do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself around...

I started this really inspired entry a couple of weeks ago about the month of November. It was really heart felt. And did I mention inspired? Sadly my inspiration comes in spurts and I wasn't able to finish before I'd gotten side tracked. And I can't remember what I was going to say anyway.

November is an ideal month. Because it has a bonafide holiday for which all of my family members have a paid day off. There is plenty of holiday cooking and cheer but no stress over buying gifts and things like that. Of course, up until this Thanksgiving, The Monkey and I had never been quite so broke. (Financially, I mean. As a married couple we are a well oiled machine most days.) It is rough having to be tight fisted. Not being able to go out and buy stuff on a whim. Or, more accurately, in a manic frenzy. I don't even have credit cards to fuel that anymore. Which is probably a good thing.

Speaking of mania that's exactly what I was when I went to see my new pdoc yesterday. Utterly and completely manic. The drive to D-Town was fascinating (and the drive home even moreso... did you know that long strings of headlights in the dark look a lot like Christmas lights??). I was already positively giddy when I bounded into Starbucks and ordered my Caramel Brulee Latte. I could hardly keep still while I sat in the pdoc's waiting room for almost two hours. This doctor has some kind of thing for peacocks. The waiting room was completely decked out in peacocks. I didn't find this at all odd until I went to the bathroom (too much caffeine!) and found that it too was decorated in peacocks! Complete with a really busy wallpaper. When the nurse finally took me back into a room it TOO was decorated in peacocks. I literally could NOT contain my laughter. When the nurse came in to "interview" me I giggled about the doctor's affinity for peacocks. She laughed too and then showed me their Christmas tree decorations. ALL PEACOCKS. Cue hysterics! I finally stopped laughing long enough to answer all of her questions. I'm not sure if she was entertained or annoyed by all of my side stories. It's, uh, a bit difficult to stay on track when you're manic. (Which is why I hardly ever write anything until after I've come down a bit. Things come out way too...jumbled. A hundred half-finished thoughts in ten seconds. It aren't pretty.) When she left I kicked myself. I was so busy trying to remember everything that I'd left out two BIG BIG parts of my mental health history: my previous self-injurious behavior and my binge/purge...uh...thing. I did tell the pdoc when he finally came in, though.

Once all was said and done, the doc gave me some Prozac (to help with the more frequent depressive episodes) and some Restoril for sleep. I've taken both; I had no real issues with either. (Well, except that one time when I OD'd on Restoril and the fact tha Prozac did cause SSRI-induced mania. But the OD was eight years ago when I was single and wanted very much to die; and the mania problem was all because my previous pdoc didn't have me on any kind of mood stabilizer BEFORE adding the Prozac.) I go back in a month to see how things are going.

I have the distinct feeling that this is not over.

In the meantime I am going to focus on the upcoming stuff-yourself-to-bursting day. And my niece's SECOND birthday. (And try not to focus on the fact that our child would have been almost two, too.) And find THE recipe for Red Velvet Cake for my birthday. And baking Key Lime Cake for my sister's birthday. And celebrating Christmas/the solstice just The Monkey and me this year. (I am seriously considering getting totally sloshed on hard eggnog.) And hunting down some Godiva Chocolate Liqueur for my Chocolatinis for New Year's Eve.

Is 2009 really that close to being over??

Insanity, I tell you. Absolute insanity.

EPIC FAIL, Congress

I'm not huge on political issues. I kind of like to be mostly oblivious because the news SERIOUSLY stresses me out. I watch the news and I can't sleep for two days because I'm plagues with worry. If a nuclear holocaust is in the works, I'd rather be oblivious, I think.

But the Health Care Reform is something I've kept tabs on. And I spent the entire day today watching C-Span and vehemently arguing with the Democrats and, for the first time in my life, cheering the GOP.

I can't get behind a government run health care system. If I'd wanted to live in a socialist nation I would've renounced my US citizenship, learned German, and applied for German citizenship. I grew up there, after all.

But seriously? A bill that backs abortion but is going to deem infertility treatment as "unnecessary" medical procedures (something that has already been said about PGD and other tests involved with IVF)? A bill that is costly and really accomplishes NOTHING that America really needs? A bill that is going to have taxpayers paying for health care for illegal immigrants?!?

I am so livid I can't even think straight.

And this is why I so rarely watch the news.

