My dear friend Travis scored some free tickets to see Jack Johnson on Monday. I wanted to see Jack anyway, so this was a major windfall. What could be better than spending a warm summer night sitting on a lawn with a bunch of your friends and listening to cool island tunes? ...Doing all of that for FREE, of course. Add to this the fact that concerts are probably the third best venue* to people-watch, and you have a recipe for an enlightening evening.
We saw dudes that looked like chicks and chicks that looked like dudes; guys toking up and a girl really upset that the guys has toked up without her; lots and lots of drunk people and one guy who started his drinking by pouring the rum for his rum and coke out of his sandal.
The coup de gras, though, was the bear woman. I call her the bear woman because her size and look reminded me of a bear walking upright. She was also rubbing up against this very tall and long haired male in a way that remarkably reminiscent of a bear scratching against a tree. She was also very hammered. The whole thing looked an awful lot like this:
The highlight of the whole evening, though, was when the bear lady started to get her freak on a few yards in front of us. It was very a Woodstock-esque flailing sort of dance. In her hammered state, she meandered all over this couple's blanket and knocked over their overpriced soft drinks. As they reached down to prevent the beverages from soaking their blanket, the bear lady had the audacity to slur, "You guys should really put those somewhere else, you know..."
We looked at each other in dumbfounded amazement. They needed to move their drinks because she danced into them? Well, someone took as much umbrage to this as we did, and it was this pint sized gal next to us. She stood right up and accosted the drunk lady. I didn't hear most of the conversation, but the sight of a young 5' 2" and very clearly Mormon woman scolding an indignant, overweight and drunken hippie was something to behold. What was even funnier was the way the woman's husband very calmly watched the whole interaction seated on the blanket until it looked like it might turn into a poking and pushing match. At this point, he calmly stood up behind his wife, put his hands on her soldier, and said, "Dear, let's not forget that you have a 2 year old and a 5 month old at home..."
Well, the cooler heads prevails, the drunk hippie wandered away to scratch her back against the tree again , and we applauded the pint size defender as she settled back onto her blanket. One of my friends said, "We were so close to getting up; good for you!" And she replied, "I kind of wanted to go to Relief Society with a black eye." Her husband is probably still rolling his eyes and shaking his head in disbelief.
*My poll data indicates that state fairs and airports are the two other venues ideal for people watching.
