Friday, July 25, 2003

I had to tease Sarah about getting to see Gaelic Storm before her, so we exchanged the following text messages on our cell phones:
S: "Hi Woman, Gaelic Storm..."
H: "Call you tonight from Patrick's room!"
S: "No way sweetie, that sweet hunk of man is mine!"

After a quick dinner at Wendy's, the Lake girls picked up John and headed towards Riverscape. Now, don't die of shock, but I didn't get lost, and in fact the way I went turned out to be the perfect way to go. So there. LOL Parking was $5, which was understandable since admission to the Festival was free. The parking attendant laughed at me because I had trouble getting the $5 bill out of my little bag-thing. But, hey, I still looked cute. LOL



Bethany at Wendy's.


Finally, we were in the festival. Gaelic Storm's show was to be at 8 pm—we were there about 7:20, plenty of time to look around, and maybe find Bob beforehand. We were right by a large tent, so I thought we should look around and see if that was the "Riverscape Stage". Then I spotted a very familiar logo—Gaelic Storm's—on a small tent. Turned out to be their merchandise tables, and the girl working there told me that the large tent was the right one. How easy was that? LOL I snagged a couple of programs from the table and we walked towards the stage. The Irish dancer kids were performing, so I led them towards a white plastic fence that separated the "backstage" area from the riff-raff. Not that we were being bad...after all, I was supposed to behave since the Pastor was going to be there. *ahem*


Can you see Patrick asleep on the grass?


Anyway, while we were standing near the fence, watching the dancers and talking—and I was keeping an eye out for Bob--we saw Steve. I said hi, and to my delight, he immediately hugged me and greeted me like an old friend. (If you’re feeling jealous already, you may not want to keep reading. *G*) I again asked him about his daughter, and he informed us that he has "a demon daughter". She's a bully, it seems--she likes to take other babies' pacifiers and when she gets more than one, she claps them together like cymbols. LOL He also added that he has NO idea where she gets that kind of mischief. Yeah...*rolls her eyes* LOL We chatted for a few more minutes, then he looked towards the stage and said, "It looks like we might be taking the stage earlier than we planned, so I will have to leave you now." Little did he know...

After that I met a group of girls—two I knew from Bob's online group--they found me, recognizing me despite my big fat haircut! We chatted a while, and made our way towards the tent. We watched the last performances by the Irish dancers, and once they were done, and the people were coming out, we "invaded". LOL The entire front row was taken over in the dancing area. WOO!

I had an opportunity to hang out and bond with the group of girls, and exchange comments and stories with them. One girl—eek, I've forgotten her name! LOL...I'll just call her "Boobs" *G*--well, she was a blast! You may wonder about why I refer to her as Boobs...it's from a story she told me from the previous weekend. To sum it up, since it's her tale, not mine to tell, she was wearing a VERY low cut shirt, and her antics led to an interesting dialogue with Patrick. LOL

Carmen and John went into the audience area to sit, while Bethany and I stayed up front. After standing a while, we decided to sit down, watching all the stage guys run around, moving cords, changing things around, etc. Slowly, one member of Gaelic Storm at a time would come out and do a sound check. Then the guy in charge of the festival came out to tell us that the show was being delayed because of power and sound equipment problems. It was 8:45 by then.

Since we'd been sitting on the lovely black asphalt all that time, we finally stood up to stretch a bit. I was talking to Bethany and looking around, when suddenly, I saw Bob come up to the other girls and start talking to him. I grabbed the gift bag and went over. I tapped him on the shoulder, and before I could say anything, he turned, grinned and exclaimed, "Helen! I'm so glad you're here!!" He gave me a great big hug and I think I started glowing because he knew my name, and recognized me!!! I held up the bag and started off by telling him what the poster was, showed him the can cozy—which he told me HAD to go to Steve--and then, finally, I pulled out the shadow box. Now, I'm trying to be humble here, but he seemed pretty impressed (hey, I was impressed with myself too!! LOL) . He thanked me profusely and asked if I would "keep it safe until after the show because with all the crazy stuff onstage, it might get hurt". I told him I'd get it to him later.

