U2 at Red Rocks and Observations from an Airplane

Earlier this week I took yet another trip to Colorado. My reason this time was to go see what I thought was the 25th anniversary of the U2 Live at Red Rocks concert. As it turns out, this year was the 24th, NOT the 25th....NEXT June 4 they are going to completely reenact the Red Rocks concert and they are going to petition the band to show up. I give the odds of the band showing up about 2%, however....if they have a new album to plug it would be good publicity...I doubt it, but could happen.

Anyway, 24th Anniversary was played by a local Colorado band called Under a Blood Red Sky. They did okay...The people who were with me have never seen U2 in concert, so they loved it....I've seen them many times, so for me it was the difference between a hamburger from AM/PM and a hamburger from Red Robin...there really was a quality gap there. BUT, the thing about it is that after the show the restrooms happen to be right next to where the band came off stage after their set. I overheard them talking to some people and they were SO excited and amped by the experience of playing Red Rocks to a sold out crowd (yes, sold out...there were 7,000 people there that night...even the original concert didn't sell out). U2 is the band they are because they are so very special...it would be an exercise in futility to replicate that with any sort of actual authenticity, however, these guys didn't do too bad. After I saw how excited and honored they were by the opportunity I decided to cut them a little more slack. They are attempting to fill some really big shoes, and I have to give them credit for doing a pretty good job. And yes, I can tell you I will be making yet another trip to Red Rocks next year to go see the show on June 4th, actual band or not. :-)

Now, the plane ride...this was the first time I've been on a plane since I decided to watch all the episodes of Lost on dvd or TV. I must say, my observations on this trip are forever changed. As I'm sitting on the plane I'm looking around at my fellow passengers wondering,

"I wonder if anybody on this plane can hunt?"

"I wonder if there is a doctor?"

"Is anybody running from the law?"

"Who would be the person to panic and turn on all of us in a tough situation?"

Then I'd look out the window at the ground below and wonder,

"Are the Others down there?"

"Are they friendly or hostile?"

LOL! Funny how TV can cause you to view the world around you differently.

And finally, there was a mother and her less than 5 year old daughter sitting behind me. I heard the mother comment that this was her daughter's first flight. Anybody who knows me knows I'm not a big fan of the children, so initially I was thinking, "Great, what fresh hell is this going to be?" (I had to get up at 5 a.m. to make my flight, and I'm not much of a morning person...I just wanted to get in the air so I could go to sleep). As luck would have it, the mother's voice wasn't annoying and the child only kicked my seat a couple of times. I slept most of the flight, but as we were coming into Denver we hit some pretty decent turbulence. The mother was explaining that the bumping was just like "bumps on the road" and it was nothing to be concerned about. As we were coming into the airport we had to hang a pretty sharp u-turn and the child was sitting at the window on the side of the plane that tipped down when we did this. As the wing tipped and we are looking at the ground the child says,

"Oh, oh...here we go! Mayday! Mayday!"

The mother quickly shhh'ed her and explained we were turning, not crashing, but THAT made me laugh out loud, and that is the thing I've been telling everybody about my trip. Kids aren't my favorite, but I must say some of them do have their moments. From here on out when something gets tough for me my reply will be, "Mayday! Mayday!"