Driving, Festivals and More

This past week was so awesome I'm having a heard time finding a place to start. I rolled out of Maine late Sunday night headed toward Maryland. The entire trip was problem free until I got to Maryland and then the van started stalling at red lights and just generally being cranky. I managed to make it into Glen Burnie and Jen and Eds driveway. Three things I noticed about MD upon stopping for gas just off Pulaski Highway:

1. It's loud. The noise was a bit overwhelming after being rural for the past couple months.
2. It smells bad.
3. THE HEAT!

I was sweaty and exhausted when I got into town so I said some hellos and them promptly headed to nap. Hung out with Jen and Ed for the evening catching up and having a few drinks.

Wednesday we headed to the Mutiny bar which I posted about.

Thursday saw Jen and Ed heading to VA. so I just sort of lounged around for the day. They have a pool in their backyard which I floated in for about an hour - adding one set of bizarre burn/ tan lines to myself. The sun in MD is definitely different. I can stay outside in ME for hours and barely tan. Maybe the pollution has something to do with that?

Friday brought about the Annapolis Irish Festival Twilight Concert. Lizzie came up from VA to pick me up so the cats could stay plugged in and cool. We headed to Annapolis around 5 so we could get in for free. I ran into so many people it was an awesome way to be welcomed back to the state. Not that the concert was to welcome me back but it was a fabulous way for me to run into all the folks I know and have been missing.

The concert was amazing. The Rovers, Albannach and The Rogues did great sets. After the concert we headed to Brian Boru where we had more drinks before retiring back to Silver's house for even more drinks, laughter and good times. We didn't get to bed until nearly 6am.

Saturday afternoon I headed over to the fairgrounds since I managed to talk to someone about volunteering and was scheduled for a 1 - 4 pm shift. I got there early and jumped right in. It was chaos. I have a list of things that could make the whole volunteering thing much easier but all in all everyone did the best they could in the situation and finally got it worked out. Unfortunately 2 hours into my shift I started showing signs of heat exhaustion. I was having a hard time breathing, my face turned beet red, dizziness, blurry vision, and then I started puking. At that point I called it a day and went to sit in some shade with some ice on my neck and fist fulls of bottled water. It took hours for me to feel okay again. Needless to say I didn't drink on Saturday.

I managed to catch sets from The Screaming Orphans, a bit of Barleyjuice, The Rovers, Albannach, The Rogues and a bit of Scythian before we rolled out to shower the days sweat and dirt off and head over to Fado for the after-party.

The after-party was awesome.

Sunday brought rest. I slept most of the day so I could night drive back up to Maine and away from the heat. I'll be hanging up here for the next month before heading to New Hampshire for a concert by the above band and then heading to New Jersey the next day for a horror convention so I can see Doug Bradley and maybe meet Clive Barker (who is one of maybe three people on my list of famous folks I have always wanted to meet but haven't in the horror genre) and then I think I'm off to a van run the weekend after that, the MD Renaissance Festival, another horror con or two - Fall is looking to be as busy as it usually is for me.

I can't wait!

I pulled out of MD around 9pm Sunday night and made it to Maine around noonish yesterday. Not too bad considering I didn't stop much with the exception of a three hour nap in upper PA. The weather here in ME is in the 70s and fabulously lacking humidity!

I put all of my pics of on FB but sometime today I'll get them up on Flickr and add a slideshow.