Make way, whatever will be will be...

My mind is a blur of past events. This week was insanity, as I've been to three free concerts within the past three days. INSANITY! OK, so I believe we left off near the beginning of the week...

Work was good this week, although I can't remember anything crazy happening. I also don't particularly remember what I did AFTER work this week. Laundry, and reading, I think. It's been nice to just kind of come home and mostly RELAX. I've been pretty good about keeping up with my internship-course journal, although I'm one entry behind at the moment. Still, I have the rest of today and tomorrow to write it up, and then just ONE more week to write up before I ship it off this upcoming Friday. Then it's one more week...

Thursday after work, I bought groceries, made dinner, and went to sleep IMMEDIATELY after eating. My alarm went off at 11:30 and I managed to only hit snooze once. Then I was up and showering, packing my purse with the goodies I wanted (Wheat Thins, a bottle of water, two magazines and a Sudoku book) and I met up with Kate at the subway. We headed to the Today show area at around 1:15 a.m. and were there by 2. We got into the "fan pass" line, and there were only 3 people in front of us. We sat down on the sidewalk, and rested, chatted and slept on the ground in the middle of New York City for the rest of the night, into the morning. It was the first time I ever camped out for anything, and it was AWESOME. We met so many kooky characters! There were two guys who approached us, kinda bro-ish looking fellows, and told us they had a condo and we could come up and watch the show with them if we wanted. They said they were awaked to early-morning soundchecks every single Friday. It was funny, but we declined. My only regret was not asking them to use their bathroom, because it would have probably been cleaner than the McDonalds restroom I ended up using around the corner (eeeewwy). Then, three German guys (probably in their late teens) came and sat on the street with us, asking us if they had missed the party. Adorable. We chatted with them for a while, probably an hour - turns out, they were on their way to Jamaica for vacation, and originally were going to fly out of Frankfurt straight there, but had either missed their flight or weather had forced them to switch, so now they had flown into NYC at 9pm and were grabbing a connecting flight at 4am to Miami, and from there, they'd get to their final destination. They had decided it didn't make sense to get a hotel room, so they were out exploring the city. While they were with us, a trash guy came up to ask us who we were waiting for, and when he hadn't heard of the band I showed him my copy of Rolling Stone with the Kings of Leon on the cover. He shook his head and said, "Nope, I just don't know!" After the Germans left, Kate and I laid down and she napped. I closed my eyes and listened to the summer night sounds, and felt a little grimy but totally content. At 5:30am, they checked us in and let us into the venue, which is basically just an open paved area that they organized with tons of gates. We were super close in front of the stage, and then of course it began to rain. At first it was light enough, and I had been warm and sticky enough, to where I enjoyed it and left my umbrella in my purse, but when it started to pick up, I took my umbrella out. I stayed dry for as long as I could, but when the Followill boys took the stage for a sound check, everyone called for umbrellas to come down so they could see, and I went ahead and obliged. Unfortunately, taking one's umbrella down meant water that had collected on it pouring down on everyone in the surrounding area. We were soaking wet, but singing every lyric at the top of our lungs. Fabulous. The guys played all three songs they would play for the show, and then left the stage hurriedly to change clothes and probably drink or do whatever else rockstars do before shows. The show came on at 7am, and when you're standing in the filming area, you can watch the show on TVs up on the side of a building, and there are speakers surrounding you so you can hear everything. People freaked out when Al Roker came out to do his weather thang, and of course there was one last downpour that soaked me through to the bone before the weather finally decided to get awesome for the rest of the show. I saw Meredith Vieira and all the others up close, which was fun, and we even managed to collect a silly foam microphone as a souvenir. Before we headed into the venue, I forgot to mention that they gave us poster material, and so Kate and I made signs. Hers was for her mom - it said "I <3 Terri Grady," and mine said "Austin <3s K.O.L." The Kings are all Sooners, which I think adds a special bit of irony to my poster:-P I ended up doing a write-up of the show, which I didn't think would get posted, but it was totally posted. AWE-SOME. Then, exhausted me got my butt in gear, put on some fresh clothes, and headed to the office to meet up with my co-worker and friend, Chris, to go to an acoustic Silversun Pickups performance that he won tickets for. We got there a couple hours in advance, and managed to make it inside before the rain hit again (thank goodness!!) The room was SUPER tiny, as there were only 200 of us there. It was SO great, and the crowd was good - there was just a great vibe there. There were also pictures taken, and they snapped one of Chris and me. We matched, which was pretty hilarious to my other RS co-workers. Anywho, the Silversun Pickups were AMAZING. Dead-on, sound-wise, and such a GREAT repore with the audience. It was just a fun show, and Chris' write-up made the website, too! After this, I headed home, ate dinner, and SLEPT.

Yesterday was awesome as well, because after sleeping in, working out and takin' it easy, I headed to Central Park's Summerstage and sat in line for three hours to be right up against the stage for M. Ward. We were SO close, which made it UNBEARABLY awful that we weren't allowed to take any photos. But the sound was great and it was great to be near. The opening band SUCKED - "Floored by Four," Mike Watt and Nels Cline(from Wilco)'s experimental group. Excruciatingly boring. It was this weird psychedelic crap that just went on and on and on. But then Ward absolutely destroyed. He played one of my most favorite tunes, "Chinese Translation." He also did a bunch of covers, the rockin'-est being Chuck Berry's "Roll Over Beethoven." It was a beautiful night, I was hanging with two fab ladies (Kate and Angelica) and then I headed home, had some sweet ice cream, and passed OUT. Today, it's super rainy so I'm doubting I'll get to do any of the other free events I was planning to hit up. I'm about to go for a run, and then just play it by ear, methinks.

I'm devestated that I've got just two weeks left here. It's unimaginable to me. It's flown by so quickly, and although I'm definitely looking forward to things back in Austin, I'm going to be homesick for New York. It's so strange, I was even telling Kate this morning - I've been following the Austin American-Statesman on Twitter, and there have been so many shootings and fires and everything else there, it almost feels safer here! (Crazy, no?) I'm gonna miss beautiful Central Park, I'm gonna miss hiding away in my room when I feel like it, but going out and doing fun crap whenever I dont. I'm going to miss work most of all, although I am starting to almost feel closure there. Don't get me wrong, I'm DYING to get a steady job with RS, but as for this summer, I have accomplished everything I set out to - I have one reporting credit, and an actual story credited to my name. I've done really excellent work. I've met Rob Sheffield and chatted with him about crazy stuff. I saw Conor Oberst on the 4th of July from very close range. I've been to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Annex. Those were the "must do"s. And along the way, I've grown so much and learned so much more about myself. I know that no matter where I end up when I graduate, if I love working there as much as I've loved working here this summer, life is going to be amazing.