So, here we are with the promised entry.
On Thursday, I took the day off so I could sleep in a lot. There was a reason that I needed to sleep in a lot, but I’m damned if I can think of it. Probably something to do with staying up too late and talking. I dunno. That isn’t the point, though. The point is that I was home at a pivotal time, and this happenstance is what allowed Dirk and I to see Jello. Were it not for my slackfulness, I would have been at work or something, and we would have missed out on it. And that makes it okay.
There I was, sitting at home and watching Judge Judy or something (does it matter what? We only have broadcast, so it all sucks), or maybe I was taking pictures of Yahoo with a pack of Marlboro Reds parked on top of her head like that bunny. As a side note, would any of you like to see stuff parked on the cat’s head? I can assure you she makes really funny faces, and it’s comedy gold. But I’m losing my train of thought here. I was doing whatever I do when I don’t bother to put underwear on under my floppy loose exercise pants and t-shirt when I got a phone call. It was Brent, wondering if we were going to the Jello Biafra show in Baltimore.
I almost said “Color Me Surprised” right here. Lame. At any rate, I was in some sort of shock, as I hadn’t been informed that Jello would be in Baltimore doing his spoken word thing any time in my lifetime. I quickly ascertained that we were completely broke, and started to pester Brent to front us the money until the next day when I got paid. It didn’t take much pestering, really. I just asked, he checked, he said okay and bought tickets for us online. Brent is a god. Also, for you ladies in the area, he’s single. I just thought I’d throw that out for your consideration.
Once I got that all sorted out, I called Dirk at work and told him to get his butt home ASAP so we could get to this Jello thing. None of us is intimately familiar with Baltimore; another concern was the weather, which the terms “rainy” and “gross” do not adequately describe. There was some debate over who would be driving, as well as which bullshit internet directions were least likely to get us killed, and off we went.
It took an incredibly long-ass time to drive there. Traffic was nightmarish the whole way up, and Dirk was driving. Dirk isn’t well-suited to driving in heavy traffic conditions – he gets upset at all the asshole drivers. So we smoked, and actually turned on the radio in hopes of hearing the Nirvana song they’ve had on repeat-play lately. Instead, we got Danzig doing “Mother” and we were all rocking along to that.
Citizens of Baltimore, I hate the way your city is designed. I’ll elaborate later. We managed to get to The Charles theatre with minimal damage, and parked in the parking garage across the street from the theatre. Dirk pissed on top of the building, so watch your step up there. We got in and the line for Jello was pretty long already, but not even a third of how long it would end up being. It was incredible – and these were the people who already bought tickets. I’m pretty sure it sold out before half the people without tickets got one. Dirk talked to these guys who were standing in line behind us, while Brent and I were laughing at a movie poster that said “Sexo” and making fun of a scary old guy wandering around. We’re not good people either, sorry to disappoint.
It took forever for the doors to open. After we’d been standing in line for 45 minutes, I started making odd noises and moving my hands in time to the noises. Every few minutes, I’d realize what a dork I looked like, usually because either Brent or Dirk was laughing at me, and I’d jam my hands in my pockets to keep from moving them around. This would last all of about 5 minutes. The doors were supposed to open at 8, with the show starting at 9, but the doors opened at 9 with the show starting at 10. We found our seats, Brent geared up his camcorder, and I geared up my digital cam.
I have no words for how wonderful Jello was. It was just like all the spoken word cds we listen to obsessively, except a hundred times better because he was right there in front of us and we could finally see his facial expressions and hand gestures. He has always inspired me to want more from our government, expect better of people, and dream of a future where we aren’t all pitted against each other to get the most money we can grab. Through him, I can laugh at situations and political leaders that make me want to retch. In short, he inspires hope.
I took some pictures while he was on stage, but they sucked a lot. Brent got about half his show on video. Does he mind? Not at all. Become the Media. As long as we’re not selling it for our own profit, I’m pretty sure he doesn’t mind; it would be hypocritical.
When the show was over, I was determined to meet Jello, and get a picture of the boys with him. He made it clear that he didn’t really want to be told what an inspiration he was, because we should be off trying to do the same for other people, so when I went up to him with Dirk and Brent in tow, I introduced myself, told him that we put together a compilation benefiting the Alternative Tentacles Legal Defense Fund, and asked him for a picture of him with Dirk and Brent to put up on our site to promote it. He readily agreed, and this is what I got:
Brent, Dirk, and JelloI might have compressed that photo too much. Oh well. If you want a better picture to admire Brent with, let me know. I'll post up a better version.
By this time, it was after two in the morning, and we had to find our way out of Baltimore. We couldn’t use the same way we came in, thanks to construction, one-way streets, and a lack of order or reason to the street names that I could discern. We got horribly lost in a place that looked like 98% of the buildings had been boarded up as plague houses years ago. It was rainy, visibility sucked, the few people out driving were obviously drunk, and it took us a good 45 minutes to work our way out of the city. Bad doesn’t even come close to covering it. By the time we got home, it was 4 in the morning, and I had to get up for work at 6:30. I ended up getting up at 7:30 and leaving for work at 8:30. Fun.
Let me tell you, though, it was worth it.
