Metal Monday: Plant and Page /  by jen geigley

Robert Plant and Jimmy Page. So I'm realizing now that Metal Monday might not always be 100% metal, but whatever. Thanks to my cool dad, I grew up on Led Zeppelin. They absolutely deserve a spot in my list. Plant and Page was one of the first shows that I was allowed to go to, and I love this shirt because it has their childhood photos on it. I drove to Minneapolis to see Plant and Page on their reunion tour with my high school friends Mark, Wolf, Nick, Blair, Don and Lippy in 1994 or 1995 (and I'm not sure if I'm remembering everyone who went with us, but I think that was it.) At least two of these boys had to meet with my dad to promise him that I'd be looked after and returned home safely. We may have been young, but we knew that we were witnessing legends play right before our very eyes. We knew every word and it was a very special and memorable show for all of us. This show started it all for me and I fell in love with seeing bands play live and feeling that music come straight from the source. It was magic.


(On a very sad note, I just heard that Slipknot bassist Paul Grey was found dead today. Talented, young, and about to be a dad this year. Gone too soon. RIP Paul.)

goodbye to you /  by jen geigley

Here's to the countless nights spent holding my breath, making guesses and theories, loving the good guys and loving the bad guys. Accepting the total confusion, smoke monsters, polar bears, time travel, parallel universes, and throwing up my arms over and over again and saying 'what the ...!??' So sad to say goodbye to one of my favorite shows of all time.

birthday memories /  by jen geigley

Another year older and wiser. ;)I spent the whole day with this little sweetie, who had just as much fun as I did.There was cake decorating.And surprise guests to spend the day with.Piggy-back rides in the sunshine.Fish to feed.And a mallard in our yard!Actually, two of them!It's so strange. I have a weird thing with ducks hanging out in my yard on my birthday. This has happened before in three different cities that I've lived in. (One time, a female mallard had a whole string of babies with her.)Wishes were made and kisses were blown.
There was lots of swinging in the hammock swing. (But that's a daily occurrence.)
Dinner out with the fam.
Awesome Mongolian stir-fry.And we ended the night with some deliciousness from this place.
What more could a girl ask for? It was a RAD day.

Metal Monday: concert edition /  by jen geigley

This Metal Monday is brought to you by Lazerfest, where I spent over twelve hours yesterday watching twelve bands play on two stages with my friend, Audra. The lineup included Dead Horse Trauma, Mindrite, New Medicine, Violent Soho, Red, Halestorm, Drowning Pool, Skillet, Papa Roach, Seether, Hellyeah, Three Days Grace and Godsmack. But also my very favorites: Five Finger Death Punch, Alice Cooper and Rob Zombie. And since Metal Monday is usually a tribute to my t-shirts, I guess I will mention that I wore my Brutally Frank/Midwest Psycho shirt. But more importantly...
I got to see Alice Cooper.
The one and only. And he was totally perfect, with stage theatrics, costume changes, props and all of his biggest hits. Out of all the shows I've seen, I feel so lucky that I got to see Alice. Legendary. So good.
And there were the girls.
Lzzy Hale and the girls from Skillet rocked our faces off. You can't not love metal girls.
And I can't really talk about the whole experience without mentioning that there were 25,000 people there. Twenty-five thousand. A sea of people, no matter where you tried to walk. It was the biggest Lazerfest ever and people were in line for hours after we had been let in. They actually put out a Lazerfest warning on Facebook to tell people that there were no more tickets, and no more parking. Vendors were running out of food. And the porta-johns? I won't even go there.
When we got there, we were queued through these massive lines which were more like packs, and then people would break out of their 'line' and just start running towards the next funnel through security or whatever was next. I don't have a pic that adequately shows what I'm talking about here. It took a couple of hours to get in and a couple of hours to get home that night.
It was cloudy kind of cold all day, but thankfully we dodged the rain until the very last couple of hours, and even then it only sprinkled. Whew.
But anyway, back to the show. Rob Zombie!
I have seen Rob Zombie back when it was White Zombie. I have seen him six times. Maybe more. But he is always my favorite. (I have a lot of pics because their stage show is KILLER.)
I jumped and pushed my way right up front, and even though it might seem like the crowd was stationary in these pics, I can assure you it was rough. That pit was moving. So I ended up moving back a bit halfway through. On board with Rob for this tour is the legendary John 5 (from Marilyn Manson) and Des Moines' Joey Jordison of Slipknot, who I was super stoked to see.
I saw his hand go up when they first came out and was like, 'DUDE, there's Joey.' Sorry ... I'm friends with his sister. So it's extra exciting. And how much fun must it be to play with Rob Zombie?!?
So yes, it was a great time. An incredibly long day but super rad, for sure. And a crazy good end to my metal weekend. (Hope yours was just as fantastic!)

are ... you ... ready!?!?! /  by jen geigley

Last night, Bo and I went to see Korn.
If you've read here for awhile, you know that these are our date nights. ;)
This show kicks off a super metal-tastic weekend for me, since tomorrow I'm going to Lazerfest to see Rob Zombie and Alice Cooper and a bunch of other bands. Woohoo, I feel like I'm in high school!
Korn put on a great show, and everyone sounded as gnarly as ever. They're so animated and crazy and exciting to see live.
The last time I saw them was twelve – twelve – years ago during the Family Values Tour in '98, which was such a memorable show. (With Rammstein, Limp Bizkit, Ice Cube and the rest!!!)
Favorite part of the night: the bagpipes for the encore. It just makes your heart beat fast. Back in my glory days, I would have absolutely busted into that pit. Now I'm just grossed out by the sweaty shirtless dudes and I can't bring myself to do it. Plus it was 90 degrees inside Val Air.But in retrospect, I might as well have gotten all crazy at the show because today I flipped my bike on an innocent ride to get some coffee and scraped up my chin. Nice, huh? It was quite the spectacle, since chins tend to bleed a lot and there was blood all over my bike, coat, shoes and the pavement. A nice lady gave me a gardening glove to stop the bleeding for the walk home and the governor's security guys (he lives on our street) started running over to help. Just a little bit embarrassing. But whatever. Happy metal weekend!

goodbye, SIStv /  by jen geigley

So sad, but tomorrow we say goodbye to SIStv. I'll miss it ... lots. I'll miss the F-girls, the 20-page threads that had me in tears laughing, and most of all, the inspiration from everyone there. The end is here and it's bittersweet.
(And this is what I'll miss the most.)

Market Day! /  by jen geigley

Hello hello! So happy that it's time for the downtown Famers Market again, which also means the return of Market Day. Mark your calendar now – May 29 is the first date this season. (New location this year, even closer to the Farmers Market. Go here or here for more info.) Bring the whole fam downtown and come out to say hi!

Sidenote ... super stoked to see that my Week in the Life book made an appearance on Ali Edwards' blog today. Yay! Thanks for all the kind words – it was such a fun project.