in the morning of the magicians

so the freepress houstonfest is over. i still prefer the name "the super-happy houston funfest spectacular festival" but this name has yet to catch on. but by either name, it's over.

there are two things i will remember from this year's super-happy funfest. one: my wife and i huddled together under a small black umbrella as her left side was getting soaked and my right side was getting soaked during what was probably a 35-45 minute torrential downpour while sitting on the hill at eleanor tinsley park holding our spot so that we wouldn't lose it for the flaming lips later that evening.

two: the flaming lips. it was one of the most amazing shows i've ever seen. dancing bears, crazy props, walking through a women's legs, megaphones, plastic orbs that floated into the audience. and the sound. the sound of their songs was amazing. absolutely incredible show. i could barely move while they were playing because if i did, i probably would have slipped and fallen into the muddy hill that had become the park, but i was able to shake it enough to inspire the crowd to follow my lead.

backtracking to saturday now....saturday was weak. the sun was behind the clouds, which helped. but i would have rather taken a beating by the sun and gotten better music. ra ra riot was okay. but girl talk was just some dude behind a computer that would take a rock riff and paste it over a hip-hop song. what the hell? i could do that shit in my bedroom if i wanted to while watching reruns of scrubs. i can't help it. i love scrubs. i think i'm a lot like turk. anyway, he was the headliner for saturday! before him was some horrible stuff like medeski, martin and wood and detroit cobras and some rap dude. so that was saturday.

sunday was hot all day. the sun was out. we were preparing for the worst. but when we parked, the wind picked up and could feel it coming. we had no idea how bad it was going to be. we literally sat down and got out the umbrella, and it started pouring on us. and God bless her, my wife sat there with me, crouched together getting soaked in her nice pants and shoes and was happy to be there with me. no one else was there. all of our friends were in their cars staying dry. we held down the spot. she and me. i and her. and i thanked her for that. not many wives would do that. towards the end of the downpour, but still raining, lucero played. they weren't great, but it helped to take our mind off the fact we were getting soaked and having mud flung onto our persons.

the rain finally let up for stars. and i liked that show. i listened to a few tracks beforehand and thought it was a little weak, but i'm going to have to go back and listen again, because live, they were pretty strong. the lead singers (male and female) were engaging. the guy was pretty witty. i like that. wittiness.

then slimthug played(?, he didn't play anything) and we bolted and let everybody else watch our spot for us. but then the lips came on and it was amazing. they played several tracks from their new album embryonic. but they played she don't use jelly and what was cool, they used the screen behind them to have jon stewart, circa 1996, introduce them from his old show. nice.

we got home finally sunday night. with soaked feet. soaked underwater. dirty shoes. dirty blankets. and for a minute, we probably wondered why we did it. but i know why we did it. because i'll never forget that rainy sunday with my wife under the umbrella getting impaled by rain to hold our spot for the flaming lips. that was why.