😀 I’m happy. Today has been a very good day.
I applied for a few more jobs at that same company in southern England. Cross your fingers, knock on wood, and avoid ladders for me. I would really love this job, so do all you can and send me your happiest thought patterns.
But tonight topped it off. I just got back from an absolutely free concert by They Might Be Giants. I’ve grown up listening to their stuff so all of it is very sentimental. This concert was kind of a special event for fans – unpublished except in their online newsletter. Thank heavens my brother subscribes to it! He found out about it a few weeks ago, we set up a ride with some good friends, and we all went down to Borders Books on 18th and L St in Washington, DC. Traffic was *hideous*! Highway 66 – the most direct route for us to get into Washington, was entirely stuck because of a few separate accidents. We were sitting on 66 when it hit us, ‘this is stupid.’ We immediately got off and went straight to the subway. This happened at 6:00, the concert was at 6:30. Surprisingly, we were only five minutes late! We entered the store on the second floor and they were down at the bottom. We had to snake around for a while, and I was getting pretty disappointed. I didn’t want to be so far away that we couldn’t see them. Then I spotted a sign for an elevator. We got in, and when the doors opened on the bottom floor there they were. We were only about three feet away! We were able to sidle in so closely that I was right next to the little stage. I think I got some fantastic photos of them, I can’t wait to get the film developed. As soon as I do, I’ll upload it so you all can see.
They didn’t really have a set list of songs to play, so they had us shout out a few things. One of their songs gets stuck in my head so easily and it’s been in my head all day. I ended up shouting it about five times; “Why Does the Sun Shine?” Thankfully they heard me shouting (I’m sure it helped that I was about a foot and a half away from John Linnell) and sang the song with a delightful new twist – the other John sang it in the style of Peter Noone. It was *hilarious*! It only made it even more entertaining when they messed up halfway through the song, actually stopped playing, asked each other questions about how it was supposed to go, and then started back up again.
The crowd went nuts when they played two other fan favorites, Particle Man and Istanbul. I have to admit, I couldn’t help but smile and I was definitely singing along.
Unfortunately John Flansburgh has the flu so the concert got cut a bit short. Once they announced that, though, the crowd let out a big “aww!” and they kept playing just to appease us. After that they went through about five songs until they finally had to call it quits. It was great, though, and we were all really grateful they didn’t stop until absolutely necessary. I feel bad for John, though. He couldn’t just go back to the hotel, he’s probably still there signing autographs. I would have gotten two of my albums autographed, but that line would have lasted hours. Heck, *I’d* still be there! And I was too hungry by that point, as were all of my friends there, so we decided to head home and stop at Wendy’s. I don’t think I should have eaten all those fries, though… 🙂
Now I’m back at home, in my lovely flannel pajama pants, and downloading the latest BMW movie. Mmm, DSL, Gary Oldman, James Brown, cars, ‘splosions… doesn’t get much better than this. 🙂