An Evening With Switchfoot

In this needle and haystack life
I found miracles there in your eyes
It's no accident we're here tonight
We are once in a lifetime

Yesterday at 2:26, I sped out of my Music Theory class and ran up to my room to grab my backpack, packed to the limit, but not heavy, and a plastic bag and umbrella. I went to the common room and donned my scarf and coat, said goodbye to Dan, and caught a cab. I arrived at the train station early enough, and the northbound train was five-to-ten minutes late, any way. I stood on the platform, once again grateful that I hadn't missed it, and ready for an adventure. Never had I taken the northbound out of New London, and I was anxious to see where it would take me.

I got to read my book for a while, which was somewhat frightening, actually. The novel is set in the post-apocalypse, and during winter, and it had snowed yesterday.... a lot. At one point, I looked up from the text for the first time in a while, and I looked out the window on the opposite side of the train, only to see mounds of dirt, covered in a dirty snow, and shrouded in a mist. There were no people, no birds. To look up and see the very thing you've been reading about is extremely scary, especially in this case, given the subject matter of The Road.

I arrived at Boston's South Station at quarter-to-five. I took the Red Line T to Park Street, and then I took the Green Line to Blanford Street, and then I got to go to Sara's dorm! Yay! I met her roommate, and then I called Liam, and then Sara and I walked to Warren Towers for dinner.

That cafeteria was so awesome - it was really huge and had a fun sort of style to it. I met Sara's friend, Devon*, who had a really awesome Totoro bag.



After dinner, we went back to Sara's dorm because I needed to get my ticket, and Liam had forgotten to print his! It took him much longer than it really should have to print it, and we got a bus up to the Paradise Rock Club.

There was no coat check in the club, so we stashed our coats and scarves behind an out-of-the-way rubbish bin.

And then Switchfoot came on.

Oh.

My.

Gosh.

The concert was amazing. I was stuck behind a lot of tall people, but that didn't stop me from loving every second of it.



For the first half, they played their new album, Hello Hurricane, from track one to twelve. Then they took a ten minute break, and came back on stage to play songs from their older six albums. They told the audience to either tweet them with suggestions, or if they couldn't do that, to throw suggestions on stage, or something. They played a lot of wonderful songs, but they didn't play 'Gone'. Oh well, it's not like I'm not in love with every other song they played! =D



Switchfoot, as a band, are really great performers. Jon especially. They all have a lot of fun, and they involve the audience and sort of invite them to join in the fun. The lighting and effects are also very ....effective. Of all their concerts I've been to, I think the Oh! Gravity tour was probably the most fun, because that is the loudest, funnest album, in my opinion. I'm not saying it's the best, but it is a lot of fun. The only problem with Switchfoot playing this entire album is that it is a very sombre album. I did not, in any way, dislike standing there and listening to this amazing music, but I know that many people prefer the fast, upbeat music if they are listening to it live, and I think Jon even said something along those lines about loving to play the happy songs, even though he has a hard time writing them. Don't get me wrong, though, it was very well done and totally worth everything.



I had a really amazing time, and I think Liam did, too. I wish I could say more about the show, really.



After the show was over, people started chanting 'one more song' and then the band came back on stage and... they actually played two more, lol.

Liam and I walked back to Sara's dorm. She brought him his laptop, which he'd left there, and then we said goodbye. Back in Sara's room, I stole two of her cookies [which she stole from the dining hall], and I teased her about not working on her paper, due today. And then I realised I'd never picked up my I.D. from the dining hall!



I slept on her floor between the two beds. I only woke up a few times in the night, which is surprising, but nice, and I woke up naturally at 6:50, and thought it was silly to try to sleep for the next ten minutes, so I got ready and was done by the time Sara got up. We had to walk back to Warren Towers to get my I.D. back, and then I took the Green Line T to Park Street, and then the Red Line to South Station, where I bought a chocolate croissant and milk, and then I found my Amtrak train.

As we pulled out of the station, I unwrapped my breakfast, and enjoyed it. Then I popped in my iPod headphones and took a nap for about forty minutes. Despite the uncomfortable conditions [leaning my back against that wall and window just hurt because of the arm rest...], it felt really good. When I woke up, the adorable Chinese kids sitting in front of me starting playing games with me, popping their heads over the top of the seat and around the side and then hiding again when I looked at them. I started making funny faces at them, too. Eventually, they started talking to me, and singing the ABCs at me. They asked me where I was going and I said, "New London," and they said they were going to New York. I told them I live near New York, and the girl said that they live in New York! but the boy said that he used to live in Singapore. Then they asked me my name, so I told them. I think they were possibly some of the cutest children I have ever spoken with. When I was leaving, they called down the aisle of the train "Bye Kathleen!" So cute.



