Tuesday night my brother, his lovely girlfriend Erica, Casey and I went to see Hamlet on Boston Common.

It was a modern adaptation and Casey and I really liked it. I think Erica and Kyle had more of a lukewarm reaction…

It is one of my favorite things about Boston, the annual Shakespeare performances in the Common. It was hot and sticky but there was something nice about sitting in the dark, on the grass, under the lights of the city, surrounded by hundreds of other Bostonians…

Case and I went to see the Australian folk/ country/ rock band, The Waifs on Thursday night at the Paradise. We caught them at the same venue in November and I think they put on an even better show this time.

I am an obnoxious kind of concert-goer in that I never care about the opening act. If we end up being late for a show, all the better! No wasting time shifting your weight from one foot to the other, waiting for that special moment in time when those bozos get the heck off the stage and the real show starts.

(Although, I have a quiet impatience. Nothing pisses me off more than an audience that does not pay attention to someone on stage. Maybe it is my experience doing public speaking in front of perpetually bored college students, but it just pains me to see someone working hard and the audience can’t be bothered to shut the hell up and listen.)

Where was I? Oh! The opening act. I was pleasantly surprised and greatly enjoyed Ben Weaver’s performance. When he first came on, Casey and I perked up and grinned at each other because he immediately brought Tom Waits to mind. Not because of rambling or idiosyncratic songs, but his voice: Raspy and deep. Very nice.

The comparison ended fairly quickly though when I noticed that he has a country/ southern twang in most of his songs. (Casey still thought he was Australian… silly boy.)

But he is married to an Australian… Donna of the Waifs. He told a cute story about looking for a girl who could play a mailbox, because that is who he knew he was going to marry… Who knew a mailbox would so sound so good?

You can download a few mp3s from his website here. (Although I listened to them and he sounded way better live, in my humble opinion…)

Here are some rather blurry shots of The Waifs in action… check out the bellies on those girls! Apparently, both Donna and Vicki are due on the same day…. too cute!

You can get some sample songs, including my favorite Lighthouse, on the band’s website.

I had such a good time, bouncing away in the front row and holding hands with my hubby. Great music, great performance…

Not much can beat it, no siree.

We just got back from the Decemberists concert at Avalon. It was so awesome and now I am all keyed up and don’t want to go to bed.

The weather is absolutely RIDICULOUS outside- like Forest Gump, the rain coming sideways and all directions… We immediately stripped out of all our clothes because everything is drenched.

DRENCHED!

We saw the band in Portand a little while ago and while that show was good, this one blew it away. Petra is an awesome addition to the group and has a great talent both with violin and voice. She is cute too… a little bashful in front of the crowd.

They played a ton of new songs from Picaresque and it was cool to see them perform the songs live that I have been singing to myself back and forth to work for a few months.

I just love it when you see a band who clearly loves what they are doing… These guys have a fun time and it makes you get wrapped up in the music also. They brought down the house with Chimbley Sweep and the The Mariner’s Revenge Song.

In my humble opinion, I think we did a pretty good job screaming our heads off when the whale attacked.

The band posted this but just in case people are not subscribed…

They will be on All Things Considered tomorrow night (friday) at 9:30pm. I assume there will be a link here…

No, don’t worry… I haven’t abandoned Casey or anything. He is still my #1 guy.

We went to see Colin Meloy (of the Decemberists) last night at T.T. the Bear’s in Central Square. That guy is just awesome… What does the rest of the band do again? (just kidding, of course!)

He was in a really good mood and chatted with the audience throughout the entire show. (I love it when musicians do that- gets them in good with me… yes, we are alive out here!)

He even had a couple girls come up on stage to do tap dance solo while he was playing Bandit Queen (a song that didn’t make it on their new album but somehow sounded familiar to me- maybe they played it when we saw them a few months ago…)

AND he rambled into Dreams (Fleetwood Mac) at the end of one of the songs… COME ON!! That was too awesome. haha

He sang a bunch of my favorites: Apology Song, The Bachelor and the Bride, and My Mother was a Chinese Trapese Artist, among others. I am still trying to forgive him for not singing Leslie Ann Levine but I am sure I will get over it eventually.

I remember singing along to My Mother.. and I just felt so happy. You could hear the whole crowd singing every word and it was just beautiful. It always seems funny to me to connect with strangers in that way… like this band is our (Casey and me) own little thing but all of a sudden, we are not alone. You know?

The coolest thing would be is if the the people that I know who love them too could all get together and see them. That would be the coooolest. (gag- stop me!)

I took some pictures but I don’t think they are even worth the time it would take for me to take them off the camera. If I have enough energy, I will put them up… I think they suck though.

Oh- and while I was searching for their website to link, I found this neat interview/ article with Colin. I am not obsessed, shut up.

Casey and I just got back from watching Finding Neverland. It is an awesome movie. Johnny Depp with a Scottish accent? Come on, it doesn’t get much better than that!

It is a beautiful, sweet movie but oh so sad!! I seriously have red eyes from crying.

I love Johnny Depp- that man can do any accent, I think. Kate Winslet was gorgeous and such a adorable mother. I think Casey is going to want to have four boys now.

Awful stuff happened at work today. I can’t really write about it here because you never know when work folks will find out about your blog. Basically, I was a second away from bolting out the door.

I have cried and bitched and moaned about it to anyone who will listen… I even called poor Carrie, who is the sweetest thing ever. I feel a bit better because of that and the hugs from my boy.

Oh yeah- and some acquisition therapy.

I bought a Waifs cd- do you guys know them? (Aussies?!)

