Concert Review: Eric Clapton

This year for Christmas, Mike and I got my parents tickets to see Eric Clapton. Feeling a little selfish, I bought tickets for Mike and I to go with them... I've always loved Clapton so I thought it'd be fun to see him with my parents.

His opening act was the band Los Lobos. You may or may not know who they are... if you don't, I'll just say "La Bamba". Yup, that band. They were actually really good... they did a blend of English and Spanish songs and I have to say that their Spanish songs tend to be my favorites.

Los Lobos On Stage

Clapton was absolutely amazing. I found myself completely sucked into watching him play guitar. He could have just stood on stage and played all night without even singing a note. Mom put it perfectly... he plays so well that it's like his guitar sings. He started out with his rock set... lots of the new music with some older songs mixed in. He then followed that with an acoustic set that showcased his guitar, the bass and the drums. Then they came back out and played another rock set.

There was one point during the acoustic set where I leaned over to Mike and commented that I had never heard an arena so quiet during a concert. I meant that in a good way... he was playing the heck out of a song and everyone was just listening. It was absolutely amazing.

Clapton's Stage Set Up

This Man Can PLAY!

Here's a video of "Cocaine" - a classic. We actually heard someone debating the meaning of the song as we were leaving the show... people, I doubt there's much metaphor there:

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10150111480034421#!/video/video.php?v=10150111463284421

Here is "Wonderful Tonight" - it's one of my favorite Clapton songs and I think it's really romantic:

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10150111480034421#!/video/video.php?v=10150111480034421

This truly was a spectacular show... if you have the chance to get out and see Eric Clapton while he's on tour, I highly recommend it!

Bah Humbug

Last night Mom, Dad, Kati and I went to see the Sacramento Theater Company's production of "A Christmas Carol". I don't know why, but I was not expecting an out of this world production, however, I was very quickly proven wrong! This show was outstanding... from the lighting and smoke effects to the acting by all of the characters.

My favorite actress was a little girl who played the beggar girl. She came out and sang the first refrain of the Advent Carol... that little girl had a voice! She came out several other times during the production and I was absolutely amazed.

I think they also did a very good job with the ghosts... in order to give them an otherworldly feel, they used voice changing microphones to help add echo and depth. The ghost of Christmas present was one of the best ones I've seen... he was a big jolly looking fellow and just fit the role perfectly!

This was a really fun event to go to... it was in a part of downtown that was not overly crowded (read: we were able to park for free on the street) but we could have gone to a yummy restaurant if we wanted to (read: we went to In-N-Out instead). What a fantastic outing!

Return from the Lake

No, it's not a horror movie... we're actually back from vacation! There will be several posts over the next couple of days (two book reviews, vacation and a concert review) because we've been so busy!

Lake Almanor was fantastic! The weather was beautiful - warm during the day, chilly at night. As is my usual tradition, I pretty much spent the first two days reading and napping. I like to call it recharging, but I've been told by some that it's letdown. Whatever you want to call it, I had a great time doing it. We fished every single morning that we were there and ended up catching around 40 fish! They ranged from big to very small (Mike set a new record on the boat!) and we had a fantastic time.

One of Mom's fish:

Dad's monster fish:

One of my fishies:

One of Mike's bigger fish:

And, finally, Mike's record-setting fish... that's right, the smallest ever caught on the boat:

Mike and I also got a great hike in... we had wanted to climb up Mount Lassen, but the trail was closed for the entire week due to helicopter training and work going on near the top of the peak. Instead, we climbed up Mount Harkness, which is about 2,000 feet shorter than Lassen. The hike was beautiful - right near the middle there were some fantastic meadows full of wildflowers and beautiful views of the surrounding lakes and mountain peaks. Once we got up to the top, we discovered that there was a fire lookout... meaning we had a spectacular 360 degree view of the entire area. It was awesome! Here are some of the pics:

Juniper Lake:

The view of Lake Almanor from the top... I've never seen it from above and was a little shocked at how big it is:

Here's the lookout tower:

It was also our week of seeing things that we'd never seen before. One of the days that we were out fishing, I looked over at the rocks (we troll at about 2 miles per hour, about 25 feet off the shoreline, so we can definitely see the rocks) and saw this sleek black looking thing. I thought it was a cat, but it turns out, it was an otter! It had pulled something (a fish?) up onto one of the bigger rocks, eaten it and then was getting ready to go swimming again. It dove off into the water and swam away before I could get a good picture, but in all of the 15ish years that we've been going to the lake, we have never seen one of those! Also, all along those same shores are falcon nests... they're constantly diving down to pick fish off the top of the water to take back up to the babies. We saw one go after a fish that we were not able to revive after catching it when all of the sudden another falcon swooped in. The second falcon was apparently very angry that the first was hunting in it's area because it smacked into it like a linebacker! We could hear the crunch from 50 yards away! The second bird sort of splashed down into the water, collected itself and then flew away. It was spectacular:

We also had some spectacular water skiing and jet skiing days... it was a wonderful trip! Tucker and Gracie also had a wonderful time... they loved swimming and running around on the grass! Gracie really took to the boat and had a fantastic time!

