The Stephanie's Take Nashville/Memphis: Hanson Style

So as you may know (and I'm pretty sure anyone that's ever met us knows) Stephanie and I love Hanson. Like love love Hanson. Like maybe kinda a little bit obsessed with Hanson. But it's a love/hate relationship. Trust me, we realize they aren't perfect. If you ever came to one of their shows with us and listened to what we say to each other you might think we didn't like them at all. But I feel after 13 years, we are allowed a little leeway. So yes, back to our Hanson love.... Well, it's become somewhat of a yearly tradition for The Steph's to go see Hanson 2-4 times every fall. Depends on where they are going and how much money we can beg borrow and steal.Well, THIS year Hanson has decided that instead of touring in the fall, which is PEFECT weather for us to get our Stalk/Walk (charity one mile barefoot walk before each show) on with the band, they are going to tour in August. The hottest month of the year in what I'm calling one of the hottest years this decade. Sooooooo..... thanks boys. I know the majority of your fans (myself included) could stand to drop a few (hundred) pounds but sweating in the blistering heat of the earth's core for an entire mile in the 2 o'clock hour, the notoriously hottest part of the day, is really NOT the way to go about it. Unless you are starting to hate some of your fans and want to kill a few off... then by all means. Great planning.

But still, OF COURSE, we will be attending two shows. We'll brave the heat. We want to see our boys. But we will NOT be attending the Walk. I happen to enjoy life. I happen to NOT enjoy walking through hot molten lava the used to be pavement before it melted in the 110 degree TN weather.

So Steph and Steph pack their bags and head for the first stop. Nashville. The trip up actually went without incident. It was just a long drive consisting of the usual trip snacks (double dippers and most all kinds of gummy candy) and an EXCELLENT 'old school from the early years of our friendhip' car CD. It had all of the classics! Savage Garden... Vertical Horizon... Goo Goo Dolls.... Barenaked Ladies... Seal Kiss from a Rose... wait what? Yes. You read correctly. Kiss from a Rose made the cut. And I'd do it again! So we arrive safely out our 'hotel'. And I use that word loosely. Because it looked more like something from a scene from Hostel. It was, in a word, grotesque. Truly truly disgusting. We used HOTWIRE so we didn't get to really pick what we wanted before we went... so we ended up in a "Smoking King". And it SMELLED like the King of Smoking had been staying there. It was like a Chimney Factory. Three seconds after walking in the door I needed some Positive Pressure Ventilation. And the bed may have been a 'king' but the pillows were apparently for the Munchkin King. They were half size pillows put in a full size case. I don't get it. It really looked like they cut two pillows to make four pillows. Also, the bathroom had hair stuck to the back of the door... and I found some weird hair in the bedsheets. Yuck. Thank GOD we weren't planning on a ton of time in the room.So we head to the Wildhorse Saloon. Our FAVE place to see Hanson play because we have guaranteed seats in the balcony AND we've always been able to get awesome pictures! Weeelllll, not this time. For some reason they have posted that NO picture will be allowed. Now why do they do this? What's wrong with taking some pictures at a concert for posterity? I don't get it, but I digress. It's cool. At least we still have awesome seats from which to see the boys!

So the opening act for the Hanson "Shout It Out" Tour is a band I have actually liked for quite some time, but I've never seen them live. Rooney. Oh my! I want to see them a million more times! I truly loved them! They put on a great show! And plus, Steph and I were able to pick out our new D-List boyfriends. I went with the cutie-pie lead singer whom you may know if you've ever seen The Princess Diaries. And Steph went with a less obvious choice (unless you really know her then the choice is SUPER obvious) the keyboard player. I think we totally have a shot :-) They DID stand around by the merch stand before Hanson came out but I felt like I looked too bad so I didn't want to go down there to meet him and get a picture with my pic looking all greasy and gross like I felt so we decided to try it in Memphis... I'll get to that. But yes, Rooney was fantastic. And here are a couple of pics so you can meet our D-list lovers. Steph is getting Grizzly Adams up there Louie and my tea cup human boyfriend there is Robert. He truly is a tiny person. Going to put him in my pocket and carry him around for a while.

Okay, so to continue. Hanson comes out (and on time no less! They were much more prompt to these shows. They must have read my blogs and taken the not so subtle hint!) And OF COURSE, they were amazing. That may have been our 19th time to see them but it still made me BEYOND happy and excited. I truly love those boys! Great musicians. Even if I DO hate some of their songs... and sometimes feel as if one of them sings like a muppet/farm animal. Still. Major love!