This is asinine. I still have hope that the Senate will shoot this down.

this is what happens

When depression hits as hard as it has in the past month, things stop getting done. Important things like laundry and scooping the litter boxes. There have been a couple days where I've realized late in the afternoon (sometimes the evening) that I've forgotten to feed the cats.

For the past two weeks The Monkey has had to scrounge for work clothes. I did wash and dry all of the clothes last weekend but I didn't really fold them. And I certainly didn't put anything away (who could be bothered??). So my poor Monkey has had to deal with ironing this week. (Normally he can toss his khakis and a polo into the dryer for a few minutes to "dewrinkle" them.) And searching through heaps of clothes for two matching socks and clean underwear.

Guilt, guilt, guilt.

And so today, the guilt has overtaken the depression momentarily. I've decided that today, I will finish the laundry if it kills me. I will scoop the litter boxes. I will vaccuum and take out the trash. I draw the line at making the bed, though. Pshaw. (And I did remember to feed and water the cats this morning; just so we're clear that I'm not starving my furbabies to death.)

In the mean time, I am babysitting my niece. It's kind of incredible that she is already turning TWO this month. She's a good girl (albeit very spoiled and sometimes rotten). I have to bribe her to get kisses and sometimes she is flat out mean to me for no reason at all. But I guess that's just a toddler for you. My oldest niece was the same way at this age. My nephews, on the other hand, were always loveable to me. So it must be a girl thing.

My whacked out hormones combined with my depression-fueled over eating has caused me to pack on a good 10 pounds. My new jeans are snug. My muffin top is harder to conceal. My face is a LOT fuller. I really and truly need to get back on track with losing weight. I still have two months to meet my resolution/weight loss goal for 2009. I'm toying with the idea of signing us up for Weight Watchers while we still have Cigna insurance. (Cigna offers a discount on Weight Watchers but on January 1st our insurance changes to Blue Cross Blue Shield.) The Monkey is on board for it as long as we don't, you know, fork out the money and then diet for a week or two and quit. Perhaps I'll do some research today in between loads of laundry.

I haven't cooked supper in weeks. So yesterday I went and picked up all of the ingredients to make Philly Cheese Steaks and Tater Tots. We'll see if my Yankee blood shines through.

it was only a matter of time

My entire life has been punctuated by mood swings. Sometimes the swings were gradual and I'd slip slowly into a deepening depression. Other times the mood swings were quite violent. Jerking me (and anyone around me) back and forth between my whirlwind of manic mayhem and tarpits of despair.

And then there are the in between times. When I'm not depressed nor am I manic but I'm certainly not euthymic (that is, normal). Mixed states full of pent up, uncontrollable anger and relentless irritability. Those are the worst times. Because no one, not even I, ever knows what to expect.

I find it a bit ironic that Autumn and Winter are my favorite seasons. I love the changing weather. I'd much rather be bundled up under sweaters and long sleeved thermal tees than wearing tank tops and flip flops. (Some of this preference may, in fact, be due to my being overweight and uncomfortable with my appearance, though.) I have an affinity for knee-high socks and boots. Jeans and hooded sweatshirts. And here in Alabama we don't get long enough for me to indulge myself in thick, bundling layers of clothes. Halloween is, and always has been, my favorite holiday. And despite all that I love about this time of year, I can never seem to stave off the inevitable spiral into depression. Which is why I say it's ironic. Because I certainly don't enjoy being depressed.

For weeks I've wanted to do nothing more than crawl under a rock (or, more fittingly, my blanket) and hide. I try to tell myself that there are things to do. I need to do the laundry. I need to pay the bills. I need to go grocery shopping. I need to cook dinner. So I try to get up when The Monkey leaves for work (only to lie back down because I'm just too tired to stay awake at 6:00 AM). Then I try to get up at 8:00 because 8:00 seems like a reasonable enough time to start my day. Eventually 8:00 slips into 10:00 and 10:00 into 11:00 and 11:00 into noon and before I know it it's already 3:00 and almost time for The Monkey to be home from work. And so what's the use in trying to start my day now when it's already over anyway.

But there is still so much to do.

