The concert

For my birthday, Heather bought me tickets to the Blue October concert in SLC. Our friend Kirstin also had her 30th b-day in March so she was also treated to the concert. We left on Tuesday afternoon and met Kirstin there.

The venue was The Depot, which none of us had been to. We were there early enough to have gone right up to the front of the stage, but we are older now and didn't feel the need. We found nice seats at the edge of the room. It was perfect for us. We had a great view of the band and we didn't get smooshed.

I brought my camera but, being the braniac that I am, left it in the car with my coat/purse. We all had our cell phones so we did get some pic's. Also in the attempt to not bring those items in, I wore my cell phone on my belt. This is something that I DO NOT DO but I didn't want to loose it. I made fun of my "bulge" all night. Here it is:

It was a great concert. The opener was not bad, the lead singer was a little dramatic and we laughed a lot at him. That's right- at him. Blue October was great though. They played all of the songs from their new album and several favorites of my favorites from other albums. Here are some pic's of the concert. We had bought the edited version of the CD and so there were a lot of words in the original songs that we didn't realize were there. We looked at each other and giggled every time that he swore in a song. It made me appreciate the edited version though.

Lead singer, Justin Furstenfeld

Now the story of the girl-

After the concert, we went out on the floor to take pictures of ourselves. One of the band members, Ryan Delahoussaye, came out and was signing tickets so I of course went to get mine signed. This girl (totally drunk) came up to the stage and started telling him a sob story of how she had lost her kids (possibly something to do with her being a crazy lush) and that the band was the only thing that helped her get through it and begging him to give her something. He gave her a guitar pick and she thanked him and then asked him if he was part of the band. I bust up laughing and I was right next to her. She said, "you can all laugh at me but I got something that is worth a lot" Again couldn't stop laughing. Here are some pictures of me standing next to "the girl" she is the one on the right.

We laughed and joked and Kirstin did her best to talk the security in to letting us back stage but it just didn't happen. We got t-shirts (thanks again Heather) and were finally told that we had to leave. Here are a couple of pictures of us being groupies. Notice that Heather is not in any of the pictures. She was the photographer. She is the most successful person I know when it comes to staying out of pictures.

As we walked outside it was raining. We looked down the street and low and behold saw the lead singer getting off the tour bus. He decided that he would greet his fans and sign some autographs. Here he is with some of his fans.

drum roll please....

That is really Kirstin and I in the picture with the lead singer of Blue October!! He also signed all of our shirts. He was very nice (and very high).

We then stayed at hotel Bybee again. It was so great. Kirstin & I stayed up half the night talking and laughing. It was absolutely the best birthday present ever. Thank you so much Heather for everything. I had the best time and I really needed it. Thanks Kirstin for coming with us and for letting us stay at your house. I haven't laughed that hard in a long time. If I'm going to be away from my kids, I couldn't ask for better people to be with.