That time I met Slug

When Atmosphere announced that they would be stopping in through Little Rock on their most recent tour, I was pretty stoked. I invited my friend D.d. and we made plans to spend the night with Dan and Kim.

I always dork out on the shows I'm most excited about. One time, I made a rum cake to get tickets to Cake. When Atmosphere came to Memphis on their last tour, I made a little care package of Memphis-themed stuff: t-shirts, bumper stickers, key chains, and postcards. But for this show, I wanted to make Slug and Ant something with my own hands. Of course, I had to have a silly spin on it, so I make pet rocks for each of them to commemorate their Little Rock stop.

When we got to Little Rock, I was the only one that was really interested in trying to possibly meet Slug. But I had sent Slug a few messages on Twitter, saying I was making the trip from Memphis and that I had made a little gift for him. So I set out solo to the venue to arrive at the venue about 30 minutes before the doors time.

I was only there for a few minutes before Slug walked through the little crowd lined up for the doors to open. As he walked by, I called out, "Slug, I have a little something for you, if you have a minute." He said, "Yes, you do," and stopped and came in to see what I had. I pulled out the pet rock I made for him and the one I made for Ant and described what they each said because it was dark. He laughed and took the rocks and thanked me for them and for making the trip. Then, as he was walking off, he turned back and said, "Lyndsay, right?" I said that was right, but I almost swooned. I could NOT believe he knew my name. I am still a little fan girl crazy over that one.

The crowd for the show was less than half the size of the show at the New Daisy in Memphis. This meant that, by the end, I was up in the front of the crowd and rocking out as hard as possible. I even geeked out enough to make a setlist as the show went along. I posted it here on Setlist.fm, which was my first published setlist.

In addition to a great time at the show, it was fantastic getting to spend time with D.d., Dan, Kim, and their friend, Sara. D.d and I have become pretty good show buddies as of late, which is pretty awesome. Dan wound up getting to go to the show with us, which was a major bonus of the trip. It's always great to spend time with him, and I think he really enjoyed himself at the show. Kim couldn't make it because of work, but she had time to set up two guest rooms for D.d. and me and made sure we were totally comfortable. Their hospitality was really awesome.

Meeting their friend Sara was fun too. She was going through a lot of personal loss and trauma so getting out to a show was a good distraction for her. D.d., Dan, Sara, and I grabbed some dinner and margaritas before the show. After the show, we dropped off Sara, and then D.d., Dan, and I sat up for a bit and shot the breeze. It was a really great night.

In the morning before heading back to Memphis, D.d. and I ventured back into downtown to Little Rock to check out D.d.'s friends' stores. We had to park down at the Clinton Library and ride the trolley back down to the shopping district. It was fun to get the historic tour of downtown. The Freckled Frog and Dandelion were really cute shops in a shared space. The Freckled Frog had crafts and shirts and jewelry. Dandelion was of particular interest to D.d. because it was a herb shop. It a wall lined with shelf after shelf of glass jars full of many fascinating contents. I thought it was cool, and we ran into our friend Suzie working there. In all, it was a fun little side excursion before hitting the road back to Memphis.

The granite one was for Ant, and the schist one was for Slug.