A few weeks ago, Matt asked me if I wanted to go see the Gin Blossoms. They’re currently touring in celebration of the 25th anniversary of their most successful album – aptly named New Miserable Experience.
“Sure!” I said. We listened to them in high school and sometimes I like to pretend to want to leave the house.
Matt knows my #1 rule for concerts – I must have a SEAT. So, I trusted that he had scouted out the venue and there would be no need to 
stand in a mosh-pit-sort of group of people or sit on the ground.
Our tickets said the show started at 7pm, so we rushed to eat dinner and get up to Ft. Myers to THE RANCH (an old ToysRUs turned into a country line-dancing mecca).
Upon closer examination around 7:15pm (when we were still locked out of the building) the tickets ALSO said the show started at 9pm….
Not ok – seeing as I was hoping I’d be back home and in my PJs by 9pm.
When they finally let us in the doors we were in a giant room with a huge wood dance floor in front of the stage. It looked not unlike a skating rink, and I wished I’d brought my old roller skates. Matt and I grabbed two barstools along the rail that contained the dance floor/skating rink and proceeded to sit…. for 2 hours.
I’d left my phone in the car – and of course there was no re-entry.
Matt’s phone died after an hour of watching Doug the Pug videos to entertain ourselves.
So, when the 90’s cover band finally started at 9pm – we couldn’t remember who originally sang the songs they were singing and didn’t have Google to help us out. “I think the CD cover was like red and orange,” Matt said about one particularly elusive band name.
Smoking was allowed in there – I didn’t think smoking was allowed indoors anywhere in Florida. Great, I thought, now I have to take a shower before I put on my pajamas…
The Gin Blossoms FINALLY started playing about 10:15pm – after three hours of sitting on those wooden stools with no backs. (New concert rules – I must have a seat WITH A BACK – and ideally – upholstery.) The lead singer kept encouraging the audience to sing the words, so the people we’d just watch line dance for the previous three hours were now the ones singing the songs.
And, to top it all off – people kept setting their empty (and not so empty) cups on the rail right by me. “Why do people keep putting their trash by me?” I yelled to Matt over the insane volume and screeching feedback every time the lead singer held the microphone over the crowd.
His reply: “Probably because you look like Oscar the Grouch sitting there.”
Fair enough.