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Thursday, April 06, 2006 Excess is the new moderation OK, blog writer’s block over for now. So I haven’t written for what, two weeks or something? I wasn’t really getting any complaints though, so I’m not sure what that says about my blog. Gone are the days when I couldn’t go five days without a whiner. My popularity waines. But seriously, who wants to hear about another day working at Corperate Coffee Giant? Not me. But that’s pretty much all I’ve been doing, and driving myself insane in the meantime. I had something like 50 hours on the schedule last week. That’s a lot of coffee. But that doesn’t leave much to write about. Oh, I’ve also been watching Season Four of 24, but you’ve probably all seen that so there’s not much discussion to be found there either. That said, I was probably the only person disappointed when Michelle and Tony hooked up again. There go my chances with Tony and his newfound beer gut. (There's just more to love!) And so, I shall tell you about my recent excursion to Glasgow and Greenock last Sunday night. I plan to meet up with dearest Lori at Pizza Express at 6:30. Going to the Imogen Heap show with Lori is a gamble because she always looks cooler than me. This is probably because she is actually cooler than me. I mean let’s face it, going anywhere with Lori is a gamble. I should really start hanging out with people who are uncool, so that I can look better. I am only a few minutes late, which is amazing since my earlier bus never showed. Well, it showed…but only RIGHT behind the later bus. Amazing. God bless public transport. It needs it. I change in the bathroom, only then noticing the stains on my newly-cleaned shirt (it was washed in cold water, I think this is the problem). It’s a good thing the gig is in the dark for the most part. I return to the table where Lori is, and Lori says I look “gig-tastic”. We proceed to eat pizza and catch up on things while Lori drinks apple juice that looks EXACTLY like orange juice. What kind of country IS THIS? I often wonder, when I go out with girl (second-word) friends whether other people think we’re a lesbian couple. I love Lori of course, but not that way. But let’s face it, we ARE sitting at a rather romantic-looking table in a rather romantic pizza place. (If you’ve been a Pizza Express, you understand. It’s the only place where it feels improper to eat your pizza by picking it up.) And we’re both pretty hot, so it would make sense. Lori and I have talked about the fact that we’d probably make pretty good lesbians, if we agreed with that sort of thing…and actually liked girls (we like boys). I’m not sure if I’m allowed to say this, being a good Christian girl and all. But I’ll say it anyway. Lori and I also buy MASSIVE desserts. If I had any suicidal tendencies, death by this very dessert would be the way to go. And I’m pretty sure the end result, if we were to actually finish them, would be death. I can HEAR my arteries clogging. But I paid a tenner for this show and I’ll be damned if I’m going to miss Imogen due to my untimely dessert death. Lori and I walk in the rain to try and find The Arches, where the show is. We give up and Lori asks some random guy if he knows where it is. Actually, first she asked a security guard. She has some sort of reasoning behind asking the security guard, but I forget what it was. That fails, and she asks the Local Drunkard, who magically does actually know where it is. (We had just walked past it.) He kinda stumbles around his words, until he realizes we actually speak English, then he rambles on in a Glasgow accent. It’s a good thing I’ve lived here for three years and that Lori is married to a Scotsman. There’s no way an American tourist could have understood a word he said. We find The Arches. Lori walks in with her umbrella and the doorman says: “Sorry, no umbrellas in here.” Lori immediately has a freaked look on her face, til the entire door staff (four of them or so) start laughing. Cheeky doorman. The Arches is a VERY cool venue by the way. I highly recommend it, even if it has a pretentiousness about it, as Lori pointed out. It’s a lot like the Caves in Edinburgh, methinks. It’s pretty perfect for an Imogen show. But Imogen is not yet on stage. Zoe Keating is on, with her mass of dreads and cello. It’s great, but not GIG music. More….peaceful driving music. Or going to sleep music.She makes a sort of attempt to get people to not talk during her performance, something about the sound resonating from her cello, I dunno. Apparently, no one told her that people have to talk during the opening act…it’s pretty much a rule. If you want people to be quiet, get your own show. In any case, it doesn’t work. Lori and I reminisce about Ye Olde Gig Days, when we used to go to shows every weekend, whether we’d heard the band or not. We lament the loss of our “gig legs”, which are not unlike “sea legs”, as we now feel we are officially getting old and cannot