Bethany was standing off to the side, watching our stuff. I called her over and introduced her to Bob. He--time to mention I love Bob again!--said to her, "Hi Bethany! You have a really cool sister!" She replied, "No, I'm the really cool sister!" Which made him laugh and say, "Well, I'm glad you're slumming to make her look good then!" LOL...hey...wait a second! *wink* LOL

I must note that Bethany had use of the digital camera (and the disposable)--she used an entire disk on the sound checks, etc...BEFORE the show ever started. LOL Oh, and you might also notice there are a lot of Ryan pics. Take a wild guess who took most of those. LOL



I caught Twigger in half-step! LOL


Everybody dance!


The fine looking Ryan!


Bob, tuning and doing his sound check!


Hi Ryan! Wow, it looks like he saw me! LOL


Isn't this silhouette of Steve cool?


The guy came out to say the show would be starting soon, much to our relief. The lads came out—WOO—and broke into "South Australia". A short time later, Steve said that for the next song, he needed to ask a question: "Does anyone out there have any whiskey?" I dug my flask out of my purse and held it up. Patrick saw and asked if there was anything in it. I nodded and he took it from me. Now, I knew something was wrong when he walked away, turned his back and kept glancing over his shoulder towards me. I saw him take a swig, all the while looking at something in his hand. When he handed it back to me, I realized what he'd done--somehow when he unscrewed the lid, it came out of the hinged circle that kept it attached to the rest of the flask. I turned to my sister, and exclaimed, "Patrick broke my flask!!" LOL But I popped it back in, easy enough, and looked down the stage at Steve. I held the flask up and tilted it towards him in a "want some?" manner. He smirked and motioned for me to bring it to him, so I made my way past all the other--oh so jealous! LOL--girls and handed it to him. Bethany got a picture of that, and of him taking a huge gulp. Once I had the flask back, I went back to my spot, grinning.


Notice Ryan in the background, looking like he wanted some too!! LOL
It's not that complicated...
Why am I NOT LOOKING AT STEVE??!?! LOL

So, Steve liked it.....LOL


I'm not sure what it was about that night, but I seemed to have a silent communication with the band:

The songs were awesome, the dancing was fun, and I fell in love with the band all over again. My sisters--no longer Gaelic Storm Virgins, Steve!!--finally seemed to understand what I meant when I kept saying, "No matter how great they are on the CDs, they are ten times more amazing and fun in person!" They certainly lived up to it—coming out to do encores and harassing each other as always.


Perhaps my favorite picture of Bob!!


Another jammin’ shot—and Bob was looking at me! LOL


A brief respite between songs...


Jammin’ on the bagpipes!


Between songs, some girls yelled out, "Yo, Patrick!" And he paused long enough to say, "Yo yo yo, dese is my hizzles"—in his SEXY Irish accent!!! LMAO

Bethany was thrilled because Twigger sang her favorite song—"Swimmin' in the Sea". They all looked like they were having an absolute blast—except for the new girl. Maybe she was nervous, maybe she wasn't used to the craziness of the festival...I don't know, but her facial expression rarely changed from one of dazed suffering. I'm leaning towards stage-fright, myself. They said she was from Cincinnati (and darned if I can remember her name, I want to say Kelly)...and her playing was fine...and maybe I'm biased, but she seemed to lack the passion that Bob exudes. Don't worry, she got better! LOL *NOTE added later--her name is Ellery Kline!!*



Okay, technically this pic is from Saturday, but this is her. Deal with it. LOL


Okay, there's always someone at these events that is drunk and causes trouble. In this case, it was a lady, maybe early 40's, who alternated between yelling to Patrick and Bob, or telling Bethany and I things about the band. I kept saying "I know, we know", etc, but she just didn't stop!! At one point, I SWEAR she asked Bob if he would get Patrick to come sing to her. She was really obnoxiously drunk, and Bethany says she kept patting her shoulder like a drum. Yeah, she was fun. LOL

But wait, Friday is not over yet!! The guys went out to the autograph tables to await their adoring fans.