I would like to note TWO things about the show. One: At one point Taylor pulls a girl out of the audience, kisses her on her freaking lucky cheek, and then dances with her. And I'm not talking junior high slow dancing. What a flippin' lucky girl!!! It was awkward and stupid but still.... very lucky. But really, Taylor. Why are you so awkward sometimes? Okay, and TWO: WHY? Oh WHY???? Why do Hanson's wives insist on sitting with us at every freaking show we go to??? DO you want to be friends with us? I'm starting to think you DO! They were LITERALLY standing like a foot away from us. UGH. It's REALLY hard to pretend someone doesn't exist when they are in your face.... and Zac's wife is preggers again. Nice...... OH! And I know I said two things... but THREE: why does Hanson dress so bad? Taylor was dressed like a gay railroad conductor and Ike was wearing a vest and looked like, as Steph put it, a cater waiter. And Zac... well he did the best, but he was still wearing a Mr Rogers cardigan and what looked like slippers. Boys. Come on.

So after the show we head back to the Bates Motel for a disgusting nights sleep. Of course when we get there we are greeted by our complimentary body guard/escort. Mr Gigantic Cockroach. He did a great job of leading us to our room. We just sat on his GIGANTIC back and he flew us right to the door. Even had some peanut packets for the ride. He also tried to sell us some what I'm sure was stolen jewelry and was a little pushy when we tried to say goodbye. But all in all it was great to meet him.

Okay so we manage to sleep without getting Hep C, Raped, or Murdered and we go down the next morning for our continental breakfast. Believe it or not, it was truly deliscious. I didn't have to fight a scavenging sewer rat for my Waffle Either. I did expect the Waffle was going to be an Awful but it was great. After breakfast we gather our things and run like hell out of there and head toward Memphis.

The drive to Memphis is boring and nothing really happens. We get there and realize... our hotel is amazing! SOOOOOOOO much nicer than the one from the movie VACANCY, which is where we'd just stayed. Thanks so much La Quinta.

We leave the hotel early so we can go eat somewhere truly amazing. The Neely's. OMG! It was delicious. I would eat there every day. I very much recommend it. I now see why they have their own foot network show. SO yummy!

So we head to the venue full and happy. And might I just quickly say how it was LITERALLY 110 degrees outside. Hanson even had to cancel the walk because even THEY deemed it too hot and they'll walk the road to Mordor with Orks chasing behind them. So when we get to the venue we are so happy to be able to go in and get out of the heat... for about ten minutes. Then we realize we've walked into the lair of Mr. Freeze. It was SOOOOO cold in there it looked like the building was haunted because you could see your own breath! I'm probably going to end up with pneumonia. It was hard to decide which was worse. The pits of Hell or absolute zero.
So after finding some chairs to sit in the with elderly because we do NOT enjoy standing up during entire concerts, we watch Rooney put on another amazing show. Then they come out and we get ready to get our picture.... and for some reason they head behind the merch stand and stay there.... with a thousand people around them... boo! How are our D-list lovers going to know they are meant for us if we can't see them!? Double boo. Should have gotten the picture in Nashville. Greasy pic is better than NO pic. It is in Memphis that I realize just how tea cup my boyfriend is. He's a very tiny person. Pretty sure he was protecting a pot of gold behind that merch table. Don't care. He's adorable.

I'll take this quick moment to interject and show you guys the shirts Steph and I bought at the show. And YES we've already worn them in public.
And it reads correctly. I DO love Hanson.

The show is, of course, fantastic. I don't love the venue... or all of their song choices. But I love the show. And it was our 20th show! A completely amazing and not nerdy at all milestone! 20 times to see Hanson! And here's to 20 more!

At some point during the show while Steph is at the restroom some dude who's spent the entire show dancing around the whole venue walks up to me and thanks me for coming to the show... umm... you're welcome dude. And I thank you for being a giant weirdo.

So after the show we are walking to the car and we see a guy being cuffed and shoved into a police car right outside the venue. Someone is getting arrested at a Hanson concert? What? Well, during the show I see an entire drink ice and all fly up on stage and hit Ike and he looked sooo pissed! Well he's standing there holding an ELECTRIC guitar. Prob got a nice shock. So turns out the dude who did it is the one getting arrested. He was covered in tats and piercings... what was he doing at a Hanson show? Oh well. Fun times! Love good drama! There were cops all over the venue during the whole show. Did they expect some crazy @$%# to go down at a Hanson show?

So we go back to the hotel. Go to sleep. Get up. Check out continental breakfast... and it stinks. Very boring. Nothing to eat. Guess sleezy only good for torrid affair hotel=good food. Nice upstanding no bedbugs hotel=bland. Live and learn.

And then when we stopped at Walmart in Gardendale there was a dude leaning on the wall outside the main door to the store smoking a joint. For real? At least try and HIDE what you are doing. Jeez.

And that was our trip. Saw Hanson for 19th and 20th times. Saw an arrest. Rode on a cockroach. Found our D-list husbands. Rebuffed friendship attempts from Hanson wives. And a good time was had by all.

Hope you enjoyed reading that rather long and information filled narrative of Hanson Adventure. Until next time. Peace. Love. And Pocket Sized Boyfriends.