tripeight

TRIP EIGHT - GWAR

"Good God, bless my soul! I need a fix of rock 'n' roll!"

WHO:       Moo & I
WHEN:     November 2nd - 4th, 2002
WHERE:   Urbana, IL
WHAT:     GWAR show
WHY:        Don't you know better than to wonder this? The fact that we had 4 more shows over Vets weekend wasn't enough... we were like addicts going thru withdrawls, we just couldn't wait one more weekend. We had to fucking do it.

Bless our souls indeed, we needed a fix and FAST!!! Happy that we'd be hitting more shows on the 8th-11th, it wasn't enough tho. We already tossed around the idea of hitting up Detroit on November 2nd because it was a Saturday so I could leave class Friday afternoon, get there for the show saturday, drive home sunday and be back home in time to NOT miss any school or work. By now I was on the verge of failing, being fired or both. But of course Moo & I didn't really care. You can always find another part time job!!!
After our SC/NC/GA/FL fiasco, I spent alot of time at Melissa's place. After one particular nite of heavy drinking at the Brass Mug, some awful karaoke of GWAR tunes that nearly cleared the place our and a terrific hangover, I spent Friday Oct. 18th at Melissa's place. It was my first time sleeping in in about 5 months, it was awesome!! I spent the day on her computer printing up directions to NJ, MA, NY and RI... it was definite, Moo & I were going!!! WHOOHOOOOO!!!
But there was this Detroit show looming... we could do it! Why not, ya know? A free weekend, what else are we gonna do? Let's do it!
Oops... I forgot, I'd be skipping out on my internship alot as of late so I'd have trouble requesting that weekend off. Especially since there was a UCF game that saturday nite and EVERY other intern asked for the weekend off. It came down to an issue of, "I might be able to get sunday off but I'll NEVER get saturday off!" SHIT!!! Where is GWAR playing on sunday? Urbana, IL? Okay, let's try it! But no... my internship scheduled me for both days. I was fucked. Stick a fork in that idea, it's DONE!
Where there's a will, there's a way! Or where there is a real sneaky, devious, creative mind, there's a way. :)
I need to call in sick, that's what it's gonna come down to. I gotta think of a sickness that is serious enough for me to miss work and require a doctor's visit yet something that doesn't have any side effects that I can't fake. Of course, a bladder infection!! It burns when you pee and you get pains, right? No, that's a kidney infection... PERFECT!!! I'd start faking sick at the Halloween party, ya know, lower back pain and the "burns when I pee!" thing... then on saturday morning I'll be doubled over in pain, making it obvious I'm sick. Tell them on saturday afternoon that I have a doctor's appointment on sunday afternoon. Then of course, I'd call them monday morning and say my infection is bad, I was ordered to stay home for a day and rest since if we saw GWAR in IL on sunday, we wouldn't be back till Tuesday.
My older sis worked at a print shop at the time so I gave her Melissa's info and she printed up some very accurate looking doctor's notes. Mailed them over to me, made copies and went to Melissa's to have her sign them. The day before Halloween I was at Melissa's videotaping her signing them.
"Hahaha, we're forging doctor's notes so Lisa can go see another GWAR show!" she grinned. She even changed the message on her answering machine in case my internship decided to call! But we used her name, address, number, everything. She signed them, "Lisa has been under my care and can resume normal activities on Tuesday October 5th"... something like that. We couldn't stop laughing!!! I even went as far to look up medications prescribed for a kidney/bladder infection... Macrobid!
Sure enough on Halloween I limped around and casually told one of the interns that I thought I had a bladder infection cause it burned when I peed. She sympathized with me, awww. Saturday morning I wobbled in, back hurting, trying to not make it look too obvious. Hey, they oughta be happy I showed up when everyone else bailed for some football game that wasn't even gonna happen until 4pm. I had the first shift, 8am - Noon. Around 10am I said I had to call our supervisor cause I wouldn't be able to come in the next AM, I had a doctor's appointment. "I'll bring a note on monday," I said. They were cool with it... I guess.
Noon rolled around... I limped back to my car... as soon as I was out of site I hopped in and sped all the way to New Port Richey (about 2 1/2 hours away) to get Moo. All my shit was already packed and ready to go! Of course, I was feeding my parents some bullshit excuse that we were going to Halloween Horror Nites that weekend and seeing some friends. Of course I'd be dropping her off on Tuesday then picking her up again on Thursday... our folks were absorbed in their own issues at the time and going thru divorce so I guess they didn't bother to question my constant Moo-napping. We had a good chat with Dad before we left tho, one of those life-talk chats. We hit up the Citgo to say hey to Liann and were on our way!   We did alot of singing on this trip... our screeching rendition of Three Dog Night's "Joy to the World" was caught on tape... we sucked but we love that song... we also heard Avril Lavigne's "Complicated" about a zillion times and sang it every time...
Paid homage to Charlie! I wore this tacky ass mink coat the entire trip, but it was cold, dammit! We didn't anticipate HOW cold it was going to be but we had an idea.
We stopped at the KY welcome center to snap some pics and met some of the coolest old people!   They worked behind the Visitor Info. desk and asked what 2 little girls were doing alone on the road, esp. from FL going to IL. We told them our whole story, they were shocked but the woman was all, "Hell yeah! You do this while you're young and able..." The older man was concerned for our safety and said he'd never let his daughters do it... we said, "Neither would ours! Our folks don't know where we are!!" They gasped... but later agreed that as long as we're good kids and aren't getting into trouble or drug addicts, this is a good way to "do our thing!"   We couldn't agree more.
It was real cold, rainy and shitty when we got to Urbana. And the roads leading to the venue were closed off for some reason!! DAMMIT!   Not knowing our way around town, we had no idea how to get to the venue. We stopped at a Blockbuster and asked how to get around the blocked roads... and asked WHY the roads were blocked.
"Oh, a Bears game just got let out, so they're blockin the traffic..." the clerk said. Poor Moo misunderstood the guy and shrieked, "OMG, there are BEARS running loose?!?! OMG!!!!"   The clerk and I couldn't stop laughing, "We're not from here..." I chimed. When the guy re-gained his composure he gave us directions.
We didn't tell anyone we were going, how the hell could we anyway? We figured it'd be an interesting surprise. Still too lazy to change clothes, I wore my internship uniform to the show that I'd been wearing since the morning before. Oh well, I was gonna start stinking pretty badly very soon anyway!   NEXT!!!!