Ozzfest 07

First of all, I was way too old to be there and had no business having that much fun on a weekday, but here's what went down.

I decided I was responsible enough to drive to the show and in a worst case scenario we could cab it back to my place and my counterpart could still get home in her car if she left it at my apartment. I'm using counterpart in every sense of the word here, too. So, of course, I think she is awesome. I pack an Elvis blanket, some waters, an Arsenal warm up top and some spray on sunscreen. We head to show at 11:00 AM and pick up a twelver of wifebeater light and head to $20 worth of parking. We are four deep by the time we get to the gate to pick up our ticket from Pappy. It might barely be Noon.

The next part of the story may break some rules, but let it be said that we are in the gate with 6 beers in my backpack. That's like $48 worth of beer inside. We meet our group and proceed to the second stage. All the beer is gone by 1:00 PM. Drunk dialing and texting is in full effect as i try and talk a Googler into grabbing a Google bike and coming over for the show. She's not biting at all.

We work our way to the bar and start cocktailing on some Cape Codders for a bit while I talk to strangers. I'm mostly making fun of their emo without them knowing for my own amusement.

We walk around and people watch for a little bit and I put a guy named Big Dave (6' 5") on my shoulders for a picture in fron of the I (heart) vagina booth. There is a pic from that somewhere.

We keep returning to the second stage to check out some of the bands, but most are disappointing or I'm just way too old. Mondo Generator was pretty tight. I remember that.

So, hours are slipping by and we decide to go mark our space on the lawn so we can catch Lordi. They are kind of like Gwar. Very theatrical. I'm fading at this point, which i think is like 6:00 PM. My counterpart and I are starting to get cranky and tired. We're too old for this enduro-drinking. I head up to grab another beer for us and bump into these two girls who I think start trying to clown on me while I wait for an outhouse. I clown back a bit and then head back to the lawn with beers.

My counterpart and I start throwing beer on each other and arguing pretty soon, so she heads for the box with the rest of our group and I sit it out for a while and sober up on the lawn. Three or four songs into Ozzy we are texting each other and ready to bounce. I tell her I will meet her at the car.

As I walk out the two clowning girls are right next to me and tell me to meet them at a bar three blocks from my house. Who could say no to that? I drop off my car and counterpart at home and head to the bar. They are there. They are pleasant and they were born in 1985. I start having reservations and try to avoid any shenanigans. I manage to get home alone which actually became a goal.

It's 1:30 AM and I'm at my door when these two Mexican dudes walk up to me. I'm pretty sure I'm about to get mugged by the dudes who stole my shorts and everything is about to make sense when, through broken Spanish, I realize they just need me to call them a cab because they can't speak English well enough to and they have no idea where they are.

So, I grab a cab number and call it on their cell phone as my phone rings. I answer my phone while I'm waiting for the dispatcher to pickup and am now in two conversations...wait make that three and one is partially in Spanish. On my phone I have one of the girls I was hanging out with. Her friend and her got into an argument and she bailed with no ride and was now down the street from my house crying. On the dudes' phone I've got the cab company and I get them a cab and hand them back their phone turning down a $20 bill they offer me for my help. It feels nice enough to do something nice for my friends from south of the border. I go back to my phone and get the dirt on what's going on with the girl and realize that she is probably going to have to stay at my house that night. Chivalry is not dead, but it misplaced severely sometimes.

Twenty-two year old drama all night chased with a hangover Friday morning means another day of vacation from work. Turns out she lives with her parents and has had a live-in boyfriend for six and a half years. In my head I'm just thinking "What the Fuck!?!?!?!?" I take her home the next day and grab a Squishee from the Kwik-E-Mart in Mountain View which quells the hangover nicely.

On my way home, I start noticing that this hangover is feeling a little severe and unique and chalk it up to enduro-boozing. By Saturday, I'm sweating through my clothes and then getting the chills with a gnarly cough and throat scratch. By Sunday, I've nested onto my couch and my apartment is looking like an opium den. I seriously feel like my weekend is going to turn into some Kafka-esque tragedy of self-discovery as I start to spin some type of cocoon made of Kleenex.

As all of this is happening, I look underneath my desk and see the girl's ID. I'm giving up at this point and just accepting that Ozzfest is never going to end for me. I'm sitting here finally back at work, wanting nothing more than to go home and sleep and thinking that there is going to be a parking ticket in the mail or something from Shoreline, so that my Ozzfest experience can keep carrying on.

As an added bonus to the story, my drunk ATM pulls would rival drunk ATM pulls seen in Vegas. I'm getting way to old for this. WAY TOO OLD.