properly stand for 3 hours at a go. We’re willing to give it a shot though. Just before Imogen comes on, two Irish guys start chatting us up. One guy looks just like our friend Bryce, but much taller. I don’t remember the actual guys’ names though, so we’ll just call him George and the other guy Bob. George seems interested in Lori til he finds out she’s married, and me til he finds out I’m a Christian. It’s actually humorous to see the immediate reactions when he learns each of these things. Bob tells us that he has a friend who’s sister used to room with Imogen in London. Somehow this is kinda cool. Six Degrees of Imogen Heap. So the show starts and it’s great. And now comes my favorite part of the night. I basically had to break up a fight at an Imogen Heap show. It was awesome. I think it’s somewhere in the middle of “Loose Ends” or maybe “Headlock” that some girl who is about 4’5 and standing next to Lori (who is in front of me) starts singing loudly along. Now, this is annoying, but not rare at shows. Lori can tell this part of the story much better than I can, because she heard it all, but from what I gather, Chubby Blonde (who is next to Goth Midget) turns to her and says something about not having paid 10 quid to hear HER sing off-key. One thing leads to another and Goth Midget (or Goth Midget’s friend? I’m not sure…) is knocking CBs drink out of her hand. This was where I started to notice. CB GLARES at Midget in a way that I can only describe as FANTASTICALLY hilarious. I’m like…seriously, girl, you need some lessons in the Art of Tough because that ain’t it. Then there are some words exchanged along the lines of “Want to take this outside?” to which I ALMOST say: “Actually, please DO take this outside, because I sure didn’t pay MY 10 quid to have to drunk girls fight so loudly I can’t hear Imogen.” But I don’t. Then there’s some shoving and more shoving and CB’s boyfriend steps in front of her and I step in front of Goth Midget to separate them. It’s more like I’m protecting Goth Midget though because CB could have seriously kicked her ass. Goth Midget was scared at this point it seems, and (thankfully) her and her friends moved back. I’m like…dude. I just broke up a bar brawl. At an Imogen Heap show. I’m not sure if that’s pretty cool or really lame. Let’s go with really cool. Anyway, like I said, the whole show is amazing. If you haven’t heard or seen Imogen, it’s hard to explain how great she can be. She’s basically a one-woman band, with all sorts of electronic stuff…beat boxes and her PC and loops and harmonizer. My only complaint really was her version of "Let Go" just didn’t do it for me like the original version. But everything else was incredible, including "Daylight Robbery" which is one of my favorite songs. Actually, there was one more thing, and that was that…no one moves. Like I said, Imogen is kinda….electronica. And yet….people just basically stood still the entire time. It makes sense on her slow songs like “Hide and Seek” or “The Moment I Said It”, but not when she seriously rocks the house with “Daylight Robbery”. She even warned us that on this song she may break out “in a boogie” and that we were invited to as well. Well…only me and Lori take her up on the offer. Spot the Americans. But it’s actually outside of my control. I do not understand how anyone can hear “Daylight Robbery” live and not at least move a little. Lori and I walk to her car in the rain and drive to her house in Greenock, where Scott is up waiting for us. He was a good boy and made my bed in the guest room as Lori asked (it seems). Lori’s cats are ridiculously cute, and I’m glad to call them friends on MySpace. (I’m not joking, they actually have their own MySpace.) Lori breaks out “The O.C.” DVDs in order to confirm her notion that “Hide and Seek” was the song playing at the end of the season when whatsherface shoots (but apparently doesn’t kill) whatshisface. Yep, that’s the song. We can all sleep peacefully now. And then we go to bed and get up the next day and Lori drives me into Anniesland where I get a train to get a bus to get to work in Edinburgh….which makes for a very long day. But it was totally worth it. I look forward to our next time together in hopes that in will include Felicity and cheese. Oh and Lori gave me a WHOLE ROLL of Girl Scout Thin Mint cookies! So I went ahead and forgave her for that whole “seeing Rent without me” thing. So there you go. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Enjoy it, because I may not have anything fun to write about again for a while. And you thought Scotland was such an exotic place to live. And Imogen is about to tour the U.S. again. If you can see her show, PLEASE go see it. It's simply stunning. Mic |
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"In the city you will find that the poor and the broken are often much, much more open to the idea of Gospel grace and much more dedicated to its practical outworkings than you are." (Tim Keller) | |
