Hookahville XXVIII

One more Hookahville down....now only nine months to go before the next one!!!! Yes, I'm already counting!!!!

We had such a great time this weekend. Ryan and I both worked late Thursday night and got up to leave for Ohio at 3:30 AM Friday morning. I felt kinda bad for Ryan.......he drove all the way while I slept. I couldn't help it. My eyelids felt like they had boulders hanging on them.

We stopped first at Aaron's house to meet up with him and Julie so they could follow us there. I remember nothing of the ride to Ohio....only that we stopped once for Mcdonald's and a pee break.

It was about 8:30 AM Friday when we pulled into the parking lot. We made really good time. I think that's the earliest we've ever made it to Hookahville. Too bad the gates didn't open until 9:00 and we had to wiat a half an hour. We weren't real happy about that, because, it specifically said doors would open at 8:00 AM. But, hey, it was a nice day, so we all just hung out in line while we waited.

We found a good spot to camp, pretty close to where we were last spring, so that made it easy to find after the sea of tents kept growing. Aaron, Julie, Ryan and I all had our tents up within an hour or so, and were ready to just sit and hang out with eachother. Julie brought a big shade tent, so we hung out in there waiting on the rest of our Indiana crew to arrive.

Shortly after noon, we got a call from one of the guys saying Dave, Kelly, Pete, Rhonda, Matt, Liz, and her friend Jacquie were finally here. Ryan met them by the gate, and showed them to the spots we had tried to save for them. It was starting to get crowded, so I was glad they got there when they did. The spots around us were disppearing quick!!!

The first person we wanted to see and hear play was David Gans. He used to travel as a roadie with The Grateful Dead. He covered a few Dead tunes and did a lot of originals. I really enjoyed his set. Here's a few pictures of Daivd:

After David Gans, we had a couple hours before Dark Star Orchestra took the stage. So, we all headed back to the camp site for awhile. We played a lot of corn hole. Ryan's dad made him a corn hole game for his birthday.....we all love it!!!I love this chick. She sings the parts of Donna from the Grateful Dead, andin my opinion, she sounds much better than Donna ever did.........I think this guy is gonna look just like Jerry when he gets older. His voice in hauntingly similar to Jerry's. When you're not looking right at the stage, it gives you the feeling of hearing Jerry live again. Absolutely amazing!!!

When Dark Star played, it was still pretty hot outside, so we watched part of the show up by the stage, and part of it from the big hill where there's a little more shade. I actually fell asleep in the shade up there for awhile. That nap was much needed...believe me!!

Dark Star played for a few hours, and then it was time for some HOOKAH!!!!!!

The guys took the stage, and we all went crazy!!! It is always so exciting to see them come out to start a show. Here's a few pictures of the Friday night show:

OK, so there's the famous people from Friday night....now here's the rest of us!!!!
This is Aaron and my friend Julie.

Here's Matt poking his head around like he always does......with Ryan and Aaron..............Me and Kelly Jo.....this was before her haircut.......just keep reading :-)My sweet baby, all red faced...and me all drunk faced :-)

This picture was taken Saturday afternoon from the hill where I took my nap. Look at that beautiful sky!!!! We couldn't have asked for better weather!!!This is Andrew and Kelly Anne playing some corn hole. Ryan and I made a rule that if you win, you have to write your team name on the board. There was some funny stuff written on there by the end of the weekend!!!Liz and Matt working on an afternoon snack for all of us......check out all the burgers....YUMMO!!!!Ryan, Pete and Rhonda. We met Pete and Rhonda through Kelly Anne a couple weeks ago at the Jester Music Festival. They're great people, and tons of fun!!!!!Kelly Anne and me......awwwww aren't we sweet?!?!?