The pdoc I've been seeing since this time last year is not covered under my insurance. The program I've been using is a program for the uninsured. They called me in to update all of my information and paperwork the other day which means they'll soon be asking for proof of income (or lack thereof) and I'll have to show that I am now insured and blah blah blah. It was good while it lasted. (I was getting my very expensive Lamictal for $5.00 a bottle.) In a way, I'm relieved. The pdoc I've been seeing has always been very unreceptive to my opinions on meds. She insisted that I take Zyprexa (nevermind that I had much better results with Abilify). It took me months of being on Lithium and insisting that it wasn't working for her to FINALLY try me out on Lamictal. And she refused to give me a sleep aid and insisted that I take the Zyprexa to help me sleep instead. (Nevermind that I'd rather NOT sleep than take Zyprexa.) So I made an appointment with a new pdoc. A friend of ours uses this doc (her husband and son both see him). I'm not sure what I'm expecting. I know there's no "magical cure" for bipolar disorder. I know that, despite being medicated, I'll always have mood swings. But right now this depression is really relentless and I don't know how much more I can stand. So maybe it's time to supplement the Lamictal with another med. (Surely I didn't expect Lamictal to be my end all, cure all drug anyhow.)

[sigh] What's another horsey on the med-go-round anyway?

flippity floppity

So, the month of October has nearly slipped away. I wish the weather would cool off and stay that way for crying out loud. We had a nice little cold spell this weekend (even a frost advisory!) but it's right back into the mid to upper 70s now. And that would be all well and good if it would drop down into the 50s or something at night but it's not getting much lower than 65°. [sigh] Why I ever moved to the south, I'll never know. (Oh, yeah. This was supposed to be a temporary situation. Funny how falling in love and getting married can change EVERYTHING.)

After the Metallica concert I went into one of my post-excitement slumps. Things like that happen to me all the time. It'll most likely happen again after Halloween but maybe I'll get lucky. Who knows. I am looking forward to our Halloween party. Even though this year I won't be able to have Jell-O shots or alcohol of any kind because I'm on a double course of antibiotics. As it turns out I wound up having a recurrance of pelvic pain with my most recent AF. Cultures showed Group B Strep but I can't see how that could cause such bad pain. I'm wondering if something else is going on. Needless to say, if it occurs again with my next AF I'll be stopping my birth control pills and asking for a different one. The pain started when I started the pill. Which is really strange to say the least but whatever. It's not the first time my body has acted out of the norm.

I was so preoccupied with the Metallica concert and we spent a small chunk of money on it that we're not doing elaborate costumes this year. The Monkey is going to dress up as a rock star and I'm going to be his groupie. Heh. I'm considering making us look zombie-fied in some way to make it more Halloween-ish. We shall see.

There is really nothing exciting in my life to speak of. My niece is turning two next month. TWO! My nephews will be 15 and 7. Soon after I'll be turning 29. Almost 30 and still no babies. [sigh] It's a good thing I know plenty of ladies that are in their 40s and having babies. We have to elect new benefits this month. VZW is changing things and will no longer be offering Cigna. I think this could be a good thing. The fertility coverage is different. The new coverage offers treatment of the underlying condition causing the infertility (meaning the PCOS, thyroid disorder, endo, and everything else) but it also covers fertility services (specifically IUI) at 50%. Which is way better than 0% obviously! It's a nice addition and will hopefully come in very handy. Someday. But someday is still pretty far away so I'm going to force myself not to think about it. At all. Ever. [sigh]

