This week is the start of our 3rd trimester. In celebration, the barrel packed up and rolled off to Hampton, Virginia for Phish version 3.0 (as they are calling it.) We went for three nights of Phish in the mothership at the Hampton Coliseum and had a great time. Phish is Dad and Mama's favorite musical band. They are a group out of Vermont that Dad introduced to Mama over 10 years ago when they started dating. Since then, they have been to over 30 shows together (and many more alone) all over the country. Not to mention they had a Phish cover band at their wedding... They have met many new friends (or as we call phriends) on the way and converted their some of their friends to what is fondly called "Phisheads." Now you may have read much of the press about this band, and their comparisons to other bands that have droves of "hippies" that follow jambands while selling grilled cheeses from their VW vans and wear dreadlocks. The music is very different (much more rock and a fusion of many types of compositions and styles) but the crowd looks similar. However, there are many different levels of phans including the dirty loser "hippies" which we call the "wooks" who come along for the party scene to those of us that grew up and are outstanding members of society. In the end, we share a common bond of a love for music... Phish had broken up for good (or so we thought) almost 5 years ago until about the time we learned about Barack when on October 1st of 2008 the band announced that they were getting back together again. Needless to say we vowed at their final show we would make it to their return show, and we did. Even brought little Barack along. He slept most of the time, waking up during setbreaks and after the show. His Mama was busy dancing to the music, which probably helped the sleeping factor. He definitely was a little freaked out at first from the shear screaming before the start of the first show and the sound level, but by 3 songs in he relaxed and chilled the rest of the time. He tended to kick during the softer songs when Mama swayed and sang along. He got his song Bouncing Around the Room (or as we sing Womb) on the first night. We met three of our old friends from New England that we had not seen since our wedding or the last concert. The band sounded even better than before (most likely due to a new level of the band's sobriety) and the energy in the building of 13,000+ was amazing. However, we all felt our age as in 5 years, graduate school, parenthood-to-be and more, our bodies are exhausted!
Check out some pictures from our weekend...
The mothership. The coliseum is lighted in rainbow lights to make it look like s spaceship at night. So many bands love to come to this little hockey area to play.
The folks at the Phish organization sometimes has live performance art at its shows. Here there was a group of blockheads that constructed some floating blocks and rowed boats in the fountain underneath a giant white blockhead statue. There was also what looked like cotton candy in the trees for a boost of color.
Our view from our seats each night. we sat up top so Mama could have a seat and some safe dancing room than being down on the floor (where we stood last time we were here.) There were giant white balloons that were hung and lighted along with the light show. They were dropped during Bouncing Around the Room on the first night so that the crowd bounced them around the room and then again at the very end.
It was an amazing weekend. Mama and Dad were glad that they got to spend their last solo vacation seeing their favorite band. Now we just prepare for Barack's arrival in these last three months.
Some new threads...
