REEL BIG FIIIIISH

Last night was the Tip the Van/Streetlight Manifesto/Reel Big Fish concert in Worcester.

And it was AWESOOOOOOOOOOOOME.

We left Olin at about 5, got to Worcester about 6 after some traffic issues. The doors were to open at 7, but there was already a significant line in front of the Palladium. Since Chris was just so excited, we just went to a cigarette shop to get some chips to eat in line instead of actually going somewhere for dinner.

THEN THE WAITING BEGAN. It was cold outside. Really. I'm guessing about 20 degrees, maybe even less. We stood there for a little less than an hour, occasionally huddling together penguin style. Eating was difficult because it made it necessary to take hands out of pockets. My hands and toes were pretty much numb by the time we finally got to go in there. We managed to hustle our way pretty close to the front by the time Tip the Van started.

It was pretty ridiculous--as they played we'd be compressed this way and that as people pushed their way around and created mosh pits and such. I never had to worry about falling as bodies were all around giving support, but it was quite an experience being smushed into some sweaty guy's back. The waves going through the crowd basically caused our group to separate out; I ended up in the back corner by the end of Tip the Van, where the crowd wasn't quite so dense, and there was some room to actually dance. Tip the Van was pretty good, especially for a band I'd never heard of before. I went a bit deeper in during Streetlight Manifesto; the crowd basically swept me around in a circle from the middle to the back center to the back corner area again. I don't think I was able to get more than a fleeting glance of the actual band. I found the perfect spot for Reel Big Fish: about a person or two away from the edge, and about halfway to the stage. I was able to see the drummer and lead singer perfectly, and the crowd compressions weren't too bad. Needless to say Reel Big Fish were freaking awesome, and I was doing some serious skanking.

Various highlights include:
- At least two people trying to crowd surf above my head. I got out of the way as best I could.
- A dude jumping OVER me and landing to crowd surf.
- Two guys asking me if I want to crowd surf. They looked disappointed when I said no.
- A couple making out literally inches from my face. I probably could have joined in if I wanted to. A guy next to me asked how the view was.
- Being covered in sweat, most of which wasn't mine. I kept on thinking of the old STD thing, if Jane sleeps with Bobby and Bobby sleeps with Susie then pretty soon everyone in the room has chlamydia. I'm not sure about sweat transfer, but it sure felt like I had been smashed against enough people's bodies to have a mixture of everyone's sweat on my shirt.

AND!

The night before (Friday) a group of us built an IGLOO. We found a big pile of snow on the O, and shoveled it out. By the end it could fit all eight of us inside. Comfortably, it could fit about five I'm guessing. I also snow sculpted a chair and table (outside of the igloo.)

So those days of the weekend were pretty awesome, whereas today (Sunday) has been painfully uneventful. I've been (not) doing homework most of the day. And I have class tomorrow. Boooo.

Why Benjamin Button = Forrest Gump

...and why Forrest was a lot cooler.

I suppose a spoiler warning is necessary here. Consider this your spoiler warning.

We've got two boys growing up in the south. They both have something different about them--Benny is aging backward, and Forrest is dumb. They're both raised by mothers, not fathers. They both live a big house where they have guests staying with them. An old lady teaches Benny the piano, and Elvis teaches Forrest how to dance (or the other way around.) There's a big dramatic moment where Forrest breaks out of his leg braces and runs like a mo-fo. There's a big dramatic moment where Benny steps out of his wheelchair and walks... like an old man. They both meet their sweethearts as children.

Then they grow up. Forrest goes off to war, then becomes a shrimp boat captain (with ping-pong in between.) Benny works on a tug boat, then goes off to war (affair with married woman in between.) Meanwhile, their sweethearts go off and become hippies. The respective couples meet on and off again throughout their lives, until eventually they end up happy together. Yay. In Benny's story, the hummingbird symbolizes resurrection/regeneration;

in Forrest's, you have the feather which represents (essentially) the same thing.

Obviously some of those are stretches. But in general--they're both epic, semi-historical films of a romance through time told mostly in flashback, and that's the biggest similarity.

I like Forrest Gump better because I felt more for his character and more for the relationship between him and Jenny. When Forrest tries to propose to Jenny, she tells him, "You don't even know what love is." But Forrest denies that, saying, "I may not be a smart man, but I do know what love is." He stands up for himself and the love he has for his girl. Benjamin doesn't, or at least I didn't see him do it. He's more of a go with the flow kind of guy. When he goes to the party with Cate Blanchett, he realizes that he doesn't belong there, and so he just leaves (or tries to.) He never fights for her, never writes her a stack of letters that are returned. (He did for a while with the postcards, but then he stopped.) Anyway, I was never fully convinced that there was anything between them. (I'm not trying to say that the relationship was bad, that no one could be convinced, only that I wasn't convinced. I'm explaining my personal dissatisfaction, in other words.)

THAT BEING SAID, if I had to give Benny a thumbs up or thumbs down I'd give him a thumbs up. The similarities to Forrest Gump don't necessarily make the film worse (in my eyes), they were just a little distracting. The film was quite well made and (although a lot of people disagree) I didn't feel like it was dragging at all. I didn't feel like I had just wasted 3 hours of my life at the end of it. The hurricane bugged me though. I suppose its purpose was a time reference, but it was brought up so often I thought it would actually serve a greater purpose, which it didn't.

(I discovered just now that I really like parentheses.)

In other news, I finished Kafka on the Shore, by Haruki Murakami yesterday. It was a lot like Heart of Darkness, only it had a plot. I, er, think I liked it.

I want to go back to college. The end.

rawr.

That is the essence of my soul.