Wednesday, March 23, 2011

Look who came to my birthday party!

To celebrate the big 3-0 this year, Doug and I went out to SLC to hang out with the family and get one last ski trip in. The real driver for this trip was the Lady Gaga concert that Whitney got us tickets to about 7 months ago. The Gaga was playing on my bday in my home state and I had a free ticket...um, yeah, I was going to go!!

This is quite a long entry, so I've broken it into chapters so when you get bored, you can come back to where you left off.

Chapter 1 - Express Train
I almost didn't make it (nothing dramatic like a plane crash, just almost a missed flight). I gave myself 3 hours to get from the city to JFK since it was St. Patty's Day and getting out of the city is just a pain anyway. In an effort to save time, I jumped on the Long Island Railroad and accidentally jumped onto an express train going to BFE Long Island making only express stops...FML. The first stop was 45 min. out of my way, so I was freaking out the whole time. It didn't help that all of the drunk Irish revelers were laughing at me. After running off of one train and onto the next, I made it to the airport with 4 minutes to spare. I guess I had the luck of the Irish on my side.

Chapter 2 - Secret Stash
Since Doug didn't fly in until Friday night (you know, because the President and VP of this family can't fly together...what would happen to the dogs if we were both on the same plane that went down) I went up to Solitude for a day of skiing by myself. It was a blue bird day with beautiful spring conditions. In the afternoon, I was skiing down a chute and stopped to breath and all of a sudden some dude was standing right above me, I had no idea where he came from. I told him to ski through, but he said "Hey...wanna follow me to my secret stash of snow?" Normally I would decline and run, but for some reason I said sure and followed him to the lift. He was about 55 and just a seemingly harmless ski bum. I made sure on the lift ride up to mention that I am going to pick up my HUSBAND and that I'm meeting up with my family later just so that he knew people would be expecting me and might get tipped off if I didn't show up. We had to hike to get to his "stash" so I just kept following and lo and behold, he took me to 3 ft of untracked snow...thanks new buddy! After that run he asked if I wanted to do it again, and I totally did, so I jumped on the lift with him. About half way up the lift he got quiet and then turned to me and said "What time do you have to pick up your husband?" Ruh-roh... "Ummm, do you wanna get stoned with me?" Me - "Oh, no thank you. But you won't offend me if you do." Ski bum - "I've been working up the nerve to ask you this whole time." Oh, sorry dude...you really think I'm going to smoke with someone I don't even know? Hell, I don't even smoke, so I'm surely not going to do it with you. Weird. After that run, I made some lame excuse and went and hid in the bathroom for a few minutes hoping he wouldn't be outside when I came out...luckily no sign of him after that!

Chapter 3 - The big 3-0
There's nothing I love more than being in the mountains, so spending my birthday on the ski slopes was non-negotiable. Doug, my mom and I headed up to Solitude for a beautiful day of spring skiing. We were so busy having fun, I didn't take any pictures.

But, I did take pictures of the evening activities! Whitney was kind enough to rent hotel rooms downtown for all of us so we didn't have to go far after the concert. Here's a picture of us all ready for the concert. I had big intentions of dressing up, but I went for comfort and am so glad I did. There were enough freaks, they didn't need one more.

By the looks of Doug's eyes, you'd think he'd been drinking out of that brown bag all night (but, he hadn't been)


This somehow made it's way on my camera


The Scissor Sisters were opening for Gaga and they are probably one of my favorite dancing bands of all time. Don't feel like cleaning? Put on some SS and you'll be mopping the ceiling! We had GA tickets on the floor, so we got there just in time for the opening act and they were just as awesome as always! I'm not sure that much of the audience knew who they were, so my mom and I looked like fools shaking our thangs, but we had a blast. It took Gaga over an hour to appear, so there was plenty of time for people watching. Here are a few of the gems we saw...

Wonder Woman


Full wedding dress


I don't even know


Once Gaga came out, she put on an incredible 2 1/2 hour show full of amazing sets, dancing drags, burning pianos and lots of S&M. My mouth was dropping in disbelief for most of the show. Even if you're not a Gaga fan, it's worth seeing her live because it's more like a Broadway show than a concert. The sets were incredible - apparently it takes 40 semis to haul everything from one show to the next.

Steel trees


Real Monsters


The Gaga singing Happy Birthday to me


Subway car


After the concert, we crashed hard and then skied the next day on a fresh 10 inches of snow! Once again, no pictures, so use your imagination (or look at any of my other Utah posts and you'll get the idea:)

I did get to hang out with my g-rents and uncle for lunch on Monday before flying out on the red eye that night. Try explaining a Gaga concert to your grandparents in a G-rated version...not an easy task.

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