Summer Vacation, 1.2: Dixie Chicks

So, a friend of mine called (or possibly emailed, it's been a while) and told me she had tickets to see the Dixie Chicks and asked me to join her. I was a fan of the Dixie Chicks a while back - their first album and then Wide Open Spaces and then I sort of fell off the Dixie band wagon. It had nothing to do with the ridiculous reaction to their political affiliations, I just got distracted. So, I approached this concert with interest, but not necessarily great anticipation.

The night started out remarkably well, with the best gyros ever from a Greek restaurant that I can't remember the name of. We were tasting the garlic the rest of the night, but it was well worth it. I can't wait to go back there, if I ever remember where "there" was. Then, it was off to the show.

We skipped the opening act. I was hoping it would be Pete Yorn (the Chicks collaborated with several songwriters on the latest album, including Yorn and Gary Louris of the Jayhawks [an awesome band in their own right who have sadly disbanded]), as someone had told me he had an unaccounted for date in Chicago, but no such luck. The opening guy was someone I had never heard of and we preferred to spend the time beforehand catching up and talking. It's a good thing, too, and the woman sitting next to my friend was very upset by unnecessary chatter during the quieter (and not so interesting) parts of the show. We got to our seats before the main act and, once the Chicks took the stage, I was pleasantly surprised. The Dixie Chicks pretty much kick ass. They are all really talented musicians and Natalie Maines can really sing. Man, she belts it out. I love the sound of her voice.

The show was a while ago, so some of the highlights have slipped my memory, but I really enjoyed pretty much the whole thing. They played some hits - including "Goodbye Earl" which you'd think they'd be sick of by now, but they seemed to enjoy it - and a lot of stuff from the new album. It was good enough that I bought the new album on iTunes the next day.

I wanted to write a more in-depth review, but it has just been too long. I started one a couple days after the show that somehow disappeared and then my car got all jacked up and things slipped away. In the mean time, I have been avoiding my friend's blog, because I didn't want to unconsciously copy any of her review and now it's been a month and I'm in serious withdrawal. Unfortunately, I have a crapload of work to do and can't really catch up all at once. I'll have to spread it out over the week.

I just read her review, though, and it is way better than mine. I will add that the acoustics in the United Center are awful, and I don't think I'll ever pay to see a show there (Mano gave me my tickets, so all I had to pay for was the yummy gyros). Also, the Chicks' massive backup band is a little odd. They play pretty much in the dark and they only introduced three (out of probably seven or eight) of the guys. It was like we were supposed to pretend they weren't there. Finally, the Dixie Chicks draw sort of a weird crowd of people - we saw way more cowboy hats than I thought we would (and, yes, I would classify them as country, though they sort of border on maybe something like roots-inspired pop) the crowd seemed to be a mix of teeny-boppers and people who had been able to find a sitter in a while. It was good times.

Side note: I started this as a draft, and it seems to be publishing it as if I had written it then, instead of now. So, Maybe no one is even reading this.... hhhmmmmm

Coming soon: The rest of My Summer Vacation

Summer Reading Update

I finished reading Faking It by Jennifer Crusie this weekend. It was really good - great character development, the plot line was interesting, and I was happily surprised by the ending. A lot of the time, once the major story lines have been wrapped up and the heroine has her hero, the last fifty pages or so are basically filler. This book managed to keep me interested and guessing until the very end. Good stuff. I started Welcome to Temptation this morning. I wish I had read Temptation first, since they have overlapping characters and it looks like Temptation is first, chronologically. But, since there seem to be no overlapping plot lines, I think it's ok.

Someone told me about something that I wanted to add to my summer reading list. I don't remember what it was. hmmm...

Summer Reading

I finally finished my paper. As it turns out, I'm an idiot. I recently switched to Mac and use Word for Mac. Word for Mac is not the same as Word for Microsoft. It is compatible, which is super, but it just looks a little different. Well, it turns out that when I thought I was double-spacing my paper, I was actually setting it at 1.5. Which isn't double. So, I wasn't as far behind as I thought. Whoops. It still wasn't the best thing I've ever written, but it would have had to grow by 5-7 pages to grow at all. So, it was little short and probably could have used more editing, but it is done and now I am free to read at my leisure.

I haven't had time to read a book for fun since Christmas. Here is what I'm planning to read, in no particular order, in the next 5 weeks before school starts.

1. Faking It by Jennifer Crusie
2. All U Can Eat by Emma Holly
3. Lady Anne's Dangerous Man by Jeanne Westin
4. Welcome to Temptation by Jennifer Crusie
5. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey
6. Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers
7. Lake Wobegon Summer 1956 by Garrison Keillor
8. Mohawk by Richard Russo

Clearly, my class on romance novels has inspired me. I loved Bet Me by Jennifer Crusie so much, I bought a bunch of her other books (including one that I've already read, though I didn't know that at the time). I want to read The 7 Habits because I think I could be more effective in my life, and I use the Franklin-Covey system so... It seems to make sense. My boss also lent me that one on CD, so I can listen to it in the car and read it - sort of a double whammy to hope it sinks in a little.

It's kind of a lot, but I think I can manage. I started Mohawk just after Christmas and didn't get very far before school started. The romances generally read pretty quickly. I'll keep you posted.

Meh

I was up late last night, reading this blog. I was supposed to be working on my paper, and I did a little. But then I made the mistake of checking out some of my friends' blogs and found a link to that and I was hooked. Then, I forced myself to get back to the paper, thought I was doing pretty good, discovered I wasn't and went to bed.

So now I have no paper, am ridiculously late, actually, with that paper, and I'm tired.

Apparently, when I'm tired, I crave cookies.

Which made me think of this:

I Am a Bad Student

It is currently 11pm, and my paper for my summer class is nearly a week overdue. If I get it to my professor tomorrow (early) he can grade it in time to turn in my grade to the school. If not, I get an incomplete for the class and he grades it when he can, and I don't know when that will be.

I have no excuses. I loved this class - summer class in Romance Fiction? Come on. It doesn't get much better than that. I like the book I'm writing on - Julia Quinn's "The Viscount Who Loved Me," but I am just not that inspired to write. I feel like everything I'm saying right now (in my paper) is trite and basically at a sub-par undergraduate level. I'm supposed to know stuff now. I'm supposed to be able to come up with a theory and find evidence in the text and it just isn't happening.

But I'm running out of time and I have to get it done. I was doing so well and then, I made the mistake of reformatting.

See, I write my papers single-spaced and in the default font. Then, when I'm done (or stuck and think I have enough for the minimum page requirement) I reformat, slap on a concluding paragraph to tie everything up in a nice bow and call it a day. I didn't think this paper was "done" but I did think it was long enough. Um... No. I'm barely halfway to the minimum length and I ALREADY feel like I'm repeating myself.

So, it's back to my secondary sources to see if there is some more stuff I can throw in this paper.

I'm so disappointed in myself.