Friday I took The Monkey to have his eyes checked after he got a migraine that lasted for about four days. (Well, the migraine pain lasted about a day and a half; the residual pain continued for another two and a half days after.) The Monkey never gets headaches. Well, almost never. But, when he does, they are exclusively migraine in nature. And they are always preceded by an aura (blurry vision) and we can usually use that to get pain meds in him before the pain becomes too much to deal with. We did okay this time, but he had some trouble with bright lights and wound up wearing a hat and dark sunglasses at work. (He's doing everything in his power to keep an impeccable attendance record. It comes down to job security and raises and blah blah blah...) Being the concerned (and intuitive) wife that I am, I scheduled him an appointment with a local optometrist. It was quite the ordeal and the one that got us in was the last one on our list of in network providers. One of the nice things about our medical coverage with VZW is that we have vision coverage. And, as it turns out, said coverage is actually pretty spectacular. After The Monkey's exam (which took over an hour) the optometrist said that he is far sighted. Not horribly so but since he's getting older his eye muscles are wanting to over-compensate for his vision impairment less and less. And the subsequent muscle strain of staring at a computer screen for eight to ten hours a day at work and then coming home and playing World of Warcraft for another three or four is taking its toll. Simply put: his muscles don't care to keep up with his demands anymore. So, glasses it is. They dilated his pupils (of course) so afterwards not only did he look like he'd dropped acid (or taken a couple of hits of Ecstasy) he also had horribly blurred vision for the next few hours. He bickered and complained when we tried to get him to pick out frames. We ("we" being the nurse and me) picked out a few pair and had him model. The first pair turned out to be our favorite. And, luckily, also the cheapest. The frames were $139.99. Then we went over lense options. VSP would've paid 100% of the lens cost if we'd gone with plastic. But plastic is notoriously heavy and scratches easily. So we paid the extra $25 for the polycarbonate. Our plan paid $115 for the frames and then an additional 20% off the remaining cost. So we paid something ridiculously silly for an otherwise pricey pair of frames; $18 if I remember right. Then the $25 for the lenses; $25 for our optometrist office visit copay; $20 for our medical copay (since she looked at the vessels in his eyes to be sure that the problem wasn't something brain related). Total cost: $89. Uh... I paid $200ish for my glasses two years ago! And that's not including the multiple visits to my opthamalogist. (I have other eye 'issues' that require me to see an opthamalogist instead of an optometrist.) So I'm glad that is resolved. We're hoping the glasses get here quickly but the lady did say 10 - 14 business days. UGH. (I also paid a little extra for convenience. I ordered and paid for and walked out with my new glasses within a couple of hours.)

My life is just full of excitment. It's high time that I schedule an appointment with a new psychiatrist. And a new therapist. I should also schedule an appointment with a specialist about my elbow. I'm still dealing with quite a bit of pain in my right elbow. It's been a good five months since this started. It was getting better until about two weeks ago when it started to get bad again. I refuse to just "deal" with the pain anymore.

TOTALLY worth it!

This entry is mostly for my benefit. I want to be able to look back at this and remember it with vivid detail.

On Sunday morning, The Monkey and I got up early. We loaded up our suitcase (which was totally too big for what was in it, but whatever) into the Alero and headed to Atlanta.

I had printed the route Google Maps suggested the night before. When The Monkey looked at the directions he asked me if I realized I was trading the mostly straight, two lane highways for winding, curvy back roads. (Well, duh, of course I didn't!) And yet, he insisted that we take my route anyway. I guess for kicks. As it turns out, we got to see some of Alabama's prettier side. It was a bit blustery on Sunday -- chilly with a tad bit of wind -- and we kept driving around curves and over hills through windswept leaves. It was a good thing we had a full tank of gas because we saw three gas stations before we finally hit I-85. And those three were, uh, many miles apart. Either way, we enjoyed this part of the drive quite a lot. Autumn weather always puts me in a good mood.

I was smart and decided not to put on [much] makeup for the drive up. The plan was to get to the hotel early enough to get showered and put on makeup before the concert. This turned out to be a very good decision because about a third of the way through the drive my eyes were starting to water profusely thanks to my fall allergies which STILL haven't let up. We hadn't seen much civilization for miles so the thought of finding a Walgreens or other pharmacy was laughable. Eventually, though, we drove into Tuskegee and sure enough, they had a CVS. We decided to stop. I bought a box of Zyrtec-D (Claritin hadn't done squat for me) and a couple of 5-Hour Energy shots. The Monkey and I both popped a Zyrtec and downed half of one of the energy shots. Half an hour later I could've easily taken a nap. So we opened the second bottle and polished it off. In a few more minutes I was back on full force mode.

Google Maps' directions were spot on for the majority of the drive. We kept a watch on my odometer and the mileage on the 'step-by-step' instructions and they were perfectly timed. The Monkey and I couldn't get over the fact that we'd taken at least nine turns -- all of them right hand turns -- but we still managed to be going north somehow. However, just when we'd thought Google Maps was KING of Internet directionage, we missed our exit off of I-85. The Monkey, being the logical little Libra that he is, told me to get off at the first Hartsfield exit. I didn't argue even though I did NOT want to be at the airport! As soon as we found a spot, we pulled over and he took over driving. (I get far too stressed out when I'm "lost" and/or in heavy traffic. And, let's face it, it's Atlanta. Even on a Sunday morning traffic was pretty heavy.) He asked for directions to I-85 North and we were on our way once again.

