Happy yawn and heartfelt sigh

As promised, the weekend report:
Emily, Jeff, and I went to dinner early Friday evening at Amore while we waited for Matt to get back from work in Fort Worth. Once he did, we piled into his car and drove to the mini-ranch. We arrived there to find it empty but for Murphy and TVs tuned to the Olympics opening ceremony. After watching for a bit, the four of us walked over to the Lockes' lakehouse and found everyone there watching the Olympics on the big plasma screen. We stayed for a while, chatting and watching the TV, and then left them to eat their dinner. Leslie and Bryan wandered over later and much DDRing was had by all - Leslie and Bryan were novices, and all the Heineken didn't help, but they had a good time.

On Saturday morning we all got up early to eat breakfast and play softball in the morning cool. We had an awesome game, and my team (Claude, Matt, Leslie, Bryan, and myself) won it in the bottom of the fifth 11-10, beating Dad, Jerry, Robert, Emily, and Jeff. Some highlights include me getting all the outs in the top of the fourth, Claude smoking on the pitchers mound, Leslie hitting line drives at the pitchers' heads, everyone yelling "lefty" as Emily stepped up to the plate to adjust the player placement, and Matt's spectacular outfielding. After softball we all sat around and waited for the rest of the non-overnight guests to arrive, which included the Roberts, Cynthia Lydecker, the Stimsons, the Settles, Aunt Lisa and cousin Katie, and Mike Shannon and Carolyn, as well as Amanda and Jeff who could only stay Saturday night and therefore hadn't come yet. We had a wonderful lunch under the pecan tree, and then it was time to play in the lake. I went out on Mike's speedboat with Amanda & Jeff, Emily & Jeff, and Matt. The boys all tubed and got thrown from it three times each. Jeff L did three full revolutions one time, and the third run, where he told Mike to "kill him," had him airborne as the tube went one way and Jeff went somewhere roughly 90 degrees from the tube's direction. Emily also tubed and Mike was much more gentle with her. Amanda and I declined the tubing offer...I enjoyed watching others do it and knew I'd made the right decision when the boys could barely walk on Sunday. After the boat, Mike exchanged us for other passengers, and we floated and slid down the Pous' new dock slide. It was fun. When we were tired of the water, we walked back and played some DDR and Halo and whatnot until dinner, which was once again served under the pecan trees. Post-dinner activities included feeding the cows, ping-pong and darts, Frisbee, bonfire, and S'more making. Matt and I also took the opportunity to ask his 7-year-old cousin Mary to be our flower girl at the wedding. We weren't sure if she was excited or wanting to do it at first, but then she started dancing (and didn't stop until she crashed around 10 pm), which we interpreted as a good sign. Later that night, after the adults had gone back to Dallas or to other lakehouses, the eight "kids" (Emily, Leslie, Bryan, Jeff x 2, Amanda, Matt, me) looked for shooting stars for a while and then retired to the house. The boys played poker while the girls played DDR, and looked at pictures and scrapbooks. Then, because we're all so awesome, we went to bed around midnight.

On Sunday, Mom came back and made some wonderful French toast. Then we all cleaned up a bit and went our separate ways - Mom took Les and Bryan to DFW, Amanda & Jeff went back to College Station, and Matt, Em, Jeff, and I went back to Dallas. Dad stayed Sunday night to do some more cleaning and ranch stuff. Once back in Dallas, the four of us went to Matt's house, where we were treated to some fabulous grilled cheese sandwiches by the very talented grilled cheese chef, John Roberts. Then Matt took me home so I could unpack and whatnot. At 3:40 Matt was back to get me for the Phish concert, which will be discussed in the next paragraph.
So yes, last night was the last Phish concert ever. Matt and I went out to the UA Galaxy close to Garland to see it simulcast there, and it was great - the video and audio quality were amazing, and I almost felt like we were there because of the quality and the crowd around us in the theatre. There were people of all ranges of Phish dedication, and at all times some people in our audience were dancing and twirling. The concert was three sets, and set 1 started around 4:45. (Set list and notes from Phish.com)

Mike's Song ->
I am Hydrogen ->
Weekapaug Groove
Anything But Me
Reba
Carini ->
Chalkdust Torture ->
Possum
Wolfman's Brother* ->
jam (the sexy bump)** ->
Wolfman's Brother ->
Taste

*The wolfman's brother is Fishman.
**Trey and Mike bring out their mothers and do the 'sexy bump' dance with them. Then later, 'sandwich' their manager, John Paluska with it.

Possum was awesome, as was the Reba jam. Trey gave a whole little story during Wolfman's Brother about Fishman, which was very cool. It was like they were going to reveal secrets since it was their last concert. And the sexy bump was pretty hilarious, especially when they "double teamed" their manager - and that jam was all about Page, since Trey and Mike were too busy dancing, and Page was great. The first set was pretty long at almost two hours.

In between sets 1 and 2, Matt and I got popcorn and Cokes for a super-nutritious dinner. There was a little over an hour between the two sets. Set 2 started around 7:30, I think.

Down With Disease*** ->
Wading in the Velvet Sea****
Glide
[band speech]
Split Open and Melt ->
jam (blowing off steam) ->
Ghost

***Trey plays his guitar with a glow stick.
****Page gets emotional.

Down with Disease was great. The first song of the second set always starts with a glow-stick war, and as soon as they started flying at the real concert, a wonderful Phish fan in our audience also starting flinging glow-sticks. So, we got our own glow-stick war, and it was very cool. Then they started Wading in the Velvet Sea, and Page got more than a little emotional. He started crying and couldn't sing. The band played on and Page was able to rejoin the singing later. It was really touching. And then there was Glide. Trey was horrible! He was completely messing up the guitar part, and they ended the song without embellishment or jamming. Then Trey started talking about how they were all emotional and it seemed like they'd been talking during their break and had gotten themselves worked up. Trey then said they needed to blow off some steam, and they went into Split Open and Melt + jam that lasted a really long time and was pretty amazing. During Ghost, there were two fans in our audience dressed up as ghosts that started running around the theatre, and it was funny. Matt and I were sad, thinking we should've dressed up as a song - I would've been a Golgi Apparatus!

We had less than an hour for the second break, and during that time Matt and I walked around outside and over to a Dodge Dealership to look at cars to kill the time. There were lots of interesting activities going on in the theatre parking lot that night, some legal, some not...The third set started at 9:45.

Fast Enough for You
Seven Below ->
Simple ->
Piper ->
Bruno***** ->
Dickie Scotland****** ->
Wilson ->
Slave to the Traffic Light
[fireworks]

Encore
[Trey speech]
The Curtain With

*****The band spontaneously writes a song to acknowledge their monitor engineer Mark "Bruno" Bradley. Other crew acknowledgements.
******Same as above, but for Richard "Dickie Scotland" Glasgow.

The 3rd set was also great. I really enjoyed the new songs written for the two guys: the Bruno became a dance where you pretended to turn knobs on a sound board, and the Dickie Scotland song was excellent ("Dickie dickie dickie SCOTLAND ..." in C minor). Matt and I had both tried to figure out what the last song would be, but neither of us were right. But it seemed like Phish played one that was right for them. It was all over around 11:30. We left the theatre sad but satisfied. I couldn't have made it through the whole concert up in muddy Vermont, but this was a perfect way to experience the last concert of a truly awesome band.