Last Wednesday (holy crap, was it really a whole week ago already?!) was my first day off, and thus the first Styx show. We got to the fair at about 2 p.m., I think, and grabbed a lemonade before finding the place to start lining up. I love GA shows because I'm pretty much guaranteed a front-row spot as long as I get there early enough (seated shows require buying tickets at the exact right time, dependence on the speed and reliability of one's computer connection, etc. At this point, I'm not likely to go if I can't get a seat in the first five rows…so terribly, terribly spoiled…). On the other hand, as we waited, someone wondered aloud not how much of their life they'd spent at Styx concerts, but how much of their life they'd spent waiting for Styx concerts, and that's a truly frightening concept. Waiting for, and traveling to and from… Yoiks. Mustn't think about that.

We weren't first in line, but we were reasonably close, and hung out with various folks we knew. The venue was a dirt racetrack, the stage (a cement wall) was 7 feet high, and the barrier was pretty far away from the stage, but it was better than nothing. It got rather chilly as the sun went down, thanks to the ocean breezes, but the concert itself was extremely pleasant because of those breezes.

There was no opening band, so Styx played for 2 hours, adding in the songs that get cut when they have to do shorter sets. Chuck (original bassist, who only joins them occasionally) was there, which is always great to see. In fact, he was at all three shows.

Three? you ask. But Dayle, weren't you going to only two?

Heh. Yep. Except Tani had used her connections and told someone (I don't know if it's okay for me to say whom) that she couldn't get decent tickets to the casino concert in Highland on Thursday night, and the person said they'd give Tani four tickets in the band section (i.e., where the band's free tickets are—sadly, not with the band…). Vickie was visiting from NY, and Sheri was free to go, so Tani offered the fourth ticket to me. Ken, being The Most Wonderful Husband in the World (Don't Argue With Me On This), had no problem with the concept of buying a single ticket and either making his way to the front or just hanging out farther back.

I should add here that he's also agreed to us going to the show on his birthday. Yes, that's right: He's willing to spend his birthday with a bunch of screaming women and his wife lusting after another man. Most. Wonderful. Husband. Ever. (The women have decided to make him a shirt. Seems I've been officially inducted into the West Coast Styx fans known as the Heauxs, and the shirt will read Heaux Security, since Ken's job is to break up chick fights, protect me/us from the crush of the crowd, and catch things [picks, beach balls, Polaroids, drumsticks, Frisbees, etc.] tossed by the band.)

So, yes, Thursday. I worked at home for most of the day, then we hopped on the bike (the better to sneak though traffic) and headed off through Freeway Hell (hot, crowded, stinky…) to the desert. (Well, it's all desert—we went through the LA part of the desert into more desert.) We arrived, but no tickets for Tani were waiting at the Box Office or Will Call, and we couldn't get hold of Tani. Someone gave us two tickets for seats in the back, so Ken had a way in for free, which was nice. Sheri arrived, and we knew Tani was on her way, but that was it. We grabbed food (in an area of the casino where there was no cell coverage) and apparently Tani and Vicki snuck by us, because there was more confusion, and finally we got into the concert hall (through metal detectors! which confused us because it looked like an airport and we didn't have tickets to show them) and Tani found a man with a clipboard and an envelope, and lo, the envelope contained our tickets…

…and passes to the pre-show Meet-n-Greet…

…which we'd missed.

Sigh. Oh well. The show kicked ass, although it was a shorter set. Stupid casino. And they kept trying to make us sit down, because “people couldn't see.” Then they shouldn't be in the front rows, should they? Sheez, even Tommy commented on it.

I didn't get a towel from Larry, but I did get another Consolation Polaroid (I have a large collection of these…), specially taken after he'd handed the usual ones out, of him and JY looking extremely goofy.

The drive home was less crowded and less hot, getting downright chilly by the time we hit the Conejo Grade. So we spent some time soaking in the hot tub before pouring ourselves into bed.

Friday morning we headed down to Anaheim, ate lunch at the House of Blues so as to be allowed in the early line, and were lined up by early afternoon. Since there was a bunch of us, we traded off sitting in the hot sun and sitting inside the restaurant sipping cool drinks.

The concert was loud, hot, and went well into the night—just the way a rock show should be. Everything was fantastic until the end, when Larry broke his tradition of giving his towel to a blonde bimbo…and gave it to a brunette bimbo next to me. And I was showing far more cleavage! Oh, I just about gave him up for good, I tell you. Certainly for a couple of hours. Maybe into the next day, even. Damn him and the Canadian horse he rode in on, muttermuttermutter.

After the show, Terry, their new PR guy, was doing video interviews with people (he'd done some in line before the show as well), and I was soooo grumpy and told Ken (who, uh, caught the Consolation Polaroid, oddly) that it would be unwise for me to be interviewed because I would pretty much just spit “Larry, what the f— do I have to do to get an f—ing towel?!” But I pulled myself together and marched over and looked straight into the camera…and no doubt sounded like a raving idiot, even though I was entirely articulate. I used the phrase “110%” which I abhor. I realized halfway through that my hands were firmly on my hips, and discovered afterwards that the heat and humidity had made my hair look like Roseanne Roseanneadanna's. I probably had mascara everywhere, too. Yeah, if the band watches that, I can just imagine what Larry's reaction would be: “I am so never giving her a towel—she scares me.”

