Andrew Bird.

Holy moly, what a weekend.

Especially for me, someone who rarely does anything one could consider "exciting" or "inspiring". A friend of mine from the flower shop where i work was running the Nike Women's Marathon in San Francisco on Sunday, and since she knows how much i miss home (the Bay Area in general), she asked if i wanted to drive up. My response? "Hell yes!"
We left around noon on Friday, with two boys in tow. One was heading home up to Portland, and the other was going to run in the race with her. But wait, wasn't it a women's marathon? you're thinking- and yes, it was. But this is Pablo we're talking about. This is Pablo who flirts with boys and wears mismatched socks in pastel hues on purpose, and who has a tiny (also pastel) bike with green plastic pedals.
On the drive up (we took the 5 for time even though the 1 would have been a sight-seeing spectacular) not too much happened: we saw a bunch of hay and carrots on the road that a truck had spilled, and came this[ ]close to being involved in an awful collision. I had to listen to the Killers and the Offspring, which was rough, but hey- i'm an adapter. It was hot and windy the whole way.
Got to my good friend Addie's house once we reached Oakland, where they dropped me off. She took me out to dinner (well, breakfast: i had french toast and hash browns!), where i bought a homeless guy a Turkey Reuben. He told me whatever sandwich i ordered would be great, and since i've never (and probably will never) order a Turkey Reuben, that's what he got. It's funny, because i would never shell out $9 to someone spare changing on the street, but when someone asks me for food, there's just no question. We all gotta eat.
Saturday was alright; Addie and i rode our bikes all around Berkeley and did some clothes shopping (something i absolutely detest, but for some reason i have good luck when she's around). I finally replaced my black hoodie that was full of holes; actually threw it away in the bathroom of the Italian restaurant we ate at later that evening, where we drank miniature bottles of sparkling wine. Good times!
Then we visited our old workplace (the flower shop, where we first met years ago) and had an awkward visit with the old boss. Got some beautiful flowers, and quickly biked our way home through the chilly streets. Drank a vodka cran each just for kicks, and watched Adventures in Babysitting on YouTube. Ah, good times indeed ;) Did you know that Vincent D'Onofrio was in that movie? I'm tellin' ya.
Sunday we were up early, left the apartment by nine, and headed to the city (this is East Bay speak for "San Francisco"). The BART train was filled with nervous, quiet, staring people, so we decided to play the alphabet game. i picked vegetables as a category, which we turned into "Things you can buy at a greengrocer" just for ease of playing, and started things off with Asparagus. Addie countered with Beets. This continued:
Heather: "Chard."
Addie: "What am i on, D? Hmm. Dates."
Random Guy Sitting in Front of Us: "::turning slightly:: Fennel."
Heather: "::surprised:: Thanks, but i'm on "E"! Fennel's an awesome choice for F, though, thank you!" (We ended up using it, of course).
So it went on, and on, until we got to the letter U. For some reason this stumped us. i hinted and honted* as much as i possibly could, but the dude in front of us wouldn't offer any more help. Or maybe he just couldn't think of anything, same as us.

We got off the train at Civic Center, just made the bus up Haight Street (whew!), and got off at the entrance to Golden Gate Park. The finish line for April's race was clear on the other side, right where the land ends and the Pacific Ocean begins, but we were going to get a cup of coffee and zoom on through the park. Turns out our favorite coffee spot was swallowed up in a Bermuda Triangle of sorts, so we got some so-so cups of joe and then realized we were running out of time. A harried cab ride later, we arrive at the beach and see scores and scores of runners, wrapped in tinfoil (i later learned that these help keep your body heat in, as it was easily in the low 50's that day) and boarding shuttle buses back to their various hotels. i was so upset; thought we'd missed her. But we pushed through the thousands of runners and spectators, made our way to the finish line, scanning for April the whole way. (This is a bit like if you took a "Where's Waldo?" book, removed him from all of the pages but one, and then ripped that page clean out of the book and threw it away.) She was nowhere to be seen, nor was Pablo. Add to that the fact that Pavel was still sitting at the starting line, thinking he was in the right place to see her finish before he got on a bus to Oregon, and he was upset. It seemed like all was lost.
We sat around for 40 minutes or so, but knew we would never find her. Addie and i boarded a bus back downtown, then decided to eat somewhere in North Beach. We walked around for half an hour there, looking at menus and then rejecting them as either too expensive or not enough non-meat options for yours truly... finally we found a place and guess what? We were the absolute only two people there. It was awesome :) Plants hanging in every window, an old metal chandelier hanging form the rafters, garlic bulbs hanging on every post, a tortoiseshell cat playing in the yard outside. We had such a good time, and a handsome waiter with a dead tooth who made us some pretty strong drinks.
Ambling tipsily back to BART, we smoked way too many cigarettes, stopped to give a street juggler some assorted Halloween candy that i'd picked up a bag of, and somehow managed to get home across the Bay.

