| Labor Day Weekend 2002 Birmingham, AL and Valdosta, GA |
| There is so much to say that it's difficult to figure out exactly what to share. I'm still amazed that this was all for AARON and not his big bro, but hey, I am officially an Aaron Carter fan, and after last weekend he's got me for life. I'll try to limit this to just the major events, but I have a tendency to #1 get excited about little details and #2 be long-winded, so just bear with me. :) After arriving in Atlanta at the crack of dawn on Saturday morning, Debi and I drove to Alabama in our rented red mustang, tried to get some sleep, and met up with our FL/TN friends. In the afternoon Debi and I scoped out the venue and parking lot so we could find the best place to try to follow Aaron's bus out after the show. (Since we were going the same place as he was, why not follow him? lol) All of us ended up back at the venue around 5 pm and just hung out keeping an eye on the "backstage" area where all of the buses were parked. To our surprise, Aaron was doing his sound check when we arrived, and we got to hear him singing the Journey song Send Her My Love -- WHY he was rehearsing that, I don't know, since he didn't perform it in concert. *shrug* Eventually Aaron showed himself and ended up playing football behind a link fence with Craig and Matt and various other people for about an hour, so we were able to watch him just be silly and playful. (FYI Matt and Blake fans, they seem to like sunning themselves shirtless in public) A little while later Mark came over to talk with us. He remembered our conversation with him in June and, when we told him we were going to the show the next night as well, he surprisingly offered us meet and greet passes for the next day. *speechless* It was unreal. Debi and I had been telling ourselves that the key to meeting Aaron this weekend was talking to Mark again, and BAM, done. We actually talked with Mark for a while about Aaron's new cd, Aaron's previous cds, Nick's cd, upcoming tours, the 49ers... he's a great guy, extremely approachable and friendly. He even asked us where we were staying in Valdosta the next day, so we told him and then asked where they were staying (fishing for information of course lol) but he said he didn't know. Darn. It was a good try, right? lol After our conversation with Mark, the first opening act was starting and the small crowd that had been watching Aaron (who was now playing basketball SHIRTLESS) disappeared, so it was just me, Debi, and two other friends. Before we even realized what was happening, L led Aaron over to us. Um, what do you do when you're suddenly confronted by a half-naked 14 year old pop star? lol I handed Aaron an AWESOME picture that Debi took in March of him and Nick singing Outstanding together, and Debi added, "Not that you want a picture of your brother!" Aaron laughed of course. *Note to Aaron: Do NOT hold pictures in front of your naked chest. It makes my eyes inadvertently look places they shouldn't.* He asked us if we were going into the venue, and I said something like, "Yeah eventually, but we were out here watching YOU." Dork. Debi told him that we were the ones that gave him the jersey, and he responded, "I know, thanks!" When we said that we were from CA and spending our holiday weekend seeing his shows, he got kinda embarrassed and was like, "For me? Aw, you make me feel special!" *in his squeaky voice* lol It was so adorable. Immediately after the concert was over, we headed to our cars. Good thing we checked out the set up of the parking lot earlier in the day because we were parked in the PERFECT spot to follow Aaron's bus. Unfortunately for us, he had a police escort to zip through traffic (after driving through the parking lot standing at the bus door shirtless), but we KNEW we had to go in the same direction that he was, so Debi and I made our way to the highway as fast as our red mustang could carry us and eventually caught up to Aaron's bus. We followed him all the way through Alabama, into Georgia, past Atlanta... for HOURS we tailed the bus at a safe, respectable distance -- nothing TOO crazy. Bob (who was driving) made it a challenge though, varying his speeds anywhere between 30 MPH and 90 MPH. Debi and I were EXHAUSTED, having flown in from CA that morning, and we were begging Bob to stop and pull over so we could at least get gas and snacks to eat. Our wish was granted about 3 hours into our drive when Bob pulled off the highway into a gas station. Debi jumped out to buy us goodies and I started to fuel up... but the Carters had other plans. No sooner had Debi reached the door of the convenience store than the bus started up again and began to pull away! I yelled for Debi and we jumped back in the car, frantically trying NOT to lose sight of Aaron's bus, which we didn't. We're cool like that. lol Not 10 minutes later Bob pulled off the highway AGAIN into another gas station, but we were leery of being tricked a second time. We stayed in our car until we saw the bus pull into a overnight truck stop, lights and engine turned off. The Carters seemed to be calling it a night, and poor Aaron apparently slept in a parking lot. :( Eventually deciding that we NEEDED to get to our hotel in Valdosta asap, we fueled up, bought some sugar and caffeine to try to keep ourselves awake for the remaining 3 hours of our drive, and headed back out on the road without Aaron's bus to lead the way. Miraculously we made it to Valdosta around 6 am without crashing the car. Debi, bless you for driving that last leg and not falling asleep behind the wheel, I couldn't have done it. Imagine our surprise when we checked into our hotel and walked out to the car to find TOUR BUSES pulling up to the hotel next door! *shock* We did NOT follow them, we were there FIRST! Turns out it was two buses carrying Aaron's dancers (this is where I realized just how hot Blake is *fanning myself*), Mark, L, and some other people in Aaron's entourage, no Carters though. We actually felt kinda bad cuz it probably LOOKED like we followed them, but SWEAR TO GOD we didn't. We told Mark the night before where we were going to be staying and he didn't know where they would be. They followed US! lol Getting a second wind, we scoped out the adjacent hotel for more "interesting" people (and got caught spying on Blake lol), but then Debi and I decided that we DESPERATELY needed to sleep. 