Sunday, January 04, 2009

Day 5 in Colorado

~ I woke up first and opened the curtains to see a white wonderland. The weather gods were cooperating, giving us gorgeous weather on the driving days and a beautiful six inches or so of fresh white stuff on our full no-driving day in town.
~ Relaxed, stopped into Starbucks for a "reliable" java, and had breakfast at the very busy Poppycock's (French toast, nomnomnom). It seems every place here is busy; I won't attribute that entirely to it being high season, because everyplace we went was a nice mix of delish and friendly.
~ Walked around, shopped, took photos, threw snowballs (OK, that was just me, the tropi-chick), and relaxed until our final (sniff) Big Head Todd show.




~ We decided tonight to have a "nicer" dinner, so we followed the recommendations of several friends and visited two places for supsup. Social was cool, but it felt more like a NYC lounge than what we were looking for and the menu wasn't entirely up our alley. (That said, the scallop/brie/honey appetizer was scandalous.) Next stop was J-Bar at the Hotel Jerome. I particularly wanted to stop here as it was a haunt of Hunter S. Thompson (seems he had several faves; the man liked the drink), and we did find a "Hunter S. Thompson for Sheriff" sign behind the bar. It's lovely there, cozy and warm (figuratively speaking only, unfortunately, as there was a mean draft by the window seats), and the menu was comforting. Our salads, burgers and chicken pot pie hit the spot, and my pretty-dern-local Blue Moon was ace. (Oh, and yeah, what they say about being able to drink much less at altitude is true!)
~ Again, we got to the club just after the doors opened, but tonight we had a two-hour wait until the show started. Last night, a DJ took over the club after the BHTM show, so they only played two hours and we all had to clear out right after. Tonight there was no after party and we'd heard from a crew member that the guys might play a longer set, so we were hopeful and didn't mind waiting two hours for the show to start. Football, beer and war stories commence...
~ Here's what I posted to the BHTM boards:

Wow. This weekend has left me at a loss for words (and for those of you who know me, you know that's a rarity). Our second night here in Aspen was outta sight. The guys seemed to really be having a great time, and a little musical birdie told me they were stoked to see people showing up at all the CO shows night after night.

How could we not? This place is a gem of a venue; I can't stress that enough. The guys never cease to amaze me with their friendliness and down-to-earth attitudes; they always make you feel like you're an old friend. Aspen is crazy beautiful, especially while decorated for the holidays and covered with a dusting of the nice white stuff, and the people here have all been really nice. And the energy and set lists... man oh man... let's just say that both nights we all left a lil' bit worked over.

What a weekend! I'm sad to see it end, but I must head out into the 3 degree weather and back to Boulder now. In the meantime, chew on this setlist:

Monument in Green (just Todd and Jeremy)
Friend of the Devil (that's the Dead, baby!)
Cruel Fate
Neckbreaker
Blue Sky
It's Alright
Moose
Riviera
Sister Sweetly
Mona Lisa
Strategem
Tangerine
VOJ/Leaving
Heart of Wilderness
Love Transmission
Magdelina (with a horn)
Ever Since Ya Pulled Me Under (with horns)
James Brown Medley (with horns)
Beautiful World (with horns)
Runaway Train
Come On
Encore: Circle, Rocky Mountain Way (!!!)

~ I should add to the above post that I danced more than I think I may ever have at a show; perhaps it was the set list, maybe it was the fun produced by being surrounded by more friends than I usually am at a show, likely it was simply the perfect circumstances of the weekend. It truly was a perfect weekend.




~ Oh, let me not forget to mention that after the show we hung out BS-ing with the merch guy, who is a friend of the band, while my lil' cousin bought some goodies. Jeremy came out to chat with us and we got some photos of him with the kid and some of the girls. He was his usual sweet, funny self. When we finally left, we bumped into Brian, who was helping load some equipment into the trailer; he, too, was his usual friendly, twinkly-eyed self, and the kid got another photo.

P.S. PER YOUR REQUESTS, I'LL POST LOTS OF PHOTOS AND VIDS ON FLICKR AND MYSPACE IN A BIT. GO TAKE A PEEK!

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