The first concert I went to was in 1999. HFStival ‘99. Live. Offspring. Mighty Mighty Bostones. Other bands, other people. Someone threw a water bottle and it clocked my friend Lisa in the head.

The second concert I went to was a few years later, at Merriweather Post: Live and Counting Crows. Parking was atrocious, but I had my Jeep and seem to remember I took a somewhat muddy alternate route to get out and my friends were laughing and clapping and saying “Go Snay!” I also almost died that night as on my way down, some idiot almost caused me to run off 695 at 65 mph.

Third concert I went to was last night. Bob Dylan, at Hershey, PA. Geisha took me.

Observations:

1. Don’t eat at the Wendy’s in Hershey, PA (”Dylan Purgatory”). Inefficient, mismanaged, unclean, and slow, are some of the kinder words I can think of to describe it. We were the fourth people in line. When we got our food — twenty-five minutes later — the line stretched out the door. I did bump into a guy I knew from my Roots of Rock & Roll class last semester, Peter. He has a distinctive hair-style: “I was like, that looks like Peter. Hey, Peter!” and he turned around and was like “Woah, dude!” And then we talked about Towson U.

2. That moving floor on the Chocolate World ride at Hershey makes you feel like you’re a drunk. Woah! Geisha and I bought no chocolate after leaving the ride, which was free, so we feel we beat the system (even our parking was free!)

3. I really enjoyed the view. We had seating in the grass. By “view”, I don’t mean of the stage, but rather, of the ‘fashion hippy’ in front of us, a tall blond chick with wavy hair and a brown dress who danced for most of the concert. She wore a thong, no underwear bra, and her boobs bounced. YAY!

4. Parking was really really really atrocious. The parking lot turned into a total “go nowhere” fest and we wound up re-parking and waiting forty minutes for the parking lot to thin out, then dodged around traffic and took the very convenient back way out that no one else seemed to know about.

5. The only songs I recognized were “All Along the Watchtower”, “Rolling Stone”, and one other whose name escapes me. Something about Lily, I think. He played for close to two hours. At a few points, I even stood up and clapped.

6. Hippies like me. After leaving the venue and trying to find the car, I said, “I don’t know where we are!” I meant in relation to the vehicle. The dude behind me called out “You’re in Hershey, man!”

7. I brought Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix with me. I was reading it on the way up, didn’t bring it into the concert, and continued to read it while waiting to escape parking lot hell. Why must the Ministry of Magic be so short sighted? Silly Ministry!

8. Thank you for taking me, Geisha.