6 hours later we found ourselves at K-Mart getting our pictures from the night before developed (and a couple enlarged) because we wanted to give Aaron some copies at the meet and greet that day. (It was nice KNOWING that we were going to be seeing him so we could be "prepared") After a NIGHTMARE traffic jam trying to get into Wild Adventures (just another messed up thing about that amusement park) we finally made it to Will Call by 4:30, just in time to meet Andy and pick up our m&g passes. Mark was greeting people as they walked into the backstage area for the m&g. We thanked him again and gave him a picture of him and Aaron during the concert the night before. We were able to chat with him some more about the show, Aaron's new songs, football... like I said, he's an amazingly cool guy. We talked with Andy a little too, who told us that we were not allowed to take pictures WITH Aaron, just pictures OF Aaron. Finally we managed to position ourselves at the end of the m&g line, our FL/TN friends just in front of me and Debi. Now the first part of this is kind of second-hand because I wasn't close enough to hear the beginning of the conversation since I was at the end of the line. When the first person in our group of seven got up to Aaron, Mark (who was sitting with Aaron) told him that "we" (meaning our group) were at the show the night before. Aaron surprisingly asked the FL/TN girls what kind of car they were driving, and when they said a silver SUV, Aaron asked who was in the red mustang. Somewhere in there I caught part of the conversation and kind of shouted down to Aaron, "Why, are you looking for a red mustang?" I was half joking, but he looked up kind of surprised and was like, "Yeah, that was YOU?" Part excited and part embarrassed, I said something like, "Uh yeah, that was us, sorry" and continued to work my way closer to him. He was very cute and smiled and said, "Nah, that's ok, we were playing tag with you!" That TOTALLY broke the ice and opened up the conversation. Dork that I am, I responded, "You were playing hard to get!" *slapping myself in the head* Even though I always say that ABOUT him, I can't believe I said that TO him. lol Ok, so all of that random speeding up/slowing down/pulling off was done PURPOSELY because of US. Thanks Bob. Then Aaron added, "We were video taping you!" LMAO!!!!! Great, Debi and Angela, super stalkers captured on Carter-Cam forever. We were basically in shock and couldn't do anything but laugh and say, "We were video taping you too!" (because we did... a little... part of our adventure in the car, video taping our "prey" lol) By this point our FL/TN friends had been moved down the line and it was just me and Debi left with Aaron all to ourselves. Debi continued by giving Aaron a picture of Angel from the night before, and Aaron reacted like a typical brother. Showing the picture to Craig and Cliff (who were sitting next to him), he laughed, "AAAHHH, look at Angel!" and proceeded to mock her saying things like, "I'm so embarrassed!" It was so funny and so like a brother. Then Debi handed him a few of her best pictures from the night before, including two enlarged copies of her favorite picture, one for Aaron to autograph and one for him to keep. She asked Aaron to sign that one in particular, and after taking a look at it he asked her, "Do you have another one of these?" The goofball asked for his own copy! lol Luckily that was the ONE picture that she had TWO copies of (talk about coincidence), and she pointed out that there was another copy for him in the stack of pictures she had already handed him. That's why we call THAT picture Aaron's favorite, because it was! :) Next it was my turn to give him pictures. I started out saying, "I've actually got something for Craig too" and gave them each a copy of the picture they posed for the night before outside the arena. After they looked at them, Aaron smiled up at us and said, "Did you see what my hat said?" When I told him no he said, "Honest Mom, some other kid pooped in my diaper" and started cracking up. Boys are so easily amused. lol I guess that's proof that he really IS 14 -- off stage at least. I gave him a few other pictures from the concert and said something about having great seats the night before but being farther back that night. Aaron responded with a shrug and nonchalantly said, "Well you can just come up to the front." We HAD to tease him about that -- "Oh YOU say so huh? What does security think about that? We can just run up there and when they try to stop us, we say we have your permission?" lol Aaron joked with us, but the Wild Adventures security guard standing nearby didn't look too happy with that idea. We continued to talk about the concert the night before, complimenting Aaron on the new songs and saying that we couldn't wait until Tuesday for the cd to come out. Debi became EXTREMELY bold and added, "Well since we came all this way and have a long drive ahead of us tomorrow, you could just GIVE us a copy of the new cd right now." lol Aaron looked at us with those big brown eyes (have I mentioned that this time I couldn't look at anything but his eyes and the scar on the bridge of his nose? I'm weird lol) and in all sincerity said, "Ya know what, you guys are the ONLY ones who asked, and I would give you one if I could, but I don't even have a final copy MYSELF." (This