Our adventures...: Becoming a Parrothead

Thursday, July 17th... a date Jason and I have been waiting for four months. Jason stood in line at a Ticketmaster at a small Krogers in Kettering and was the 4th person in line to buy tickets. I was at work, trying to buy tickets online. I never even got through to pick out tickets, so we made the right choice to send Jason to that Krogers. The 20,000 tickets sold out in 10 minutes, and we got two - front row of the 2nd section, right in the middle.

We got to Riverbend a little after 7pm; concert started at 8pm. We wandered around a bit and went to find our seats. Definitely what we were expecting, but right behind the sound booth. We had to stand the whole time if we wanted to see the stage, but Jason said that everyone stands the whole time anyway.

Walking around I see thousands of people with Hawaiian shirts, leis, grass skirts, coconut bikini tops (half were guys) and hats with everything from parrots to shark fins on top. I felt out of place in my light green t-shirt with khaki pants. Jason fit right in with his Jimmy Buffet t-shirt, jeans and sandals.

Jason has been playing Jimmy Buffet CD's so I'd be familiar with the music. (Jimmy Buffet has over 30 albums, and Jason has 9 of them.) Jason also explained how the crowd participates with the different songs so I'd understand when people started waving their arms around. I had my camera ready and I was set to go.

The concert started a little late with thousands of people still pouring into the concert area. No one opens for Jimmy Buffet, and there's no fanfare when he comes out. They all just walk out in their casual Hawaiian clothes and the music started. I recognized most of the songs and Jason and I sang with the thousands of others enjoying the music. It was amazing that as loud as the music was (though not too loud), I could still hear everyone singing along with him. I did video tape bits and pieces, even though you're not supposed to. I wanted to capture the moment somehow, so I'd point my camera at the stage and steal 30 seconds of music here and there. I'll try to upload them to youtube.com and post them below for your enjoyment.

Towards the end "Fins" came on and Jason gave me a heads up about the arms waving around for this one. During the part of the song that goes "fins to the left, fins to the right and you're the only girl in town" the entire crowd would put their shark fins (arms) in the air and LEEEAAAAANNNNN to the left, then LEEEAAAAANNNNNN to the right, and then move their fins around. I took pictures, but had to put the camera away so I could join in with the fun.

By the end of the concert, I understood why Jason was a Parrothead. I finally got it. I'm definitely a parrothead now and I can't wait until the next time we go see Jimmy Buffet. Until then, I might start looking around for a parrot tattoo to match Jason's. :)

Pictures below - click on pictures to get larger version...

The view from our seats...