Ready for the best part? i know, i know- you've been reading so faithfully, sitting through these long boring monologues, and i thank you for your patience. But really none of this compares with what happened on Sunday.

April picked me up at eleven, i said my goodbyes to Addie, strapped my bike back on the bike rack, and April and i headed off south. We were going to try and reach L.A. by eight o'clock to see a sold-out show by one of my favorite musicians, Andrew Bird. He means a lot to me, and never ever plays West Coast venues, so it was sort of a necessary sojourn. April had listened to a few of his tunes on my iPod and decided she liked, so we were determined to try and get in. We had a lovely drive down, stopping at a slightly eerie but peaceful reservoir, and driving through some cute cute cute countryside. Smell of onions in the air, then alfalfa, with cows, sheep, silos fruit stands, etc. Me likey.

Got to L.A. tired but hopeful, found the place, parked quite easily, and stepped out onto that sidewalk like we were going to conquer the world.

However.

It turns out that The Largo was closed. Just.... gone. We walked up to an empty storefront: boarded over with plywood, fabric hanging in tatters, a "Change of Ownership" sign in the dirty window.

No.......way. How could this possibly be happening? It was the worst feeling ever, even though we knew that we probably never would have got in to the show anyhow. A duck in to the comic book store next door, and the boy behind the counter gave us easy directions to the new Largo spot, only a mile away! We were thrilled. Bounded back to the car, and found the second place. Saw a whole bunch of people milling about outside, hoping (as we were) to get tickets. It was pretty disheartening, after such a long day. We sat out front so i could have a smoke, and regroup. As we're sitting there, checking out the Hollywood fashionistas, someone crossing the street towards us catches my eye.

It is none other than the man himself, Andrew Bird.

I freaked out. Pretty much just lost it. "Omigodomigodomigodomigodomigod" is all that came out of my mouth. i caught his eye for a split second, then stared at the gum on the sidewalk until April relaxed her grip on my arm and said "it's ok- he's gone." It was such a major, exciting moment for me, as cheesy as that sounds. i was so happy. So, so happy :) i was ready to leave, satisfied and elated, but April suggested that we walk around the block, just to draw out the experience as long as we could. In the alley behind the place, we discovered that there was a back door with such amazing sound, it was as if you were sitting in the front row. We decided then and there that we would hang out in the alley and listen to his set. i was so happy, again, and grateful to her for being such a game girl. We hunkered down with a bag of Sun Chips and waited for the opening act to be over.

Meanwhile, employees had been going in and out of various mysterious back doors, giving us sidelong glances from time to time. Finally, Andrew Bird came on and they all disappeared indoors. We heard whistling, some pizzicato violin and some lovely bowing, and then some murmuring to the audience, which was followed by laughter. It was hard not to be in there, but we were having a great time outside nonetheless. I began to write him a note that i was going to slip under the door, when a guy in a white T-shirt came down the back stairs and asked us what we were doing. "Just... listening" i said lamely. "We just drove down here from San Francisco hoping to get in but it was sold out!" April offered. He gave us an "aaallright, you're okay. No worries." and left. Thank goodness! i thought he was there to give us the boot. Which he probably was, but had mercy instead.

Fast forward to two minutes later, and someone else comes around the corner and says, "Come on. i've got seats for you."

.....!!!!!!!!!!

This was really happening.

"Leave your drinks, let's go." We obediently chucked our water bottles near the recycling bins and hurried after his disappearing shadow.

This wonderful man (no doubt tipped off by the first, also wonderful man) led us into the theater after the second song, and gave us two back seats.

I was staring at Andrew Bird onstage, who was busy shyly talking to the audience about how he was going to play some new songs, and was that okay? We responded accordingly.

Needless to say, it was a great night. One of the greatest of my life, in all honesty. Everything just fell into place. Andrew Bird truly was an amazing performer, as i'd heard, and as humble as could be. April enjoyed herself immensely, and we sat through probably 6 or 7 songs, then 2 encore songs, which were crazy good. A standing ovation later, i finished writing my note, with the update that we had been let in, and thanked him profusely for a lovely show. Walked up to the stage to throw the piece of paper near his guitar, when the guy who let us in comes over and jokes, "stop trying to steal Andrew's stuff!" i explained that i was only trying to leave him a note, and so he took it from me and put it right on top of the guitar. "He can't miss it" he assured me with a big grin. He introduced himself as Michael, and April and i fairly fell all over ourselves thanking him. He was so happy, i think, to be able to help, and could tell that we really truly deserved to be in there. He told us that Andrew was outside, in the mezzanine, saying hi to people. So April walked me over there (my legs were just about completely numb), and i stumbled towards him, shook his hand, and told him he was amazing. i thanked him for being him, and he smiled confusedly at me.

Yay!!

Success. For serious. It all actually finally happened. What an amazing night.

we walked back to the car on cloud nine, drove the last hour and a half home to San Diego (ha ha- i just called it "home", ugh), and got to bed around three a.m.

Went to work today, same as always.

Ain't life grand?
*typo left in for the sake of hilarity.