"Hella Good"

I need to update this more; too much has happened for me to adequately go over everything.

Last weekend was probably one of the highest points of my summer. I drove up to Bloomington on Friday morning after picking up my check from work and met Kelsey for lunch at Scotty's. I felt like at total dick though, because I forgot my wallet in my car (she drove since I had just spent 3 1/2 hours behind the wheel) and she had to pay for me when we were there. I paid her back, but I still felt like a jerk. The good part was that I had a delicious burger that sounded terrible. Scotty's has a burger creation contest, and the last winner was called the Shewman (sp?) Special. What does it have on it? Cheddar cheese, bacon, jalapenos, and peanut butter. Yep. I thought it sounded kinda disgusting, but when the host took us to our table, he said that if either of us ordered it and didn't like it, he would pay for it. He said he'd offered that deal to about twenty people and hasn't paid for a burger yet, so I gave it a try. It was AMAZING. Next time I'm getting it without the jalapenos since I'm not a big spicy fan, but it was still great even though my mouth was on fire. ;-)

After lunch, Kelsey and I made cake cookies with Gabby and her boyfriend, and soon enough it was time for me to head toward Indianapolis for the No Doubt/Paramore show. I met Emily at CVS and we headed north, and got stuck in traffic trying to get off I-465 onto I-69. We only needed to get to Exit 10 on I-69, but it took us almost an hour just to get from 465 to the exit. The traffic was insane. So we were running kinda late, and as we walked up, the opening band started to play. We had to hang around outside because our tickets were still in a car around Exit 3. An hour later--three songs into Paramore's set--they finally arrived and we got to go in.

The show itself was amazing. Hayley sounded like she was sick when she was between songs (she might've confirmed that she was sick in the first three songs, but I couldn't tell what she was saying) but still sounded GREAT during the songs. They played two new songs, one of which I only heard a little bit of since we were walking into the venue when they were playing it. The other was their new song "Ignorance," which I got to hear in full once I got home since it's part of the pre-order for their new album. Here are a couple Paramore-related pictures...

My view of Paramore during "Misery Business," "For A Pessimist I'm Pretty Optimistic," and a new song.

My view of Paramore for the rest of their set. (Note: this is zoomed in as far as my camera will go.)

Seeing No Doubt was a seventh-grade dream come true. They played all of their hits and, surprisingly, a few songs from Tragic Kingdom that I didn't recognize. I really don't know what else to say besides it being phenomenal. So here are the pictures.

She still looks amazing after giving birth to two children. That's just unreal.

I thought this looked really sweet.

You can kinda see them here.

This one is a little bit better.

A view of the sold-out lawn section.

But since concerts are more about music than pictures, here's a little taste of their opening song, "Spiderwebs."

When I got to my car (we left after one of the encore songs, which I wound up regretting because the last encore song was one of my favorites, "Sunday Morning") the traffic was already backed up and didn't move for about ten minutes, so I decided to take a nap in my car. I was texting a couple people, so I was dozing on and off, and after a little while some girl started looking around all the cars around me, and after deciding that I was the only one in a car and I was sleeping, she went a couple cars over and squatted down. I didn't full comprehend what she was doing until she stood up and pulled her pants back up. She must've been pretty desperate.

After about an hour of sitting in the parking lot and then navigating the creepy back roads to the interstate, I finally made it back to Claire's in Bloomington. Saturday morning I left with a full stomach (Claire and I went to the Scholars Inn Bakehouse in Bloomington, and it was soooo good) and arrived home safely a little after noon.

I was going to write more, but I figure this has been long enough. So I will be back soon with a second update on what's been happening. But before I go...

Final thought: Why are old men so adamant about walking around locker rooms in the nude? I mean, not just from the shower to their clothes, they walk around for like ten minutes, just being naked for no reason at all. I just don't get it.