also the book of Neil Gaiman short stories I was reading was pretty fucking spectacular. As we got closer to Chicago there was a lot of quoting of Arrested Development. All and all the trip to Chicago was fairly pleasant.

We found the venue and parked relatively close to it. It was balls cold in Chicago. We hung out in a Borders while the people in our party made contact with their friends that were in Chicago. They came to meet our group and then we had lunch at a Thai place.

Ok I could keep going on with this boring play by play, but I won't. Here's the highlights.

I bought this kick-ass Nazi sweater at this Army Surplus store and put it on under my Fleece Jacket thing, bringing me to a mind-sweltering 4 layers of shirt.

We went to this used book shop that sold a ridiculous amount of pornography. Actually it just had a ridiculous amount of pornography on display. I can't really comment on the quantities of pornography that the store moved, but I can say one guy that was there when we were there bought like 8 magazines. Also I think I should point out that there were like 13 of us college kids moving about in these very small stores on the street near the venue.

While we were waiting at Borders the second time I was reading this book of 1001 albums you have to listen to before you die. Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake both had albums in there. You know who didn't? The Decemberists. Neutral Milk Hotel. Ben Folds/BFF. Cake. THEY MIGHT BE GIANTS!!!!!!! That book was bullshit.

There was a lot of standing around and waiting. In line to get into the Venue. In the venue waiting for the concert to start. Waiting for the lame opener to stop playing so the Decemberists could come on and rock the house. Waiting for Frank to come back with water to revive our fallen comrade Steven Wissinger. That's right folks, after the boring, but entirely Scottish opener finished my dear friend Steve Wissinger was overcome with some sort of fever and nearly fainted. Thanks the quick thinking and acting of the girlfriends and Petus and Frank, Steve recovered quickly and was able to enjoy the rock that soon followed his spell. What was I doing during Steve's near fainting spell you ask? Doing what I do best my friends, keeping people away from Steve while he sat on the floor trying to not pass out. Giving him room to breath, as they say.

So a word about the Decemberists. Spraelificent. What does that mean? I'll tell you.

sprae-LIF-i-cent: adj. The Decemberists rocked hard, no doubt, but it wasn't a rock concert. They Might Be Giants put on rock concerts. Actually they put on Rock Shows, but still. The Decemberists put on one of the best live shows I've ever seen. They play the songs almost exactly like they sound on the album, which is how you would want a Decemberists song played. Colin Meloy is so engaging and fun to watch. He has so much control over the audience. He can work a crowd like no other.

At some point during the concert I got it into my head that the Decemberists look like they could all be high school teachers. I spent the majority of the rest of the night trying to figure out what subject each one would teach. John would teach history, obviously. Jenny would be the choir teacher. The choir wouldn't be very good, but she wouldn't care. She would love her job anyway. She would be fairly strict but also very kind. Nate would be the chemistry teacher, but he wouldn't like teaching chemistry or teaching at all probably. Chris would teach Math or art. Probably math. He might be a coach too. Probably tennis. Lisa would be the new English teacher that all the boys have a crush on and Mr. Meloy would be the Drama teacher that all the girls have a crush on, and some of the boys too. I don't know why, but this little exercise gave me endless amounts of satisfaction during and after the concert.

Wow. This post is really long. I'm going to end it now.