Only to get lost again looking for our hotel. (Another Google Maps blunder. We couldn't find "Old National Parkway" try as we may. Even the locals looked at us like we were nuts when we asked. We finally called the hotel and they gave us landmarks to follow. We were there within two minutes of hanging up. Say what you will... there's no substitution for good ol' firsthand experience. :P

Hotel check-in was a breeze. The hotel upgraded us from a single room to a two room suite. Which was wicked convenient seeing as how The Monkey and I can't sleep in the same room and actually get any sleep. (The snoring really is that bad.) So he took the fold out couch and I took the bed (which was about as comfortable as a fold out couch bed). We arrived at 2:30 PM (local time) and I had just enough time to shower and primp. Yes, I "primped" for a rock concert. And I looked pretty damn good, I think.

We decided that it would be better to venture into downtown Atlanta, find the arena, pay the $20 to park, and then walk to find a place to eat. I was craving something nice. A sit down place; not fast food. Specifically a nice steak and a baked potato. Maybe a small salad before dinner. But, not-so-much. It took us nearly an hour to find the place for a couple of reasons. First, another Google Maps blunder. They said a 'slight left' onto Olympic Centennial Parkway after getting onto Spring Street NW. They specified this instruction where there happened to be a Y intersection and we assumed the slight left was taking the left part of the Y. Silly us. As it turned out, we'd gotten off of Spring Street and headed back onto I-85. The Monkey took the next exit off the highway and we wound up somewhere very different. Oh well, at least we got to see LOTS of downtown Atlanta. :P Whoever designed downtown Atlanta obviously works for the city transit system. I cannot imagine trying to DRIVE there every day. It's a mess! A ridiculous network of one way streets. There is no 'go one block and turn around' there! But, whatever. We eventually found the parking garage and started following throngs of fellow headbangers towards the arena. The excitement and anticipation was insane. I was SOOO looking forward to this!

I'll admit to being a little irritated when I saw the size of the crowd waiting to get in. (And VERY disheartened to discover that t-shirts were, at their cheapest, $35 a piece.) I groaned at The Monkey about how people who had seated tickets should have a different entrance than the ones who wanted general admin tickets for the floor. And then what do I hear? A security guard direction the general admissions people to an entrance on the opposite side of the arena. Score one for me! Then we asked about restaurants. Our best choice was the food court in CNN Center. They didn't have steak but they did have sushi. Which, actually, was my second choice in pre-concert dining.

By then, it was 5:00 PM. Showtime was at 7:00. They were supposed to start letting people in at 5:30. The Monkey and I ate. And then sat. And waited. And waited. And waited. By 6:00 I was yawning. (My 5-Hour Energy Shot had totally worn off.) The boredom and fatigue totally eclipsed my excitement (albeit only temporarily). We left the food court around 6:15 to enter the crowded arena. Well, it looked crowded at the time but it was NOTHING compared to how crowded it was when we were leaving. Sheesh!

We got through the gates with no trouble and found our seats pretty quickly. (Lucky us, there was a bathroom right outside of our section.) We were in section 122 -- on the 'bend' of the arena -- in row B. The second row. The picture I found of our seats did not do the view we had justice at ALL. All The Monkey could say was "Damn baby. These are awesome seats!" Hell YEAH. We sat down and got comfortable. Still 45 minutes to showtime. Well, until the opening acts, anyway. We knew Metallica wouldn't be taking the stage until around 9:00 PM. I took a picture of our view with my phone and sent it out. That's when The Monkey pointed out yellow tape on the floor. We were sitting right next to where the bands entered the arena. Another stroke of pure luck! The people around us were all fantastic. Enthused but not overly (or annoyingly) so. We had a few seat jumpers but only two were trouble makers. Third stroke of luck -- a group of four cops were seated directly in front of us. They made it VERY easy to shoo away the two "home boys" that were drunk off their asses and smoking in the non-smoking arena. One of the two idiots nearly fell on top of me when he went to sit down in [somebody else's] seat next to me. If he hadn't been such a tubby little twit he might've went over the rail when The Monkey pushed him. Eventually The Monkey had words with the guy because he tried to light a second cigarette in a no smoking arena. That's when the cops said something and I took off to get security to drag them away. I'm sorry, if you bought shitty tickets to a concert, don't try to jump seats and cause problems for people who paid for GOOD seats. We didn't let them ruin our night, though.

