Stages

I had a weird day yesterday - went to my regular gig in the morning then got called to go over to my Wednesday school for the afternoon because the other library tech was out sick. Teachers at both place said thoughtless things that made me disproportionately angry. The weather was nice but I could feel that I'm entering that weeks-long period in spring(ish) or fall when I'm just hot all the time and in order not to die I have to underdress for the weather and steel myself against everyone and their dog saying "but aren't you COLD?"

Anyway. Will save that for Thursday. Saturday was super fun - my lovely neighbour invited Eve and I to share her box seats (from work) for a Lumineers concert with her and daughter. Eve and Victoria were born one week apart (Victoria came a little late, Eve came a little early) and used to be constantly in and out of both our houses with paints and sidewalk chalk and Barbies (I used to write down their hilarious conversations: "Okay, we both have Barbies. Wait, don't you want a boyfriend? No? Well, too bad you're going to miss out on all the love!": "'Mom, I love swimming!' "Well duh, we're mermaids.'"). They're seventeen now and go to different schools and have different extracurriculars, but they pick up where they left off really nicely.

We did the thing we always do at Bluesfest, which is look at the lineup, vow that we will look up all the artists and listen to their music if we don't know them or their newer music if we do, and then... don't. J.S. Ondara was the opener for the opener. He has a really great voice, but many of the songs sounded the same - a string section and his distinctive voice over top, but often not enough over the top. I feel like a voice like that should have minimal accompaniment, and he needs to vary his songwriting a little (I'm sure my opinion matters a huge deal against that of Rolling Stone, thank you for coming to my Ted Talk). Mt. Joy was the opener - I liked their sound and they played well, but other than the first song I found the instruments overwhelmed the vocals again, which is a common issue for me. I don't really understand why bands do this - it might be just that I'm too old, but I feel like I've always felt like this, and Eve says the same thing.

I adore the Lumineers. Eve and I saw them at Bluesfest and I saw them in the same venue as Saturday a few years ago in the extreme nosebleed section. It doesn't matter if I know the words, it doesn't matter if I can tell what they're singing about, I love their sound and I can listen to it for hours. Their instruments can get loud, but they never seem to overpower the singing. The piano guy wasn't wearing any shoes. They seemed to just be having the best time. They brought both opening bands on stage with them to sing a Leonard Cohen song - I love when this happens at concerts, it has such a feeling of camaraderie and joy. Also, J.S. Ondara's white poncho was really nice.

Next Sunday is Cats in our Broadway Across Canada subscription. It's the one they sneak in there that we didn't really want but have to take if we wanted Waitress and Rent and Hamilton, and we really, really did. We've gone back and forth on whether to actually go, but we've decided that if we see it we can then mock it from a position of authority.

There. I've successfully distracted myself from panicking about the fact that I've been feeling vaguely like we're in the early stages of a Stephen King movie. Going to go wash my hands now, and strongly suggest you do the same.