And God Gave Us the STONES!!!

I had the pleasure of seeing the World’s Greatest Rock and Roll Band once last night with a good college friend of mine in Baltimore, MD last night. For those of you who are counting, this was the 8th time that I have see the Stones – what makes this latest show unique is that it is most likely the smallest venue I’ve gotten to see them in. I think the Mariner’s Arena holds somewhere around 9,000 fans.

The entire experience was fun, as I got to meet up with said friend at around 5:30 at a bar called Mother’s. Their wings were fantastic, AND they had a good beer selection - although, I wussed out and ordered the Miller Lite …. Hey I gotta watch my figure, darn-it (I don’t want it to get any rounder)! We were entertained for quite by a group of firefighters who were in the process of tying one on. This showing prompted us to “hope” that my friend’s home would never catch fire – because the fire-fighters would probably never find it … of course, if they put as much effort into fighting fires as they did into drinking, they’d be the best fire fighters on the planet.

**A funny occurrence – one of the firefighters left. That’s not the funny occurrence. However, when the guy (who probably shouldn’t have even been walking, let alone driving) decided to gun his SUV in reverse, he was able to smash into a Lexus (that was parked next to my car – gulp!). Not that we should expect fire fighters to do the right thing in this position, but I was mildly surprised that he decided to leave the scene**

After 3 hours of “pre-game,” we finally made our way to the arena. Our seats were in what would normally be the nosebleeds, but since the arena is so small, even though we were far up, it felt like we were very close to the stage (directly to the right of the stage). The Stones came out and gave another killer effort – starting off with Jumpin’ Jack Flash, playing some surprises like Love is Strong, and All Down The Line. My friend said that he started tearing up during Gimme Shelter (I got goose-bumps – Lisa Fisher is amazing). They played their hearts out for a little over 1 ½ hours, and then they were gone – prompting me to wonder (as I do after every Stones show since 1989) whether or not this would be the last chance I’d get to see them live.

We then went to a “Gentleman’s club” (insert your “How did you get in?” punchline here), and actually only spent like $10-$15 each total (no cover, and the girls were less attractive than normal). We finished the night off by going to Taco Bell – figuring that Mexican food would help us sleep better (I’m not sure how we came to that conclusion – maybe it was the beer talking).

I am suffering today, but it was well worth it – seeing the Stones with a good friend who had never seen them before.