Muttermuttergrumblemutter.

I then went and bought the best Styx shirt ever. Ribbed sleeveless T. Fits perfectly. I'm going to beg Casey to carry it in other colors. It helps to be on a first-name basis with the merchandise guy… Don't ask me how many tour shirts I have, and do not ever ask me how much I've spent over the years… I love the baseball shirts, too. Look, shiny new design!

We crashed that night at Cat and Mel's in Long Beach. Cat had set up her bed for us, because she is a total sweetie. It was late and I was a zombie, so there was no socializing, just collapsing onto crisp new sheets and having the world slip away…

Saturday, we got to see their new apartment, say hi to Mel, and have breakfast with Cat, before heading off to my favorite used bookstore, Bookman Too, in Huntington Beach. They didn't take many of my books in trade, but I forgave them because they're wonderful in other ways. Most of the books I bought were romances, and most of those were ones on my list because of interest in submitting to those publishers. It was kind of weird, feeling like I wasn't buying a lot of books for my own personal pleasure reading (although I know I'll enjoy pretty much everything I bought).

So I'll have lots of things to read on our trip to Wyoming at the end of the month. Remember, I'm the one with the strange ability to read on the back of a motorcycle. (Only on boring freeways, of course. Once we get into the mountains, I'll be enjoying the gorgeous scenery!)

Saturday afternoon was Cat & Mel's apartment-warming party. It started late, which was fine, because it gave me the opportunity to chat with Mel for a bit. She's someone I don't know well, but would like to know better. (So many wonderful people in the world, and so little time! Argh!) We talked about the SCA as a whole versus the activities we do within it, and about how people in garb should wear more hats. And the merits of speaking forsoothly, and other such topics.

The party was largely made up of her friends, although Cat's become friends with many of them. It was truly amusing when several young men suddenly realized who I was—they'd seen me at Pirate Tournament, but not exactly registered my face. Ah, the power and distraction of impressive cleavage. (Ken says the next time Styx plays on Hallowe'en, I should wear my pirate outfit…)

We brought ice cream cones and ice cream to the party because it was hot out, and I don't think anyone made them, although some ice cream was eaten. Oh well. Scratch that creative idea.

Brian and Morgana showed up, which was a lovely surprise, but then I did a somewhat bad thing: I told Morgana about Tani's party, which was starting in a short while, and how we were going to watch some rare Styx footage/outtakes of interviews. Turned out that she wanted to see it! (Brian's the Styx fan in the family, or so I thought—and he's an old-school fan, not as interested in the post-Dennis music). The reason telling her about the second party was bad was that I ended up stealing the two of them away from the first party… Oops. I apologized to Cat, and I don't think she's too mad at me. ;-)

Ken had gone to help Meredith and Geoff move their final stuff out of the old apartment that they used to share with Cat and Mel, so M&B and I drive to Tani's (a whopping 2.08 miles away) and hung out there for a while. M&B eventually left to go back to the first party, and then Ken eventually arrived, and there was much video-watching and silliness and food (Tani's husband grilled burgers, in between hiding from all of us shrieking fangirls, and Tani had made fresh ice cream). I think it was 11 p.m. or thereabouts when we left—and we had about an hour and a half drive to get home. We went up the coast, always pretty, even at night. I don't remember much more after that. There was much sleep, and lo, it was good.

It was nice to wake up in my own bed Sunday, knowing that I had the day at home to get things done. Would I rather be on the tour bus with the band? [g] Of course! But home is pretty damn nice, too.

My main goals for the day were getting a bunch of filing done, catching up on e-mail, and calling people I was overdue to talk to. I ended up talking to my parents, my oldest sister, and Sarah; Meg was the only person I never connected with. During the calls, I filed, cleaned up the recipe notebook (punched holes in pages that needed them, put everything in the notebook, threw out old recipes we'd never tried or tried only once and obviously didn't click with, etc.), and did several loads of laundry. Multitasking at its best. There's still lots more filing to do, as well as a major purge of the filing cabinet, but I got through a lot of it. Also on the plate is filing a bunch of writing paperwork that got shoved into a pile while I was on the tight novel deadline. I did get through a lot of e-mail, too, except for some sadly overdue personal responses, which I plan to answer this week.

And those were my adventures, followed by mundanity at home.

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Currently Reading: a Harlequin Eclipse gothic; Time Management from the Inside Out, Julie Morgenstern; Queen of the Slayers, Nancy Holder (chronicling what happens after the last episode of “Buffy”)
Lately Listened To: Styx Live Sessions iTunes Exclusive EP (just downloaded, wooh!); RWA sessions
Recently Watched: CSI: Miami