The opening acts -- Gojira and Lamb of God -- were decent. Gojira's drummer was hitting double bass almost constantly which would've been really cool if their sound hadn't been so jacked up. The drums were about all I could hear, unfortunately. I couldn't discern the rhythm, lead, or bass guitars. And I definitely couldn't hear the vocalist. (The volume eventually got to me and I put in earplugs. I was surprised that it actually helped things sound better!) Lamb of God was okay. I like heavy metal. And screaming is okay when it's done in moderation. But it seemed like all the lead singer did was scream. And that's just not my taste in music. After a couple of songs, though, the lead singer gave props to the military. That was the first time I yelled REALLY loud. Heh.

The opening acts lasted about an hour and 15 minutes together. Stage breakdown and setup was an additional 30 minutes or so. The crowd was pretty stir crazy while they were setting up the stage for Metallica. The anticipation was palpable! Finally, after what felt like forever, the lights dimmed and The Ecstasy of Gold started playing (Metallica opens all of their shows with this song). An eruption of screams and yells from the crowd (myself included). I got chills! I am still getting chills thinking about it. A. Maz. Ing. I tried to get pictures of them walking out from my seat (they shooed us away from the railing, damnit) but managed only to get a picture of Rob Trujillo. And only the back of him. Curses. I was hoping for a close up shot of Lars or James.

They opened with That Was Just Your Life and followed immediately with The End of the Line -- both songs from Death Magnetic, the newest album. I'd done a little more research than necessary and was sure on a few of the songs they would play but they threw us a couple that I totally wasn't expecting! Ride the Lightning (from the album of the same name) came next. Then No Remorse from Kill 'Em All (their first album); this was the only song I wasn't very familiar with. They took a quick reprieve to, I'm assuming, set up the pyrotechnics for One from The Monkey's and my favorite album ...And Justice for All. Even if you're not a metal fan you should know this song. It was the first song they made a video for and released on MTV. (Which is one of my very distinct childhood memories. I remember the video very vividly. And, seeing as how I was only like nine, it was very disturbing to watch.) But, wow, it was absolutely INCREDIBLE live. I took a short video of the intro and one of the solos but the sound quality is sucky. The music and crowd were just too over powering. The intro to the song is an overture of gun fire and helicopters. Think Vietnam. And as we were hearing the shots and explosions they timed some kick as pyrotechnic blasts all around the stage. SO AWESOME. I showed my enthusiasm. Uh...a lot. They followed One with two more Death Magnetic songs -- Broken, Beat & Scarred and Cyanide -- and followed that with Sad But True from their self titled album (more commonly known as The Black Album).

Our second "surprise" of the night was Welcome Home (Sanitarium) from Master of Puppets! More chills... it's one of my favorites. Next up they played my two favorite Death Magnetic songs -- All Nightmare Long and The Day That Never Comes. I'm partial to All Nightmare Long because it had to 'grow on me'. Plus it took me several tried before I finally beat it on Hard on Guitar Hero. :P The Day That Never Comes is easily one of my favorite Metallica songs ever. It's not so hardcore; more of a ballad if you will. The followed that up with a crowd favorite (and one we were all expecting) Master of Puppets from the album of the same name. The next song was our next "surprise" -- Blackened from ...And Justice for All. Blackened is a really powerful song. The lyrics are about the destruction of the world by the human race by nuclear war. (Color our world blackened...) After Blackened they followed up with a brief bass solo from Rob. Then everything went dark and quiet. (Well, as quiet as an arena full of headbangers can get...) Then a single light came on and showed James Hetfield on a stool with his guitar and he started playing Nothing Else Matters (from The Black Album) acoustically. Eventually the rest of the band joined in. They followed that up with another Black Album favorite; Enter Sandman. I hadn't been keeping track of the number of songs they'd played up until this point but I knew it had to be getting close to the end. And, sure enough, they took another reprieve. They played the beginning of The Frayed Ends of Sanity from ...And Justice for All (which is the March of the Winkies from The Wizard of Oz) and got the crowd pumped up again. James got on the mic and asked if everyone was still around... commence lots of screaming and HELL YEAHs. ;) Then he busted out with Last Caress (a cover of the Misfits' song). Which was pretty awesome but it's only like a minute long so I felt like we might've gotten a little gypped. Then they played Hit the Lights; some more "old shit" from Kill 'Em All.