Casey and I went to see them at the Paradise on Friday night. They are totally great- my new favorite. That Vicky can play a mean harmonica and, of course, they have great accents. I love the Simpson sisters’ amazing voices and the music is fun and sad and touching and bouncy. I know, it is really all of those things…

I especially love the song, “Lighthouse.” Don’t you just love songs that make you happy, even when you are feeling really sad? (wink-wink, Anne Marie)

I need to own all their cds!!

After that, I went and bought some more yarn for my cabled cardigan… mmm squishy!

Then I rounded out my ridiculous spending spree on some sparkly beads from Beadworks. It is quite expensive there but they have lovely beads. I have this idea to make some beaded flowers for me and my bridesmaids for our wedding. We’ll see if I can do it. So far I have one petal. hmmm…

Not so impressive:

This is going to take a while…

Anyone know how to do beading? I have no idea what I am doing!!

Didn’t you know that? heh!

It has been a while since Casey and I have gone to a punk show but we made up for it last night. We went to see Bad Religion at Avalon.

Here are some extremely bad pictures:

I was trying to get the band in the first picture but that didn’t exactly work out… I sorta feel like a dork talking pictures at shows so I did it really quickly and you can’t really see the band. Notice the guy’s hat in front of me- I wonder if he spelled it wrong on purpose? hmm…

The second picture is of the circle pit. It always amazes me how everyone treats each other in those things. I mean, they are flailing and jumping around and everyone gets tossed around but if people fall, everyone stops and helps them up. It is cool.

We had a good time. The only thing that sucked was that this guy jumped on my back- literally. I don’t know what he was doing but it hurt. Keep in mind, I am nowhere near the pit- I sit on the side so I don’t get hit. I guess he thought all of us looked like we needed to be shaken up or something. I think my back is bruised.

The band was awesome- they have been performing for about 20 years or something and they still sound great.

Well, I have to get moving. We have a wedding up in the boonies of New Hampshire later this afternoon. It is a costume reception so it should be fun! Halloween is awesome!

So, last night I decided that I needed to get over myself and stop being a grumpy-pants. I am not happy when I am grumpy, so why do it?! (That is a ridiculously dumb sentence but you know what I mean…)

I had a crazy busy afternoon/ evening yesterday. I left work early to get my allergy shots, as I normally do, but I had to run an errand for Nancy so it added a bit more nuttiness. I dropped off some Eros scarves (that I knit) to the nurses who took care of Nancy at MGH. They were very pleased with them and it made me happy.

Then, I had to run and get my shots (2 in one arm, 1 in other) and they stung and swelled up like crazy today because the fall is my worst allergy season. I am Popeye! ggrr….

I met my friend Julie after that and we had some tea again. We had a good time just hanging out and talking about wedding stuff and silly bosses who don’t pay you. (poor Julie!)

Then, I ran home to change and drop off my heavy backpack and Casey and I went to the Orpheum Theater in Boston to see Cake with my brother, Kyle!

It was super awesome. The lead singer really engaged the crowd and we had a really good time. There was a lot of pot smoking going on, which continues to surprise me at concerts. These people are either much braver or much stupider than me!

Here is a very bad picture of the concert.

I feel like it has been ages since I have been able to sit and do what I want. I have been so busy lately- between work and wedding planning…yikes. You can tell that we have been stretched a bit thin by the state of our apartment too. I have a week’s worth of clothes sitting on a chair (very pretty) and our kitchen is full of dirty dishes. We have a hamper of dirty laundry and piles of wedding magazines and misc crap all over the living room table. (But my sweetie did clean the toilet so it is not a health hazard or anything anymore! hehe)

So the mess is haunting me but I feel like I only have a small amount of time before it is bed-time and then work-time (gah- again).

So, I am plugging my ears and going, “lalalala”

I got to read some of my favorite blogs- hi guys! FINALLY. Last week at work was nutty- we got a ton more applications to study abroad in the spring- about 70 more than usual. (which is a big deal because we are a pretty small school) So this week is going to be completely stressful because we need to process all of those applications and get the students answers by the end of the week.

But that is tomorrow- LALALALA

Anyway- I am glad that I have a little bit of time to update here. I feel like my posts lately have been random blurts on the page and not much real content. Things will be better in a week or so and I can have my life back!

We had a nice weekend though. Today, we talked some more about the wedding location that we saw yesterday. Casey did a budget for us, with some help from my fabulous best friend, Julie. The budget is a bit out of control right now- about $15,000 more than we wanted to spend!! Yikes! We need to do some more reflecting but don’t think that doing it elsewhere will cut down the costs that much. It is just really expensive to have a sit-down dinner, etc.

So, decision is mostly made. I think we are going with Cranwell. I think we can do a lot with the space to make it really beautiful and special. We are both excited.

Also, Casey talked with his family a bit today about helping with expenses for the wedding. I am so glad, even though it was not the easiest thing for him to do. We are both concerned about how much money we can realistically save on our own and don’t want to bankrupt my parents. (who are being super generous but don’t have that much money!)

Anyway, enough wedding stuff. (I promise this won’t turn into a wedding blog.)

We were totally exhausted from our running around yesterday so today we took it easy.

It was Oktoberfest in Harvard Square and we went down to see Mieka Pauley play at 1pm. She played a ton of new songs and did an awesome job drawing a crowd. We even picked up her new demo cd- yay!

I pretended I was a stalker (pretended? haha) and took a bunch of pictures. Here are a couple:

Then, because that was sooo strenuous, we came back and took a nap. (loads of laundry, dishes…lalalala) I was giggling at Casey’s hair when he woke up.

hehehehe

But then I realized that I couldn’t really talk:

haha