was TWO DAYS before it was coming out in stores) He said that Jive hadn't sent them yet so he didn't have anything to give us. Mark added that, even though they obviously get copies from the record company, he ALWAYS goes to the store and buys a copy himself, and Aaron said the same thing. I thought that was funny in a cool sort of way -- can you imagine seeing Aaron Carter in Tower Records buying his OWN cd? lol Then *I* became bold and said as sweetly as possible, "Aaron, since we're the last people in line, could we take a picture with you?" Aaron immediately shot out of his seat, opened up his arms, and said, "Sure! You're my friends for two days!" lol It was absolutely adorable! Of course, the other people around were giving him the evil eye like, "Aaron you KNOW you're not supposed to do that." Somewhere in there Aaron also lifted up his shirt to wipe the sweat off his face. It was all we could do to keep our jaws from hitting the floor. Thank goodness I was wearing sunglasses or he would have seen that my eyes were as big as saucers! lol Debi and I both gave Mark our cameras and stood on either side of Aaron, who wrapped his arms around us. (He's definitely a "squeezer" in pictures, not just resting his arm on your back, he grabs you and holds on) After Mark snapped the first picture using Debi's camera, I turned to Aaron and said, "Aaron would you mind taking off your hat for the next one?" He kind of groaned and made a funny face but grudgingly took off the hat, revealing VERY messy hair that was sticking in every possible direction. He tried to flatten it out to no avail, and then out of the corner of my eye I saw Debi reach for him, saying in a motherly tone, "Oh Aaron!" as she was attempting to pat down one side of his hair. She touched Carter hair!!! lol I was dying inside -- all could think was, "OMG I CAN'T BELIEVE SHE JUST DID THAT!!!!!!" Talk about bold! But Debi and Aaron have always had a special bond. *wink* The three of us posed for our second picture, Aaron's hair still messy beyond hope. With that our meet and greet experience came to an end. We said goodbye to everyone and wished Aaron good luck with the show and the rest of the tour. We again thanked Mark for being so great with us and reminded him to get in touch with us (he asked me to do him a favor so we exchanged email addresses, we'll see if it actually leads anywhere). From there we exited the backstage area into the chaotic mess of a crowd gathered for the show. Have I mentioned that the Wild Adventures people REALLY need to get a clue about organizing such an event? *shrug* Oh well, we had our "Aaron" time and enjoyed every second of it. Our encounters end there. Turns out Debi and I could have stretched it into THREE Aaron-filled days because he was in Atlanta the next day (Monday) at the exact same time we were, and we were actually really close to where he was doing his CNN interview. But unfortunately we didn't know about it until we returned back to CA and checked our email on Tuesday. We had two wonderful days, three might have killed us! lol After we flew back to CA on Monday night we stayed up and found a music store that would sell us Another Earthquake at midnight, extending our Aaron weekend for as long as possible. Aaron sang us each to sleep that night, a perfect ending to our fabulous weekend. The end. :) Sorry that was so long, but sooooooo much happened and I didn't want to leave anything out. Congrats for surviving all the way to the end! lol Again, if you want to see our concert and meet & greet pictures, you can find them all HERE. Enjoy! |
| We had our 49ers jersey -- #96 A. Carter -- to give Aaron, so we had it out and were trying to get his attention. At one point he looked over at us and said, "Do you want me to sign that?" and we were like "DUH, it's for YOU!" There was a little crowd gathered watching him, so he sent one of his security people (I'll call him L) over to get it from us. We told L to just give it to Aaron and to let him know that we came all the way from CA to see him. L thought it was really cool and told us that Aaron's tour manager (Mark) was looking for some 49ers tickets. OMG HELLO? The 49ers are my *other* obsession besides the Carters! Debi told L that we knew Mark (we talked with him for a while in Vegas in June... it was a little stretch to say we "knew" him lol) and he said he'd send Mark AND Aaron over in a while to talk with us. *freaking out* |
 |
 |
| L then brought our jersey over to Aaron, who was still playing football in plain sight of us just a little distance away. Blake grabbed it and showed it to Aaron, who then proceeded to take off the shirt he was wearing *gasp* and put on the jersey. We were DYING!!! OUR gift, all the way from CA, not only did we deliver it (which we didn't even think we'd get a chance to do that) but then he put it on right in front of us! He wore the jersey for the rest of the time he was outside playing football, wiping the sweat off his face with it and everything. lol |
| He introduced us to Craig, and later when I asked Aaron if I could take a picture, he grabbed Craig and posed. For some reason I couldn't take my eyes off Aaron's mouth, mainly the scar on his upper lip. I don't know why, but I just kept staring at his mouth. *shrug* I did the same thing with Nick in June. lol Debi, on the other hand, was mesmerized by Aaron's not-14-year-old abs -- yep, we're BOTH sick and twisted. After a few minutes of chatting, Aaron and his entourage left us and we headed into the venue, still pretty much stunned at what had happened. I'll save the concert details for some other time. Short version: Aaron was amazing and the second row is FUN. :) You can see pictures HERE |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| Aaron looking at his favorite picture ---> |
| Aaron's favorite picture from Birmingham <--- |
 |
 |
 |