We headed for the autograph line, and as we walked, one of my sisters spotted my Pastor and his family. Like I mentioned before, I had known he was going to be there--since I was the one who had told him about it in the first place. I had made jokes about how I needed to behave Friday night, since he was specifically going to see Gaelic Storm's show. So, imagine my embarrassment when he said, "I saw you up there with your flask!" I burst out laughing, covering my face and feeling the blush creeping up my neck. While we chatted for a few minutes, I showed them what I had made for Bob, and the flask. Just so you know, my Pastor is a great, and fun guy--and to prove it, he pretended to slip my flask into his pocket. I immediately threatened bodily harm. LOL Of all the nights to be naughty...LOL

We saw Steve and Bethany hollered to him, getting him to come over to us. I gave him the can cozy—which made him burst out laughing—and asked him to make sure Bob got the gift bag. He said he would definitely make sure, and disappeared into the performer's tent with it. We went over to get in the autograph line. I held my slightly crumpled program, determined to get autographs this time--I always managed to forget before. And, with the program to be signed, I passed the flask along! LOL Steve asked what kind of whiskey it was, and I told him, and he said, "Oh, well that explains why it's so good!" and thanked me for sharing.

Bethany wanted to get a picture with Twigger and Ryan--her favorite men, ya know. So, she said to Twigger, "Can I get a picture?" And Patrick, who thought she was talking to him, said, "Sure, that will be 20 dollars!" Bethany, being the smooth and cocky gal, said, "I'll 20 dollar you!" Patrick’s eyes got wide, and Twigger said, "Did she just give you a 'tude?" This set them both off, laughing and saying how Bethany was "'tuding" Patrick. LOL It was really funny!! Finally, Bethany went around the table to get her picture--Patrick still thought she wanted him too, so he was in that pic too.



Patrick, Bethany, Twigger, Ryan


After I took the picture for Bethany, she took a picture of me with Patrick. As I crouched beside him, with his arm around me, an older guy walked in front of Bethany. Patrick started laughing as the guy said "Well, I wasn’t going to do this *puts bumper sticker on table*, but I thought you could initial this..." Still chuckling, Patrick said, "That's fine *insert name here*, but you just walked into the picture!" He still had his arm around me, so I replied, "That's fine, I can stay here a while...no really, that's okay..." He laughed again, and posed for the picture.


Helen and Patrick


Since I was already behind the table, I headed for Steve to give him a hard time--why, you may ask. Well, if you read my report for the last time I’d seen Gaelic Storm, you might remember the pictures with Steve incident. He kissed my friend in her picture, and then in mine--but the first time, we knew she took the pic too soon, so we tried once more, positive we'd gotten it that time. I said, "Imagine my disappointment when I got my pictures back and the second one didn’t have it either!" He slapped the table, exclaiming, "You mean we failed?! That's just--*sound of disgust* get over here!" I crouched next to him and he pulled me close, pressing his cheek against mine (like last time).

Bethany was taking the picture and she didn't warn us, she just took it, and the flash didn"t go off. Steve cried out, "No no no! You have to give me a count!" Laughing, she made sure the flash was on, and started counting. As she said one, he moved his cheek about 3 inches away, and his hand came up to grasp my chin--as she said two, I briefly wondered what he was doing--and as she began to say three, he suddenly whipped my head to the side...and I found myself getting a full on the lips smooch from Mr. Sexy Steve!!! *SIGH* Now, I don’t recall doing it, but John claims that after the first 10 seconds, I put my hand on the back of Steve’s head. *blush* LOL Thank goodness I had just finished a mint a few minutes before...LOL



SMOOOOOOOOOOCH!!!!!!


I told him as I stumbled away, "Oh dear *fanning self* Suddenly, I'm so hot...we're leaving and I don't have A/C in my car!!" He grinned at me, winking, and just making me blush even harder...I just keep reminding myself that he’s a married man. Steve is a married man...Steve is a married man...DANGIT! LOL

I saw the girls from the Internet again, and paused long enough to ask "Hey, is my lipstick smudged?" They made various faces of extreme jealousy and mock (I think!) glares as I walked away. Before we left, I made sure to get a picture with Bob—and we got one with all 3 Lake girls and Bob. He hugged me again and I said goodnight, and that I'd see him tomorrow. He seemed so grateful and just...sweet! *sigh*



Bob and some chick LOL

Bethany, Bob, Helen, Carmen



Before we headed for home, Bethany got one last picture with Ryan--and half of Twigger's VERY CUTE face!!!


I hardly remember driving home—and dropping John off. Mostly, I remember talking nonstop and that every other sentence was "Stevie kissed me!!" LOL And that was just Friday...