The best thirteen bucks I've ever spent.

I saw Flogging Molly in Salt Lake last night. And it was the best thirteen bucks I've ever spent.

They played all my favorite songs, and I almost couldn't handle being in the audience. I was giddy. And I jigged my heart out. It was that good.

First, reviews of the opening bands:

• Zox - There were a few interesting things about this band, and none of them were the music. The singer looked like Napoleon Dynamite, and the drummer looked like he would fit better in an 80's hair band (we're talking tank-top and big hair, it was awesome). The guy playing the electric violin was pretty cool--again, not to listen to, but to watch. Their best song was a Pixies cover.
• Bedouin Soundclash - This group has a cool name, but I can't say enough bad things about them. They were weaksauce Clash-wannabes, and they were in love with the echo effect (both on the guitar and the mic). They played for way too long, and that's the bottom line.

My guess for the song that FM would start with was Tobacco Island, but they came out of the gates with Screaming at the Wailing Wall. And it was unbelievable. As soon as the music started, it doubled your heart rate and removed your inhibitions. It was cool. And everybody was into it.

One of the best things about the band, it seems, is that they all contribute equally, and they're all equally passionate about it. Above all else, you get a tremendous feeling of energy from the music and from the stage. I appreciate the way that the sound fuses together--you can distinguish very few individual instrument when they're all playing together, because they seem to play as one instrument.

I almost lost all continence when they played Drunken Lullabies, which may be my favorite song ever. It's also the song I always yo-yo to, when possible.

The front man (acoustic guitar and vocals) is way cool, and he appears to be like 45. His first comment on stage was about what a travesty it was that they were making him drink Guinness out of a plastic cup. He would briefly mention a song's origin and meaning before playing them, which was really cool, and there seemed to really only be a few themes: his mom, his dad, drinking, God, and the Devil.

Overall jist: Hands down, this was the most exhiliarating performance I've seen by anybody. They really know how to play to a crowd. And it just might be the best show I've ever seen. Go buy all their albums. And buy me tickets to see them in Las Vegas on St. Patrick's Day (can you imagine?!).

If I were a Fig Newton...

Names No Parent Should Ever Inflict on a Child

• Hubert
• Herbert
• Pubert
  

My weird story.

So here's the story I wrote for class, by request. I'm a little self-conscious about it because I only had 25 minutes to write it, so don't mock it (or me). The first part is the prompt from the teacher, and then the rest is my part. The line of hyphens marks the change. Without further ado...

The Boyfriend

The last time Kayla saw Doug Marshall he was in his casket, so she was surprised to see her one-time boyfriend strolling across the campus and holding hands with a girl Kayla vaguely recognized as another student in her history class. Tall, tanned, and a little more buffed out than she remembered him, Doug looked anything but dead, but she was sure it was Doug. Kayla even followed the pair until they disappeared into the parking lot to make sure. All the while her heart was beating at a frightening pace and she was sweating as if she had just finished a 10k run. Now she wondered if she were losing her mind. She had been at Doug’s funeral almost a year ago, hugged and tried futilely to console his grieving parents (Doug was an only child), cringed at the overly sentimental obituary in the newspaper, and sadly eliminated his name and address from her telephone book.

Their dating had a brief but memorable episode in Kayla’s busy social life. At first she had found him sexy and charming, then simply strange. His death had been bizarre as well—as had the funeral. She remembered both events vividly now as she contemplated just how she would verify her conviction that Doug was alive, and apparently doing quite well.

------------------

She was the only one who had seen him die. She had watched the bullets—two of them—as they passed out of the gun smoke and into the night air, seemingly in slow motion, before meeting Doug’s stomach and chest. After that, time compensated by moving more quickly than ever before. She was crying, but she could not go to him. She remained rooted to her spot as Doug laid dying, the air still smelling faintly of .45 smoke and the coldness required to take someone’s life without reason.

It was horrifying, scarring.

The funeral was probably standard fare, but Kayla couldn’t tell. Her grandparents were in great health, and never before had she lost someone close to her. Its light-heartedness was unsettling. Family members laughed as they told stories of Doug’s childhood. His friends remembered and spoke proudly of his accomplishments. But Kayla was alone. She hadn’t known his friends well, that was true, and her own family had passed on the opportunity to attend the funeral, but the emptiness she felt was not the lack of people around her. It was the horrible realization that she had changed; that a part of her was missing.

And the feeling wasn’t new. She’d seen Doug several times since then, really, but not in the way she’d just seen him crossing campus. She’d seen him in her dreams. She’d seen him in the picture she kept framed on her desk, and in the tattered photo of him at 8 years old that she kept in her wallet. She’d seen him in the old notes he’d written her. She’d seen him in the restaurants they’d liked, the places they’d been, and in the night when she felt the most alone. But none of those were like this.

Nor could she tell anyone about what she’d seen. Her parents were already worried about her. She’d tried to talk to her friends about it, but it clearly made them uncomfortable. They were never rude to her, and they still said hello if she would say it first, but the relationship was different. In desperation, she’d made a foolish attempt to talk things over with the counselor at school. The counselor provided counsel, yes, but not good counsel. He’d told Kayla to get help. Professional help. The kind of help intended for crazy people and people who blamed things on their childhood and people who washed their hands over and over and over again until they bled. She was better off alone. She could handle it by herself.

Perhaps it had been another dream today, at school. Now that time had passed, she was skeptical about why she’d panicked like she had. It was going to be okay. She was in control.

No, she wasn’t. Nor was it going to be okay. The memories flooded back and spilled onto her pillowcase in big wet drops. She needed him back. She wasn’t going to make it without him. And that night, alone in the quiet darkness of her bedroom, she couldn’t even remember why she’d shot him.

Six Short Anecdotes from the Last Two Weeks

1. This one from dimmi's blog.

2. I tried to buy a couple of washcloths from Wal-Mart, as mine somehow got lost in the move. In the attempt, though, I didn't actually end up getting washcloths--they turned out to be hand towels. They were folded up nice and small, but they're really quite big and inconvenient to wash yourself with. So now I need to go back to Wal-Mart.

3. On the second day of Creative Writing class (Engl 218R) we wrote a story from a prompt so the teacher could have a sample of each person's writing. I tried really hard to put a twist at the end of my story, but in doing so managed to write a story that was really creepy and morbid. Fortunately, though, the teacher liked the twist, so I'm saved. I got the story back, too, if you want to read it.

4. In Spring term past I received the assignment to home teach two girls, Holly and Charity, who had just moved into the ward. I got the assignment a few weeks into the term, and then moved out when the term was over, so I only visited them once (one month). Apparently I did a poor job, however, because it turns out that they both have moved into the same new ward as me, and I've been assigned to be their home teacher again. This is really just an Ensign story waiting to happen... I should write it up in something longer than anecdote format.

5. We had the rockingest Movie Night ever this week. We watched Waking Ned Divine, which is already a recipe for success, and we packed the place full. Really. There were 30 people crammed into the living room when people started leaving because there wasn't any more room to sit. So if you didn't get a seat--come earlier next week.

6. If you ever need another PE class to fill out your schedule, take Flexibility (EXSC 125). It's the coolest class ever. So far all we've done is show up to class, and stretch for the class period. That's not all, though--at some point they teach us how to take power naps, and we do that in class (be still my beating heart). I don't know that I necessarily need a lot of instruction in napping (much less napping in class), but I'm always up for honing my skills.