Lollapalooza - part 1

The irony of this first installment of the Lollapalooza posts is that this post will not even consist of anything that actually happens at Lollapalooza. But anyone that knows me knows that I can't tell a short story and sometimes I have to lay down a lot of groundwork before I can even begin to get to the point. And that is what I am doing with this post. Though I probably could have cut this entire post out, I felt it was entertaining and worth posting, hopefully you will too.

So Emily and myself set off for Chicago early last Thursday. Neither of us had been to Chicago, but thanks to the internet and a book I bought about Chicago I felt we were ready to tackle the city on our own. I actually researched and studied the city so much that I had a lot of it memorized before I even stepped foot in Illinois. But our first decision to make in Chicago was whether to spend $40 on a cab to the hotel or $4 on a subway ride to the hotel. We went with the subway.

Subways don't bother me, I've ridden enough to be some-what comfortable with riding them. Carrying suitcases on them does bother me. And of course, when we had to switch lines there was only a staircase vs. escalators or elevators. I packed a carry-on suitcase, Emily, however, did not. She was not so happy about the stairs and her bag (that I can only assume must have been just under that 50 pound limit). So she hauled the suitcase down and then up a good sized staircase. The point where I cracked up until I nearly cried, though, was when we went to exit the subway. They had a turnstile that looked like this, but I swear smaller:

Emily had a look on her face that was priceless. It was the look of "I've come all this way and now this?" I started to say, well maybe we can talk the subway people (if there are any, never personally seen any of those people for myself) into allowing us to exit another way? But she wasn't having that, she just picked up her suitcase in some sort-of bear hug manner and charged through that turnstile.

Wish I had filmed it, oh I wish I had. The look on peoples faces and especially Emily's was something I think the world should have seen.

But she made it through with a sigh of relief, then rounded the corner to find another staircase. Why don't these people believe in escalators or elevators???

Some really nice man saw the distress on Emily's face and carried her bag up for her. Otherwise, I think Emily might have had some break-down right then and there. Crisis avoided.

To my shock and dismay our hotel was right next to where we came up from the subway. When I memorized the map, it was at least a block away. The riddle of why in reality it actually was not, I will never know. I was just glad to see that our hotel was actually at the correct stop and that it looked as nice as this:

And this is one time where you can judge the book by its cover. The inside of this hotel was even more of a sight to be seen! Yes, we knew when we booked it that it would be a king sized bed and have a iPod clock radio station. But we didn't know it would be a corner suite with extra room and the most amazing bath tub (that would come in handy later in the week when we needed to soak the pain away from our feet).

You may wonder why I took a picture of the TV, but the bottom left hand corner has my name on it! I am such an easy person to impress.

These robes actually came with the room! They were perfect for us, but what if it had been a couple? I have a hard time thinking a guy would wear one of those.

After we settled things into the hotel we went on a walk to find somewhere to eat for lunch. The Magnificent Mile was only a couple of blocks from our hotel, so we headed that way for lunch. After that we headed for The Loop and eventually Grant Park to pick up our wristbands for the concert. We did see a lot of things during this lengthy walk, this is just some of what we saw:

Chess playing on the street:

One of the funnier things during our walks was as we were passing the Chicago Cultural Center, the crowds got thick, roads were blocked off and people were picketing. We were just annoyed that they were getting in our way and hindering our ability to quickly pass. But as I looked at the building to try to figure out what was going on I saw men that looked as if they were in the Secret Service. So I jokingly said, "well maybe the president is in there!"

And he was. We found that out later. Had I had known, I might have waited a few moments to see if I could see him come out. The funny thing is when we got back to Austin he was there too. But it was a much bigger ordeal in Austin, from what I hear they had much more of a significant crowd waiting for him. I guess in Chicago they are a little more jaded when it comes to Obama.

That night we went to dinner at Rock Bottom Brewery, that was conveniently located across the street from our hotel. BTW-that was the same restaurant we ate at in Omaha, I really love that place!

After dinner we met up with a guy from our high school, Jon Ray. "Who is Jon Ray," you ask? Well that actually used to be his web address, whoisjonray.com. You can still go there, but it will take you to poemsthatdontrhyme.com, which is still run by him.