The rest of my pictures are up at Facebook... if you want to see more, head on over!

Shadow's Best Day Ever

Today Shadow officially had his best day ever. Mom and Dad asked if we wanted to go out on the lake, so of course I said yes! Shadow has only been on the boat once or twice, so I was excited about getting him out there again. We went out pretty early (8am) so that we could avoid the heat (ha!). The weather was actually really beautiful. Shadow started with a swim at the docks:

While that was fun and all, he was anxious to get out on the boat... so he drug me down the dock:

We did a little bit of fishing and both Mom and Dad caught some pretty nice fish. Mom had a 1 pound, 6 ounce silver salmon and Dad had a 2 pound, 12 ounce large mouth bass:

After all of that, we found this great little island in the middle of the lake (there are lots of them right now as the water is higher than it's been in probably the last ten years!) and beached the boat. Those of you that know sweet Shadow know that he doesn't do well with other dogs and that his attention span is less than developed, so I have never actually let him off leash at the lake (even when swimming). I just can't risk him going after a little dog or finding something small to chase (because then, that attention span seems to really kick in!). This little island was the perfect opportunity to let him run around and swim like crazy in a controlled environment! He had the time of his life:

That last one is one of my favorites... he had started to go around the other side of the island and I called him... he came charging around and Mom got a great picture! It was such a fantastic day... this whole weekend has really felt like I've been on vacation and this was the icing on the cake! I'm 100% sure that Shadow is going to have fantastic puppy dog dreams tonight!

While we were pulling the boat out we saw a guy do something crazy... there are three straps that hold your boat to the trailer... two in the back to keep it from bouncing and a hook in the front to actually keep it on the trailer. Normally, before you back the boat down the launch ramp, you unhook the back two straps. Then you back it down and when you get close enough to the water, you unhook the hook. Then when you keep backing, your boat floats off the trailer. Well, this guy seemed to think that he should unhook them all at the top, so as he's backing down the launch, his boat pretty much slides off his trailer... onto the cement. Definitely no good... to make matters even worse, he said that he had just greased his skids (the little bars on the trailer that the boat rests on). Not sure why you would do that, but apparently the boat definitely comes off! Bummer for him!

I'll leave you with the final two pictures of the day... one of me and my boy and the other of him just plain looking badass. :)

Happy Birthday Mom and Dad!

I know it's a bit odd, but yes, my parents were born on the same day! Crazy, right? Well, happy birthday Mom and Dad... I hope you both have a wonderfully fantastic day!

Father's Day Part One

Today we celebrated Father's Day Part One. Mom, Dad, Mike, Kati, Nate and I went out to Folsom Lake for a day of boating. It was beautiful, if not a little chilly. Shocking for the way this "spring" has gone. For those of you not living in beautiful California, apparently we skipped spring this year and are going to yo-yo back and forth between winter and summer. Just when you think it's starting to get hot, it starts to rain and gets all windy. Trust me, it's killing those of us with crazy allergies. But, I digress. The day was beautiful and we had snacks and got some sun (translation: I sunburned through 70 sunblock).

After that, we headed back to Mom and Dad's house for a little BBQ... but not until Dad opened his gifts! Kati and Nate got him a great racing game for the Wii. Mom gave him an all expenses paid excursion to his favorite winery. Mike and I got him the Beatles Rock Band for his Xbox. We ended up spending a good portion of the afternoon singing, strumming and drumming along to the Beatles. Whoever created that game is a genius. It's totally fun for non-musical people and it's deliciously frustrating for musical people who suddenly suck at things like playing the fake drums. I love it. I might need to get one for our Wii. The cool thing about the Beatles version is that rather than coming with a white plastic guitar, it comes with a replica of one of Paul McCartney's guitars. I can't wait to go back and play some more!

Dinner was delicious! Mom and Dad made steak, ribs, potato salad, garlic bread and peach cobbler! Now that I'm stuffed and home, I'm definitely ready to curl up on the sofa... full belly + too much sun = very sleepy Anna!

Picture - Slappa Da Meat Lecture 

Picture - How to "slappa da meat".