Throwing Up For Jesus

So we’re not so great about going to church, but the Catholic guilt does kick in every once in a while. We decided to go to the church fair with the family. It’s still church but with rides and fried food. What could possibly go wrong? Slather on the sunscreen, everyone in their hats, great. Tick tick tick tick….

Our six year old daughter is a bit of a daredevil and wants to go on every ride immediately. Some of the ones looked tame, and then there were the ones myself or my wife has to go on with her. I like amusement park rides, but carnival and fair rides I’m not as huge a fan of. And after this day, even less so.

Bella picks one of the rides that looks like one of those mini swing rides that every amusement park has, the one where you get strapped to a large swing and it goes up and around in a circle. Fine.

So I’m in line with Bella and then I notice something I hadn’t noticed before. The weird umbrella swing ride was going faster and faster. I was starting to have some doubts. My wife and son came over and she said something casually like “I would go on with her but I don’t have the right shoes.” Really?! Man, why didn’t I think of that? Such a lame excuse but it confused me long enough for her to walk away.

So I got on the ride and it started off fine. I had been on those giant swing rides before with Bella and no problem. She started laughing, having a great time. But then with every revolution it got faster. And faster. And faster. Too late, I realized the ride was a centrifuge disguised as a swing ride. All the platelets were spinning out of my blood.

Round and round, faster and faster and then the ride did something that sent me over the edge. It was going up and around, on an angle, way too fast, and then the basket/seat started swinging from side to side. I had had enough. Time to be the no fun dad. I held out for as long as I could.
Every time I went past the carnie, I yelled “stop”.

After five times, he stopped the ride and I stumbled off. Bella, however wanted to stay on but she couldn’t ride alone so she gave me a 6 year old hissy fit while I was trying to figure out how not to get hit in the face with the ground.

I soon caught up with the wife and son. She saw how pale I was and we sat down, drank some coke and they all had some ice cream. I thought “This will pass, right?” And… no. Twenty minutes later I had to announce I had to go home and obviously couldn’t drive. We drove home with the kids upset but I think the church was pleased we spent some money at least. Catholic guild appeased.

It was a horrible ride home, we stopped at every light and I felt like my stomach didn’t. I got home, ran into the bathroom and puked my guts out like I was at my bachelor party. Only this time it didn’t taste like kamikazes. So I was throwing up, but for once it was for a good cause.

When I finally recovered my wife said to me “Awww, you just wanted to go on the ride with your daughter so she could have fun. You’re a good daddy.” Wow, unexpected bonus points. But from now on, when we go to a fair or a carnival, I’m bringing the wrong shoes.

How Can You Not Love Sting?

Right now I’m just trying to run out the clock. 5 Year old starts school in September and 2 year old starts preschool next month. Whatever will I do with the extra 60 hours a week? Update my blog more frequently for one. Maybe sleep and then look for my sanity, which I seem to have misplaced. I also got a new computer and lost all of my feeds. So now I’ll have to add everyone back in and start visiting again. So if your blog feed readers went down by one, that’s the reason.

I surprised my wife with Sting tickets for her birthday. She was quite pleased. In fact, my brother was in town so I got an extra ticket for him too, since he is also a fan.

Sting was playing at the Hollywood Bowl, which is a fantastic place to see a concert. Outdoors sitting on a mountain. Pretty cool. I got tickets late so let’s just say our seats weren’t great, but it didn’t matter. We had a blast.

Sting sold out the Hollywood Bowl with very little advertising. I tried to imagine what that level of fame would be like. You can’t go anywhere without being recognized And that’s not just in your home town, but all over the world.

Sting put on a great show. He sounded great, was personable, and gave us Laker scores. You could tell he simply loved what he did. It went beyond being a billionaire rock star. He just loved the music and performing for people. And then when he gets tired I’m sure he gets into his airplane made of gold and flies back into his secret luxury island somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. Invisible to radar, of course. Sting needs his privacy.

The dude is 58. I remember in middle school studying “rock” in music class and the teacher played “Every Little Thing She Does is Magic”. We watched the video. This was when music videos were just starting. There was a guy dancing on a sound board in a studio. That was crazy! Yes, simpler times.

His old songs made me feel nostalgic but he played a lot of stuff I didn’t recognize, like some song about being a vampire and a few others. Not quite as engaging. But hey, he’s Sting. He can do whatever he wants. He brought an orchestra with him and even acknowledged that one of the cool things he gets to do is revisit his old songs that no one’s ever heard of. Well, probably cooler for him anyway. But all in all it was a fantastic show.

The other thing I like about the Hollywood Bowl is it’s for people who enjoy rock concerts without all the hassles of being a teenager. Starts at around 8:00 pm and you can sit and enjoy the show. Sure, people stood up in the front but where we were people just sat and enjoyed the show. That’s how I like my shows. No standing and you’re allowed to bring picnic baskets. Which at the Hollywood Bowl, you can do. There was a few “woo” “woo”ers behind us but not too bad. Then I turned around and they were all in their 60’s. Good for them.

But there was one real tool sitting next to me who wouldn’t stop looking at his Blackberry every five seconds. This made me annoyed for a number of reasons, first because I couldn’t get a signal on my iPhone. He obviously didn’t want to be there and was just there because his girlfriend dragged him there. Sorry dude. When you want to go see Nickleback or some other shitty band that dumb people like then you can cash in this chip with your girlfriend. Now it was annoying but I kept my mouth shut because he was rather large and muscular. Thankfully I think he thought the bench were too cramped and he and his annoyed girlfriend moved to the back after the intermission.

I don’t go to many concerts anymore and sometimes I miss them. But I don’t miss having a drunk teenager throw up on my Doc Martins. OK, maybe I miss that a little bit. But I love seeing bands and artists I grew up with still touring, and putting on a great show. I remember seeing Jimmy Page and Robert Plant at the Hollywood Bowl a few years ago and overhearing a guy behind me say “My Mom saw Led Zeppelin live and now I’m here with her seeing Page and Plant” And then he threw up on my Doc Martins.