Jon is a hard person to explain. As Emily and I discussed that weekend, most of what he does is unbelievable, but from what we've known, it's all been true. He's an entrepreneur, to put the only title on him I know to place. We're not really sure what he does for a living currently, but I know some of his past. In high school he designed websites for small businesses. But when he didn't pay taxes on his earnings, the IRS came to visit him at school. He had a website that everyone that was anyone in high school would go to and it had a wall that everyone would post comments on (I believe it was a pre-cursor to facebook). But when students started to write negative things about teachers the principal arranged for the FBI to come pay him a visit and shut that down. After college he did some real estate sales. He also wrote for Study Breaks magazine, not sure if he still does either of those. This is a guy that always figures out how to get around anything. He, on more than one occasion, would somehow finagle himself somewhere he wasn't supposed to be by working what-ever magic he uses to do so.

He was also my date to prom. Here's the three of us then:

Strangely, this was us in Chicago, I think I see some similarities in this photo:

So the night before we left Emily posted on facebook about leaving for Chicago and Lollapalooza the next day, he commented that he too was going to Lollapalooza. He also filled us in on the knowledge that we should RSVP to a couple of free parties. The first was Perez Hilton's One Night in Chicago and the other Belve Nights. Both were sponsored by vodka companies (hence, where the belve nights came from) and were being held at the Hard Rock Hotel.

Thursday night was the Perez Hilton party. We showed up and had to get a wrist band at this table before they'd let you in. Of course, our name wasn't on the list. But they asked what company we were with. Luckily, we had asked Jon what company we should put when signing up, but when we repeated it we didn't quite get it right and said "Loud Noise."

After a few moments of thinking it through, we got it right and it was "Giant Noise." To which one of the girls responded, "Oh...and did Claudia put your name on the list?"

I don't know who the heck Claudia is and I am not good at situations like this where I have to quickly wager telling the truth or telling what I am pretty sure will get me in. But luckily Emily is good in situations like this and she without any hesitation said, "yes, Claudia put us on the list."

Now, if they would have had ANY follow-up questions I think that is where we would have fallen apart at the seems. But they didn't, they just grabbed a wrist band and slapped them on us!

When we walked in we saw a hallway and immediately turned down it to find a bar. They had all the good stuff, so long as you want to mix it with vodka. So we grabbed our drinks and went back to find Jon. When we found him he asked, "how'd you get redbull and vodka's?" He explained that the bar in the room with music only had some pineapple mixers to go with the vodka. So we said we would show him where the bar with the good stuff was, but they wouldn't let him pass because he didn't have the right colored wrist band!

So then we started dissecting what we did to get a wrist band and we told him about how "Claudia had put us on the list." To which he said, "Claudia is the person I am sharing a room with here, how'd I not get the wrist band you got?!?"

I'm still not sure how that happened, but we did figure out that the color we had meant we were media. Doesn't make sense to me how we got VIP and Jon didn't (especially since all our lives it has ALWAYS been the other way around, him with the VIP), but whatever, it was awesome!

The party was great, they even had the red carpet out and photo areas like they have for the celebrities. Though, it was lacking on the celebrities. My theory was there was a Super-VIP somewhere else in the hotel, why else would Perez Hilton have a party and not even be there? But here's our photo:

And to further explain Jon; he was in Chicago to interview bands. C3 puts on Lollapalooza (and ACL, they are based out of Austin) and he knows people that work there. They asked him to do some of the interviews because he is good at it. But as a side (of a side of a side) business adventure, he was also promoting his latest greatest thing in our photos. He invented a protector that fits over the Wii remote (much like you would see over phone), it was just picked up by Best Buy. Look for it in stores near you soon. That is, if Jon is really telling the truth (I'm telling you, he's unbelievable, but always been truthful). But here's one where you can see his product:

The best part about the party was the concert. I did see the humor in kicking off three days of concerts with a concert. But it was actually a great start! There were other people, but by the time we got in there we only saw B.o.B., who sings "Magic" and "Airplanes." I was probably closer to B.o.B. than I was any other band the whole weekend. The best part of this next photo, however, is not the proximity to B.o.B. but the perfect side shot of the guy with the mullet!

And I found this video on YouTube of clips from the concert. Towards the end I started skipping over parts, but I never heard "Airplanes" in there, I was sad because I know he played it. I am pretty sure you can hear me singing too, I was pretty close to where this was being filmed.

After B.o.B. played there were rumors from what I'd consider credible sources that Lady Gaga was going to make an appearance. We were like kids in a candy store waiting for that to happen. We stayed and pretty much closed the doors on the place, but no Gaga. My dreams of being close to Lady Gaga herself were crushed that night, oh well. Do note that we met Claudia, she is the one on the right (see now we shouldn't feel bad, we do know her).

This was the cool, but blurry photo I took on our walk home. It's almost as if the camera got a hold of that vodka and was seeing about as well as I was.