Outside the station, a woman asked me where I was going, so I told her. She said she was, too, and wondered if I'd like to share a cab. At the end of the short cab ride, I was reaching into my wallet for my half of the cost of the ride, but she refused to let me pay! So I got a free ride back to school, yay!

So yes, it was pretty much a fantastic two days.


Check out the photos here.

Thanksgiving

On Tuesday I went home! Yay! It was awesome. Not really. Actually, my one class was cancelled, after weeks and weeks of the professor saying, "I'm not going to cancel class on Tuesday," so I didn't have anything to do until 3:00, and I could have taken the same train twenty-four hours earlier if I had only KNOWN. Ugh. Oh well. After being home for a very, very short while, Mum and I went to NYC to pick up Elisabeth!! Yay! And then, our super fantastic weekend began~



I woke up early on Wednesday, but Elisabeth didn't want to. Makes sense. Why be crazy like me, if you don't have to, right?

So I went to the high school that morning! I started the day in Mirsky's first period AP English, where we played the 'surrealist game'. Basically, everyone writes a question on a piece of paper, and then folds the paper so no one can see. Then they pass the paper on to someone else, and then everyone writes an answer on their new paper. Then, they read the combined question and answer and try to interpret it, lol. Mine was something like "Why are there no chipmunks here?!" and Vigg's fail answer was "Blue." But there was a funny one: "Where will ___ go to college?" "Pretty pretty rainbows".[I don't know the kid, so I don't think it's fair to publish his name, but they assure me he's pretty flamboyant and... yeah.]

Second period, I went to orchestra, and third I went to Madame Steffener's French class, and her son was there and he is SO CUTE. For fourth, I visited Dr. Walsh in AP Enviro, even though I have never taken that class myself. And then for fifth, I went to Gov, another class I have never taken. It took Mr. Safran a really long time to notice I was there. I went to band for sixth period and sat with Josh, texting Eric and confusing him about. For seventh, I got to go to 'my' Chinese class, and I ended up taking notes for Johnny. -.- Eighth was World Film, where we watched 400 Blows, and then I left.



After school, Elisabeth and I went to the Original Pancake House, and we were planning on meeting Bryan and Alex there, but they were slow and I had a dance lesson to go to. We ordered, and when our food arrived, so did Bryan and Alex, so we ate and talked to them. Then, when we had to leave, their food showed up. Funny, but it worked.

Then I went to my dance lesson, which, as always, was a lot of fun. I think Elisabeth was slightly impressed [Victor was in show-off mode, of course! Ugh!], but I was fairly embarrassed.

Then I had to go to the mall to get a haircut. I ACTUALLY LIKE IT and it's as short as I want it! I know, right? Lol.

<-- Me, plus new haircut, making a grumpy face ['cuz it was really late at night]. That night, we had dinner at Pane Vino, and then that's where the fun began. It started with kidnapping Vigg, and culminated with twelve-ish people watching THE FANTASTIC MR. FOX. That movie was fricken fantastic, as the name might suggest. If you haven't seen it, go see it now. If you have, well then go see it again.



After the movie, we went back to Bryan's house, where we played things and stayed up really late. And Vigg thought Arianna was a b-tard. And it was amazing and fun. Yay. ♥





Thanksgiving itself was pretty low-key. We woke up in time to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade [bizarre, as usual], and then we got ready to go to Aunt Mary's. I felt sorry for Elisabeth, having to repeat the 'I'm French, but I grew up in Tokyo, and now I'm at Middlebury, Vermont' speech so many times... We hung out until four, when we had dinner. This wast the first time we'd ever had dinner at the same time and the same table as the adults. But the Mahoneys weren't there, and neither was Uncle George & co., and the Maine McDonalds were MIA as well, of course. We were finished with dinner by five, and had dessert at six. By seven, we were ready for bed, and we left around 7:30, getting back at nine. At ten, we were sound asleep.





We had a lazy day after Thanksgiving. We both woke up relatively early - Elisabeth at eight and I at nine - because of our super early bed time. Well rested, we spent the day doing a little bit of nothing, and attempting to do homework. Notice the attempting.

Ying came over because she wanted to play violin with me. She'd brought some duets from anime, and one was from Tsubasa: Resevoir Chronicle, which is one of my favourites, and it was really cool to be able to play a song that I know. After she had to go, I just kept practising [once you pop the fun don't stop?].

Mum tried to fix her computer, but it turns out she needs a new hard drive [yay -.-], so we went to Best Buy. Elisabeth came too , because she wanted to see what it was like. We looked around the entire place, and I drooled over some gadgets and games I might enjoy, but most importantly, we found no hard drive for Mum. She'll have to order one online... for which she'll need a computer... yay?