Ryan and Aaron haning out playing some corn hole!!!Dave eating one of those delicious burgers you saw Matt and Liz working on :-)Oh yes....we brought our tails!!!! The kitties were prowling the ville this year, that's for sure!!!!This is a few other friends from Indianapolis. We met them through Ekoostik Hookah.....love 'em all!!!! Dani, Julie, and Jenni.All I can say about this is....I was not being held respsonsible for my actions at this point in the night :-)

OK, you saw what my hair looked like Saturday night.....now take a peek at Ryan's. He did a much better job!!!!! But then again, I didn't exactly DO my hair that way, it just ended up that way after I let people keep sticking glow sticks in my hair :-)Check out those guns..........he he heSTP baby......START THE PARTY!!!!!!!!!Oh yes.....you should all be familiar with my guilty pleasure, Eric, by now. You normally would see him behind the drums, but it's Hookahville tradition for him to sing the encore song the last night of Hookahville.Of course, I was front and center for Eric's song. He always does a cover....usually something unexpected from Ekoostik Hookah....and I can definitely say that for this year's encore. It was "Stay With Me" by Rod Stewart........weird. But, Eric made that song his own!!!!

This was the final picture of my sweet hair do before I let the glow sticks drop........and this is what we did with them:Oh....poor Andrew.....good thing he had some undies on, Huh?Rule Number ONE: NEVER, NEVER be the first person to pass out at Hookahville!!!!!!Whoa, Dude.....................

OK, one last chapter to the Hookahville blog.......remember that picture of me and Kelly Jo earlier???? Well, she organized a few people to get together and let the band members cut their hari for Locks of Love. This is Dave Katz from Ekoostik Hookah getting ready to chop her beautiful hair off..............................

Oh, How sweet!!!!!!!And there she is twelve hours later, and she still can't stop touching it!!!!

I think it's awesome that they did that. There weren't very many participants, but a few of us talked about getting it going for Spring Hookahville too. Maybe if the word gets out a little more, we'll actually have a few takers this spring.

Until then....I'm gonna hang onto my hair and enjoy the ride!!!!!

Weekend Getaway

Ryan and I went camping this past weekend at France Park. It was perfect camping weather....hot enough to swim during the day, but still cool in the shade of our camp site, but just cool enough at night to enjoy the fire. You all know how we love fire!!!! I guess maybe we're pyros, and that's the real reason we get along so well....who knows.

Anyway, we had a great time. We managed to get some disc golf in, two full days of swimming, some miniature golf, a little hiking, played some bullseye washers, played a little skip-bo, and last but not least, we broke out the travel edition of Battleship....and dang it if Ryan didn't sink my battleship!!!!!

I felt like we got a lot accomplished for the short time we were there.

France Park is such a nice place to get away for cheap, and just a short drive. I remember going there when I was a kid and watching Dad and his crazy friends jumping off of the cliffs. I can't imagine jumping off of one of those things. I'm not surprised they don't allow it anymore. The closest I'll even get to the edge is probably about three feet away. I don't know why it freaks me out....maybe it has something to do with the fact that I was forced to wear my lifejacket in the sandbox up at Sissy's cottage when I was a kid....and it was like a quarter mile away from the water!!!!!!

France Park is one of those places I think I will enjoy for the rest of my life. I have a lot of good memories there. Not only with Dad or Ryan.....I had tons of fun there in high school, and even with Michael a few times. Mom and I have been out there swimming together a lot, and Ryan and I keep going back making more great memories....I love it!!!

Swimming is probably the part I like the most about being out there. The water is crystal clear....unlike the Lantz's Pit water I've gotten so used to. You could see to the bottom for probably at least 15 feet out...it was absolutely gorgeous.

A funny thing happened Sunday afternoon while were out swimming. We were floating around on this big double size raft together just soaking up some sun, and listening to all the craziness going on around us. It's amazing how much you can hear if you sit quietly and listen. You can hear conversations from every direction out there, so , of course, Ryan and I had a lot of fun with that. I heard someone say something really funny, and I don't even remember what it was now, but I sat up to see where this conversation was coming from , and there were two little girls swimming near us. One of which just happened to be Jen and Chad's neice Hadley.

