Summer Tour 2004, Leg 1
Thurs, July 1st -- We drove, by way of Eaton Rapids (because of the yarn store and my mother), to Paw Paw, MI, and Ali's grandparents' house.
Fri, July 2nd -- To Milwaukee, and Summerfest, and, most importantly, JOHN MAYER! The FIRST show of John Mayer's summer tour! Before the show, Ali, Chelsea, and I wandered Milwaukee, alone, and Chelsea saw a man that looked like John Mayer to her. So we followed him for eight blocks, but Ali was already in her concert apparel and didn't want to run, so he disappeared before we got close enough to take a picture. He was tall, and in jeans, so he could very well have been John Mayer.
Maroon 5 was better live than on CD but they'll never be my favorite and I got bored, but they were good and Adam Levine is an entertaining person to watch. The Old 97's were at Summerfest from eight to ten, I think, but we didn't go see them because their stage was the first one, and Marcus Amphitheatre is last.
John Mayer was glorious. There weren't any new songs, but they were all so alive and from Clarity onward I was so excited I was about to explode. The smile he made in "83" after singing "smiling 'cause I'm scared as hell" was ridiculous, and incredibly funny, and adorable. That was another purseholder experience for Ali. And he played Quiet in the encore, solo acoustic. That was very exciting; I'd never heard it live before. Turns out, he's playing it at over half the shows this summer, but it's still exciting. And Inner City Blues (a Marvin Gaye song) was hilarious--John Mayer stalking around the stage with the microphone and no guitar.
Leaving Summerfest was akin to hell. A huge, drunken, awful crowd. But we survived.
Sat, July 3rd -- We drove to Eau Claire, WI, to see the Old 97's. We stopped at a Perkins (WI is OBSESSED with Perkins!) for breakfast around lunchtime (the start of our 2 meal/day habit) and the highlights were the waitress telling us "I drive 90 mph" and then yelling back to our table, "But don't send the police after me if you get caught," or something like that, Chelsea ordering "Authentic French Toast" and actually calling it that, and the sugar packets. Doesn't it look like brainwashing or something? What are they trying to tell us? So we took a sugar packet each.
We got to Eau Claire very early but didn't have dinner, and went to the concert as soon as the doors opened. We had really great seats, it turned out, and it was a fabulous concert. Murry was really funny, and Rhett was just wonderful, beautiful. And they played "Oppenheimer," which, it turns out, they rarely play. And there were TWO ENCORES. And afterwards we were outside walking to our car when we walked by Ken Bethea, the lead guitarist, and so when I told her, Mommy turned around and talked to him for a while. And he introduced Maaa--- (Matt or Max or Mack or something), his best friend's son, from Virginia, to us, and Maakjsf;dk is also going into eleventh grade, but we were stupid and DIDN'T say, "We're going over to the Acoustic Cafe to get ice cream, do you want to come with us?" And so that was sad, but we didn't go there, either, 'cause then we had to drive forever to Madison, b/c that's where our hotel was, because we were planning on going to the Taste of Chicago the next day and needed to get some of the driving done the night before. My mom almost went off the road three times. But on the way there we stopped at another Perkins and had dinner/shakes that we couldn't finish. We went to bed at about four a.m.
Sun, July 4th -- We broke our fast at another Perkins and decided against The Taste of Chicago for many good reasons, although that meant no more chance of seeing Ma--, and Mommy would miss Counting Crows, but oh well. And we got back to Paw Paw to spend the night again, and Ali's grandmother had read the Story and LOVED IT. She thinks it's perfect, which is crazy of her. Ali's uncle came over and encouraged us to tattoo ourselves with permanent markers, so we did. It was the second time. The tattoos were based on John Mayer's. 77 became 88, SRV became JCM, the cool boxes were filled completely differently...and we did more than he has.
Mon, July 5th -- Drove home to Grosse Pointe Park by way of Ann Arbor, to visit my aunt, but first shopped at Max 10 in Paw Paw and got matching gingham skirts, pink and red. We wandered around Ann Arbor for a while, and that was fun, and decided to make "tour shirts" commemorating the trip.
Chelsea's Use Real Sugar Page
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