At 6:30, we went to Arianna's house for her After-Thanksgiving-Day Party [or, You're Welcome Day Bash], and I brought the chocolate cake Mum had made. A lot of people were there, including Bryan, Greg, Kenny, Kim, Virginia, Cassie, Lori, and Justina and Stephanie, so it was really awesome. I was happy to see them all, and I feel like, if it weren't for this, I wouldn't have seen most of them this weekend. Dinner was wonderful - everything was homemade from scratch! - and so was Mum's chocolate cake.



Elisabeth and I left at midnight and went to bed soon after.



Saturday was the day that Elisabeth and I had arranged to meet Kristen, our mutual friend from Explo who lives near me, and so I really have no excuse for not seeing her for over a year. Mum made scones when Elisabeth and I woke up, so we were well fed for the morning. At twelve, we went to the Short Hills mall to meet Kristen at the California Pizza Kitchen, and we watched her eat lunch. Then we went shopping for a little while. The Gap was having a great sale, and all t-shirts were only ten dollars [including those men's waffle shirts I'd paid so much for before!!], so I bought two, a red waffle shirt, and a purple and black striped shirt. Kristen eventually had to leave [*sadface*], but Elisabeth wanted warm pajamas, so we went to Macy's. There, we found super soft and fluffy bathrobes and we each bought one. Leaving, she asked me, "How do you call this warm fluffy thing we just bought?" I don't know why, but I thought that was cute, lol.



After the mall, Jesson wanted to hang out. He originally suggested seeing Ninja Assassin, but that looked really crummy, and movies in Livingston are so expensive... So did all the other movies nearby, and The Road and Men Who Stare At Goats were just too far away. We agreed to rent a movie instead. I brought Elisabeth to Jesson's house, where we looked through five or more photo albums. We drove to Eric's house - our first successful Eric-napping! - and then to Blockbuster, which is going out of business [*sadface*]. I bought There Will Be Blood and some half-price popcorn, and Elisabeth bought Atonement and Speed Racer, and the guys bought Speed Racer [blu-ray], Superbad, some anime, and something else... Back at my house, Mum made us rice and chili, and then we watched Superbad in my room. During the course of the movie, Sara, Greg, Tara, and Pascal all made their way to my house, too, but Greg and Tara left.



When the movie was over, Greg wanted us to come hang out at Littel People's Park with them, so we walked there. We were almost to the parking lot when Greg calls me and says they'd left already. What? Sorry, but aren't you supposed to call before you decide to leave, if you're expecting people? He said they were going to Riker Hill Art Park, so we walked back to my house, got my car, drove to Jesson's house to get Oli's car, and called Greg again, but he'd left the art park and was going to Eddie's house. No, that was a party I just would not crash. So we ended up at Wendy's [fast food] instead.



Sunday was the 'chill' day. Or at least it was supposed to be. Elisabeth and I woke up, took long showers [because we won't get another as comfortable for three weeks], and ate breakfast. I did my laundry, and we packed. Then we made a last minute, spontaneous trip up Route 10 to Kam Man to get bubble tea.

After that was when it stopped being chill.

We drove Elisabeth to New York City for her 2:45 bus. We thought leaving at 1 was plenty early. Good thing we did, because there was so much traffic around Weehawken and the Lincoln Tunnel. Finally, we stopped at where her bus was supposed to be - it was 2:30 at this point! - and it wasn't there yet. So she and I got out and looked around; we found some of her friends from school, I said good bye and went back to find Mum's car. It wasn't there. I stood in the spot where she'd left me for half an hour, and I even tried calling her but she left her phone at home. I was quite upset. She found me after almost thirty minutes.

Then we drove down to Newark. The traffic wasn't nearly as bad on the way out. We were about an hour early for my train, so we stopped at a CVS and bought a water bottle and a Butterfinger for the ride.

When we got to Penn Station [Newark], we wanted to sit down, so we went up to the track on which my train was supposed to come in. The television board told us that the train was delayed twenty minutes, but when a train pulled in only five minutes late, Mum was convinced it was mine and sent me off. A conductor told me I was going the wrong way! South! To Newark Airport! AAAH! I asked him what I should do, and he said to get off at the next stop and find a train to NYC. That's what I did, but the next wasn't until 5:03, and it was only about 4:40. I frantically called my mother, even though I knew she didn't have her phone [!!!] and left her a message telling her my predicament, when what do I see but a train pulling in on the opposite track labelled 'Amtrak'. Well, I might as well try my luck. I asked a conductor where this train was headed and he said it was the one I was supposed to be on, so I got on at the very last second. Thank goodness it was so much delayed, otherwise, I would never have gotten back to school.


Back at school, I fooled around with Kelsey, Ariana, and Dan. It was very amusing - poor Kelsey! If I ever need to blackmail her, I'm pretty much set... Haha.



On Monday night, we had a potluck. And it was amazing. Yay! And then Kelsey wrote a letter to my German teacher about how amazing his photocopying skills are.



And, as always, you can check out all of the photos on Facebook.