And then it was time for the closing song -- Seek & Destroy (also from Kill 'Em All). Seek & Destroy has been their closing song for live shows since their Madly in Anger with the World tour so we were expecting it. The really cool part was that they turned on all of the house lights and dropped hundreds of black beach balls (all imprinted with the Metallica logo) from the ceiling. We were too high up/far back to get a beach ball but it was awesome to watch! (And we were kind of grateful seeing as how people were fighting over them. Uh... no thanks!) After the song ended James gave the crowd props first and then Lars grabbed the mic. He said, and I quote, "We have been criss crossing this great country for the past year and I have to say this is by far the best fucking Sunday night crowd we've had yet!" It was SOOO awesome! And pretty hilarious that he used 'fuck' about five times in 30 seconds. \m/

It was just a kick ass time. If we get the opportunity, we WILL see them in concert again. They put on a hell of a show and kept the energy high all night. I enjoyed the HELL out of myself, that's for sure. (Before they played Seek & Destroy James said something to the effect of "We're going to leave here with a sore throat, maybe a sore neck, but we're all gonna leave here with big smiles on our faces!" And he was absolutely 100% right. My voice was hoarse for the next 24 hours or so afterwards and I noticed on Monday afternoon that my neck hurt. But not the usual pain I'm accustomed to; it was muscle soreness from rocking out for three hours! Sweeeeet...

The crowd leaving the arena was NUTS. I grabbed onto The Monkey's hand with a fierceness you wouldn't believe. He led us through the cattle crowd and we eventually made it outside. Into the 50° chill and RAIN. Gaah! Thankfully we'd both worn hoodies. (Which was awesome at first, because Philips Arena is a hockey arena and there is ice under the stage after all. But with an arena full of body heat and regular pyrotechnic blasts it wound up getting pretty hot.) We found our way back to the parking garage and hopped into the car and waited a good half hour for traffic to thin out enough for us to back out. Silly me hadn't printed reverse directions to get back to the hotel so we got a little lost. When we finally found our way back to the hotel (around 1:30 AM) we both crashed pretty much immediately.

I didn't sleep much. Normally I set the TV on a timer so it doesn't keep me awake but I needed the background noise to drown out The Monkey's snores from the other room. When I finally did turn the TV off (around 4:00 AM) I could hear planes (we were right next to the airport after all). The alarm jolted me awake at 8:00 AM. I took a quick shower and then The Monkey and I headed down for the free breakfast. Nothing to brag about. They had fresh make 'em yourself waffles that were really good. And it filled the void without costing us extra money. We were going to wait until check out at 11:00 but The Monkey said he was awake and ready to go. So we packed up and left early. We stopped at Walmart to buy an FM transmitter for my iPod (we had to rock out to Metallica all the way home, of course!) and then we were on our way.

I was completely ZONKED. Not even a 5-Hour Energy could bring me out of my stupor. The Monkey wanted to stop in Shorter, AL (Victoryland 777 Casino) as a side adventure. When we got there I was absolutely DELIRIOUS. I couldn't stop grinning. And I couldn't even muster the energy to talk. We found a Starbucks inside after a few minutes and I ordered a Mocha Latte with a double shot of espresso. We walked around the casino (which is full of nothing but slots) for about a half hour before we broke a $20 and started feeding some machines. We actually spent $30 but we probably lost about twice that. GRR! But we still had a good time. We got to see the greyhounds up close (they were getting weighed) and we registered for the players' club. I would've liked to play some cards but it didn't look like they offered it. At least cards aren't 100% chance!

The rest of the drive was uneventful. I was so sleepy and even though I tried ridiculously hard to stay awake I passed out after we got outside of Montgomery. I woke up just as we were pulling into town.

The entire experience was so much fun. I'm so glad we splurged on the tickets! I downloaded the concert audio from MetallicaLive.com for $9.95 when we got home. So now we can relive it over and over and over and over... whenever we want! I took something like 260 pictures! The videos I took didn't turn out very good but I'll probably upload them to YouTube at some point anyway. The photos are posted on my Facebook. Some of them are blurry and indiscernible. But there are quite a few that are just AWESOME.

and they're off......

We're leaving for Atlanta in about 20 minutes' time. I am thoroughly excited. Well, excited about tonight... not so much excited about driving four hours. But I'm sure it'll be worth it.

Looking forward to posting some pictures on Monday or Tuesday.

Did I mention that I am excited??