I think I kind of freaked her out at first, because as soon as I saw her, I asked if her name was Hadley. She's definitely not a shy little girl :-) I told her I knew her dad and her aunt and uncle. When I mentioned Uncle Chad, all she could do was talk about how OLD he's getting because it was close to his birthday...he he he... (Happy Belated to Chad!!!!!!)

I saw Craig and Jessica (Jen's in-laws) sitting up on the beach looking out at Hadley. Probably wondering who in the world she was talking to. Before we knew it, our raft had been taken over by her and her friend. We told her she should go tell her dad who she was talking to so he didn't freak out. So, she ran up and told him, and within seconds she was back on the raft. Craig ended up out there appologizing for her taking over our beach toys....but we had a lot of fun with them. I think we ended up hagning out with them for the last couple hours we were there. It was great. AND, it was awesome to hear Hadley calling Jessica Mom. They seemed like such a happy little family.

So that made a great end to our trip to France Park this weekend. Lots of fun in the sun, and some good company for the end of the day. It couldn't have been much better!!!!

Here's a picture of the beach as we walked down the first day......................And then, you have Ryan and I sitting on a cliff.....not too close though!!!!!!!!Thought this was a beautiful view...................My baby roastin' marshmallows.............he got a little roasted in the sun that day too :-)Oh delicious smores.........................

Uh.........what?.........I don't remember these pictures......he he he.......................Nope.....don't remember that one either.......................

But I DO remember this!!!! This is the last photo of the trip. We were just heading back to the camp site to clean up after swimming the day away.......................

Everyone needs to go spend some time at France Park......It's only $1.50 to get in for the day, and that includes everything!!! You can't beat it!!!!!

Uncle Buck's Sucks!!!

I'm going to start this post with a disclaimer stating that the language used here may not be fit for Sissy's ears.....and an apology to the family for me talking like a sailor...but by the time you read this...you may have a few choice words to throw out there too.....................

Ryan and I went on our first camping trip of the year this past weekend. After it was all said and done, we decided we will just refer to this little trip as "Mud Fest" from now on.

Apparently, It was a little colder up here than it was Down in New Marshfield Ohio....at least we didn't get any snow, but it rained like hell the whole time we were there.....thank God for who ever invented those cheap little yellow rain coats :-)

It was a very interesting weekend to say the least. A lot of fun in a lot of ways, but also very disappointing in other ways.

We took off from West Middleton at about 5:30 Saturday morning with a five hour drive ahead of us. I woke up excited and raring to go as I always do before a Hookah show. The drive there was gloomy, but it was still nice to be awake and headed towards my Hookah boys again. I swear, they are like heroin to me......if I don't get a fix at least once a month, I start going through withdraw and freaking out....so I was ready for my next fix:-)

When we got to Uncle Buck's where the show was held, it was pretty laid back. I started seeing familiar faces right away, and hunted down a few friends I knew would be there. After we got the tent all set up, I took a quick nap while Ryan and my friend Julie took off to walk around and check everything out. When I woke up, they were still gone, so I made a quick trip to the port-o-potty, and went back to the tent to change clothes. I knew if I went towards the music, we would all find eachother eventually.

There was music starting at noon, so I headed down to "the barn" where the concerts were held, and enjoyed some alone time. The opening bands were all fantastic. I stuck around by the front of the stage for about a half an hour before Ryan finally found me. We danced for awhile and decided we needed to make one more trip to the tent to eat before the big show (Ekoostik Hookah) started.

When we got back to the tent, we realized that we weren't dealing with the normal Hookah crowd...our tent had been broken into. No....we didn't have a lock on it....shame on us. But, we have NEVER had the need to lock our tent up before. This was a very small festival, so we felt like we were with our extended family. We thought wrong.

Here's the worst of it. The Bastards stole my digital camera!!!!!! Can you believe that?!?!? ASSHOLES!!!!!! (sorry sissy....I can't help it) I was so pissed off, I could hardly think straight. Julie and Kelly Jo didn't have much in the tent besides clothes, so they were pretty safe. Now that I've been home for a day, I have heard from several different people who were at the show and had the same problem.

