The next morning, on the way to work, my favorite radio station was giving away concert tickets, including Vampire Weekend. I figure I'd call in, at worst I'd not get free tickets and get a traffic ticket for driving and talking on the cell. I guessed closest to the actual number of Phineas and Ferb CDs sold in Rochester in the last unit of time, I won. Woot, two Vampire Weekend tickets, at will call, for that nights (Fridays)show.

I texted fourteen year old, she was like whatev, did she want to go, whatev, whatev. After talking with friends all day, and setting grounds rules (no hovering, let her hang with friends, etc), she wanted to go. We got to the Main Street Armory as the doors were open, to see a long line of young white people. Whiter than the Saint Patrick's Day parade. We waited for a while, and then her friends showed up. SA_girl, driven by her cousin, had picked up newspaper_girl, and two other girls that don't appear in my diaries often enough to merit a nickname.

We waited in line, got to Will Call, and found out my name was not on the list. I pored over the two page list, several times, and I was not there. Fourteen year suggested buying tickets anyhow, but we we're broke, we didn't have $40 in the checking account. We went home, pissed off, messaged the station manager, who remembered I won (it was on his show), and arranged to meet him before Vampire Weekend took the stage. We did, and got to see them.

My oldest texted her friends, and went to meet them in the middle, with a few bottles of water. I stayed on the side, wandered back behind the soundboard, wandered upstairs, and spent most of the time behind the soundboard where the sound was best. My oldest said she looked at the lights, jealously, when she was bored (that's what she's been learning in school). I was older than 95% of the audience. Fourteen year old and her friends were on the other end, maybe 10%, but it's hard to tell ages of teenage girls. I was familiar with one of their songs (A-Punk), which they did play. Amazingly, the sound was decent, the last time I was at the Main Street Armory for Lucinda Williams the sound was terrible.

We got home last, midnightish. I ended up staying up past 1:00, sipping a beer, as Mrs. Ha came down (she had trouble sleeping) and kept me company. Rock and Roll baby!

But that's not all! Due to the screwup, the station manager wanted to give me tickets to an upcoming concert, too. Check the list, which should I ask for?

Saturday was a pretty good day, even if I didn't do a lot. Mrs. Ha and  were out shopping, so I spent most of the day at home. I was even able to get some wrenching time in, discovered the bottom of my battery box was rusty, and I had a blown 20 amp fuse, which explained why I had no power on my bike. A little spritz of primer should take care of the battery box, and I should have spare fuses somewhere.

Later, Mrs, Ha and I watched Revolutionary Road while sipping cocktails, it's the story of a couple who feels they are destined for greatness, yet get sucked into the whole suburban white collar lifestyle thing, and they sort of try to break free. While I love watching Kate Winslett, I'd even watch a movie entitled Kate Winslett goes Grocery Shopping which is close to what last night's movie was. Kind of long and boring. It wasn't totally bad, even though Winslet didn't get naked (for a change). It kind of went overboard on the conformity thing, Leo got on a commuter train, dressed with lots of other guys in suits and skinny ties, went into NY, with lots of other guys in suits and ties, had a small cubicle in an office, with lots of other guys in suits and skinny ties, etc. I get it, conformity bad.

Homework and school

Fourteen year old was complaining that she was the only one in her theater tech class that knew how to draw a 45-45-90 triangle, and no one else knew how many degrees were in a triangle. This is for the most, or second most competitive public high school in the city. The one that four out of five applicants get rejected from.

We've been spending a lot of time on homework, showing why you need three non-collinear points to define one plane, for instance. Then, on to geography, where the only dead tree Atlas in the house is a vintage one from 1942. It's interesting, and still good for longitude and latitude, but I wouldn't trust it for capitals of countries in Africa.

Book reviews

After reading Mists of Avalon I wanted a change of pace. How about those Gor books that I've heard about? I was surprised our county library didn't have any, I was surprised a local Barnes & Nobles didn't have any. I visited a local used book store, and bought a few used ones, I can always resell them.

First up was Outlaw of Gor, generically written Swords and Sandals that stresses that big hulking dominant men and incredibly sexy submissive women are platonic ideals. Pretty much the polar opposite of Mists of Avalon.

LAst up was Patton's War as I Knew It. it was good, being his edited memoirs on WWII, a handful of anecdotes from WWI and the Pancho Villa thing, and some ideas on effective fighting.