I have a feeling that God didn't want Derrick and I to go see Tom Petty last night. Derrick ordered tickets as soon as they went on sale and he still only got relatively okay seats for us. I didn't mind that though. I was glad to be seeing Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. There are very few bands where I like almost everything they've done and that's one of them. They're just first class songwriters and musicians.

It began a couple of weeks ago when one of my husband's co-workers wanted him to go along to the DC area to help her teach a class this week. My husband pointed out that he had these tickets and really, really would rather see the concert. His boss said that she would pay to fly him back to Pittsburgh for the concert and then fly him back to DC the next day. It was worth it to her to have two people on this project. My husband agreed to go reluctantly.

He left for DC Monday afternoon. I neglected to ask him about where the tickets were before he left. Tuesday I tried in vain to reach him about where he put the tickets or if he had them because I was to pick him up at the airport when I left work so that I could get him on the way to the concert. When I finally heard from him he said, "they didn't come in the mail yet?" (This was the day of the concert). So I called Ticketmaster. The customer service representative took my info and said that the venue would have tickets waiting for us at the will-call desk. Fine.

We finally arrive at the venue. Traffic was a nightmare. We parked in the middle of a field. Since we were to have real seats I dressed rather nicely. I was wearing a skirt, nice blouse, clunky but nice shoes. I thought Derrick would appreciate the gesture. (Which I think he did). We walked to the will-call desk and they had no tickets for us. They gave us lawn seats because we had everything we were supposed to have for a will-call pickup but they wouldn't give us our real tickets. They gave us lawn seats.

WE PAID $130 FOR 2 LAWN SEATS! (well. Derrick paid. But you get the idea)

We didn't want to miss any more of the show so we just went in. Tom Petty and the band sounded good (though the sound system was a bit low for the size of the venue). In fact, they gave a great performance and show. I think Tom had a different hat for every song! I loved it. Even if we didn't have our real seats we had a relatively good time. I did get hit with someone's cold beverage while they were dancing and bumped into pretty hard a few times but it wasn't like when we went to see Ozzy with lawn tickets.

I called Ticketmaster today. I told the story to about 4 people. They're going to call me in the next few days to let me know if we can have a refund or something. The Ticketmaster agent I talked to first said there was a record of my call and an order sent to Star Lake for replacement tickets.

Oh well. At least I got to see Tom Petty. And I got to see my wonderful hubby when I probably wouldn't have gotten to see him at all this week otherwise.

And yes that was one of the most drugged-out crowds I've ever seen. Just like everyone at work told me it would be.

Tags: concert reviews
Current Mood: tired
Current Music: My Baby's In Love With Eddie Vedder -- Weird Al