I am on a message board called Hookahheads.com and all the messages about Uncle Buck's this weekend have something to do with all the shady people who were prowling around. It's really a shame. I have always prided myself on the crowd that Hookah brings to their shows. Like I said, I consider most of those people my extended family. They are mostly awesome people who would do anything for one another.

I think a big majority of the problem was the fact that the festival was so cheap. it was only twenty bucks to get in, and that included all the shows AND camping for the night. That price is unheard of. I'm pretty sure some shady characters took advantage of that cheap show knowing they could get in and get their money's worth in stolen merchandise very quickly.

Needless to say, Ekoostik Hookah has already re-sceduled their next show they had planned there. It only took them one day to change it and make arrangements for another venue. The guys from the band were really pissed off, and hurt for those of us who got robbed. There was enough trouble that they had already started changing things for their summer tour before the even started playing Saturday night. I really appreciate the way the band looks out for their fans. In fact, I think I got my "Party Girl" because I whined enough to Eric. I told him it was the only thing that would make the trip worthwhile........that was a big fat lie, and I think he knew it, but hey, it worked.....we got our Party Girl!!! Thanks Eric if you had anything to do with that :-)

My friend Kelly Jo was just getting home to Grand Rapids Michigan today because some asshole stole Travis' keys among some other things. Travis was her ride home. They were still waiting on a locksmith to come to them at Uncle Buck's last night at 8:00 PM. They finally got there, and made a key for Travis, but he was only taking Kelly Jo as far as Chicago where she was riding a train the rest of the way to Grand Rapids. Obviously, she missed her first train.....but managed to get her ticket transferred considering the situation. It's 10:50 now, and she' probably just getting home......she should have been there 24 hours ago.

OK, besides all the bullshit of getting our stuff stolen, the show was awesome!!! I tried my hardest to put what I couldn't control behind me and just enjoy myself. I think I did a pretty good job. Oh yeah, and that bottle of wine I downed shortly after the break-in helped a lot too :-) I figured what the hell....I might as well get trashed...I'm cold, I'm wet, I've been robbed....I might as well get drunk. That's not my usual answer to anything......I'm always the designated driver, but I felt like I deserved to not be responsible for once....and you know what? It felt really good.....

I got a little loopy, but I remeber the whole night, so I'm doing better than some people I know :-)

I borrowed just a few pictures from a friend of mine who was smart, unlike myself, and had her camera on her the whole night. She let me take a piture of Eric, and promised to send it. He was posing for me. I felt so special :-) Hopefully I'll get some pics that have us in them. Until then, I'll give ya what I've got.

She also got several pictures of Eric (My favorite drummer in the whole wide world) So, I'm very happy to have a friend willing to share those :-) I got another drum stick from him.....I've got quite a collection going now :-) In one of the pictures, you can see the drumstick I got...it's all frayed in the middle....just about to break in half. He only gives me the sticks he breaks. But I think he gets so crazy on that drumset that he breaks at least one almost every show.

We got to hear "Party Girl" and that always makes me happy :-) Cause I'm the freakin' PARTY GIRL!!!!!! That was the last song of the last set....great way to close the show. Of course, just because it was the last song of the last set, that doesn't mean that it was the last song of the night. They actually closed with their song called "Somewhere Down The Line." I always love to hear that song live. Cliffy usually yodels through part of it. I know you're all probably thinking, what the hell? Yodeling??? Yes, yodeling. I know it sounds weird, but if you know Ekoostik Hookah, nothing will ever shock you in the musical sense. It's also a great song for the end of the show, because it reassures us all that we'll be seein' eachother again sometime soon. Us Hookah fans live for knowing we will be doing it all over again soon.........Only about a month until Hookahville!!!!!!!

Here's the picture I took....How can you not just LOVE that sweet face?!?!?

There's my drumstick.......see how it's all frayed in the middle? That's only first set...it got worse as the songs kept coming....when they look like that, they go home with me :-)

There's a couple great shots of Cliffy...none while he was yodeling, but I really like the way the lighting was caught next to him.