Non-Audio Blog Episode 1: Laziness Ensues

Ok, so I haven't posted for a while, and I'm breaking format for a non-audio post. This is mostly because I'm lazy and the audio blogs take a lot longer to produce than a written one.

My birthday has come and gone, spent at Blanc Burgers with friends. It was excellent. I always love that place, except the part at the end when the check comes. That Saturday, we used the free movie tickets from my place of employ to see Synecdoche, New York at the new Fork and Screen theaters in Olathe. The concept is that the movie theaters have a long row table in front of each row of seats, with a concierge button in front of each seat. They have a full dinner menu and will serve food throughout the movie, including drinks from the full bar on premises. I tried cconut curry chicken tenders and a boulevard IPA, for around $15 total. Pretty reasonable, considering a popcorn and soda sets you back $10 at the concession stand. I am definitely a fan of the whole experience, and will surely return. The only snag is that tickets are $10 at the Olathe 30, which makes a night out relatively spendy. I think that's still cheaper than the VIP Room tickets for the theater on the Plaza, though (similar concept). The film itself was ingenius. I'll leave it for you to go read about it yourself, but I can only highly recommend that you see it as soon as possible. Of course, I will likely go see anything with Charlie Kaufman's name on it.

Speaking of movies, Milk and Slumdog Millionaire open next Friday at the Tivoli. We are thinking of going for a double feature of sorts. Those two movies may be too much to handle in one night, but we shall see, I suppose.

Last week was the long Thanksgiving break, which was much needed. We ended up driving approximately 1,000 miles, but it was really nice to see everyone. We started at my parents' for Thanksgiving with my fam on Thursday. We went to Bolt with my mom and the younger neices and nephews. It was a super cute movie. We stayed with Rikki's parents on Thursday night. Friday, we boarded the dogs and headed to Dubuque for Rikki's extended family. Her maternal grandmother is in a bad way, so it's definitely good that we made it out there for a visit. Saturday, we began the long journey back to Ankeny, making a couple of stops along the way. We stopped in Cedar Falls to see one Mike Drahaus, and in Ames to catch dinner with Steve and Jana. We went to The Cafe, which I had never been to for dinner before. It was pretty amazing to me that one of the more expensive restaurants in Ames chalks up at below average for Kansas City. It's pretty nuts how much more expensive it is to live here. Anyway, we returned to Ankeny pretty late, and stayed with my parents. Sunday, we hung out with my parents, grabbed the requisite lunch at Jade Garden with Heidi and Senor Gruca, played some games at Rikki's family's house, picked up the dogs, and began the return drive to Kansas City. There was a bunch of snow on the road and the going was slow through Iowa. We saw a few overturned vehicles blocking the road. It slowed us down by roughly an hour getting home, but we made it back safely. The weird thing is that as soon as we hit the Missouri border, the roads magically cleared up completely, like someone flipped off the snow switch or something. It was kind of bizarre. And then... back to the grind on Monday. etc.

Shows since my last post, which was apparently ages ago:

The Dandy Warhols, at Liberty Hall in Lawrence. It was a straight ahead rock show, but man, I love almost everything this band does. It was a solid almost 3 hours of awesomeness.

Beck / MGMT at the Uptown Theater. Again, a pretty straightlaced performance, which surprised me. I was a little disappointed, compared to the first time I saw Beck. It was considerably more wacky and fun then. This just seemed a little too straight and narrow. MGMT has improved quite a bit since I last saw them live, so that was good.

Girl Talk at the Granada in Lawrence. There were two openers, and both of them were absolutely horrible. The second band, The Death Set, took something like an hour to set up a three piece band, who then played for all of 20 minutes. Lame! However, all was forgiven with Greg Gillis took the stage. It was a ridiculous carnival of dancing, balloons, beach balls, toilet paper flying everywhere, surrounding this one guy slamming on his laptop, doing things I can't even comprehend, creating some pretty incredible mash up music. They guy is awesome live. You des moines people, go see him. I'm pondering making the trip up to catch him again. It was just totally bonkers, unadulterated fun.

Of Montreal at Liberty Hall in Lawrence. The opener cancelled, but that's ok. The show went pretty late as it was. Holly joined us for this one. It was definitely more interesting than the last time I saw them, though they were pretty skimpy on the Hissing Fauna material, which is what I'm most familiar with. There were copious costume changes, and lots of little stage plays going on while the music was under way. Kevin Barnes pretended to kill himself in various ways during one song, including a staged hanging. There was a wild west shootout taking place on stage, part of which was covered by a saloon set. There were various wacky characters around throughout the show. It was quite the visual overload, but it was a really great show. Definitely more than worth the $14.50.

The Smashing Pumpkins at the Midland Theater. It was... ok. The venue was absolutely gorgeous. I can't wait to go to more shows there, presuming that more shows that I want to see come to the theater. The drinks were expensive, but eh, whatever. It's a concert venue. I'm just thrilled they took credit cards without having a $20 minimum tab (I'm looking at you, Beaumont Club). The sound was pretty poor for the show itself. One of the things I find the most distinctive about the Smashing Pumpkins is Billy Corgan's voice, love it or hate it, and his voice just got muddled in the mix quite a lot of the night, expecially in the louder numbers. There were very few hits played for a so-called "20th Anniversary Tour", I thought, but these decisions aren't mine to make. Billy generally came across as a self-indulgent snot on-stage (he asked for a singalong to Today (during which, by the way, he did not sing), and then stopped in the middle of the first verse to chew out the audience for not knowing the lyrics and not putting enough effort into the song), but I went in expecting that. What I wasn't expecting was the long, drawn out, amp-humping, formless, pointless noise jams that comprised probably 40% of the set. They were pointless and boring. So, it was roughly 60% of a good show, for which I paid 200% of what I normally pay to go to shows. There were good moments, to be sure, but overall, it was a disappointing experience.

I think this post is long enough for now. Two weeks, and then the trip to Chicago! Then, the trip home for the holidays! Then, new years in Des Moines! Then, I will finally buy a couple of shirts at Smash! Then, I will add a few more exclamation points!!!!

Farewell, whoever may be reading this.