Stage 13: The Ultimate Mud Bog. This, Plus More Ridiculous Things our Brother did to Stephen

It's good to be back. By "good to be back", I mean back to my precious blog. Not back to my jobs or back home from Stage 13. I took a 2 week vacation from life in general, except for the few times I worked at the factory.

Heather's Stage 13 Experience: Beware of Trolls

First off, a few things I learned from Stage 13:
1)Sometimes mixing Edmontonians and Calgarians is like mixing red ants and black ants (I'm assuming here that ants of different colonies and colours fight with and try to eat each other, although to the best of my knowledge, the Calgarians and the Edmontonians did not try to consume one another).
2)There are people crazy enough to marry their houses.
3)I never learn from my previous Stage 13 mistakes.
4)Never insult Sum 41 in a newspaper interview.
5)Aussies flock to Stage 13 like random people flock to music festivals.
6)j-roc likes to eat paper and dirt.
7)ZZ Top is still cool.
8)Always beware of trolls.
9)Never go into a portapotty without toilet paper and without someone to stand guard outside to make sure no one pushes it over when you're inside.
10)You can never go back again.

Alright, allow me to explain. We (j-roc, Marina and I) met some fun Calgarians at last year's Stage 13. They were a blast, we all had really good time. Yup. Johnny K., Daredevil and Worm were what made Stage 13 fun last year ("You're way out of your element, here.", "Let's go halfsies on the chicken.", "Junkie" etc.). Well, this year, Marina, j-roc and I went with 3 more people: M.Daddy, MT and RC.

So it was Friday night, and the 6 of us were in line for the beer gardens to see...Social Code (WORST band name EVER. It gives a bad name to the creativity of St. Albertans). Now I hadn't heard from Johnny K. for about a month (maybe that's because I hadn't checked my email in the last two weeks), so I had no idea they were going to be there again this year. While we were waiting in line, Marina turned around and saw the Junkies (specific group of Calgarians...and no, the name has nothing to do with drug use). So, hugs were exchanged, introductions were made. The next thing I knew, some kind of fight had broken out between Team M. Daddy and MT and Team Junkie. A hand was broken and a nose was injured. Both injuries occured on the side of Team M. The police got involved, statements were made...and my hysteria ("Conflict of interest") commenced. Seeing as I was huddled up into a ball, I did not really witness the whole ordeal, so I cannot say who was to blame. It was a bad Friday night. Also, we got really stuck in the mud on the way to our campsite and some good samaritans had to help us out.

Saturday was full of good times. We met some fun people, hung out with friends, ate some watermellon etc. I also ran into someone who was born in Peace River...other people were born there besides my brothers and I. Who knew?

People crazy enough to marry their houses? We were sitting around our camp on Saturday, or possibly Sunday, and Marina (I think) started to talk about about an episode of Oprah where a woman married her house. As I'm sure everyone can already guess, hilarity ensued. How does one have sex with a house? If you slam the door, does that count as spousal abuse? If a chunk of ceiling falls on the spouse, is this grounds for divorce? How does one divorce a house? Will a restraining order against the house be required? Clearly we are hilarious. Also, this talk about the house caused Marina to fall out of her lawn chair onto the bag of recycling.

Once again I am bright red. I remember putting sunscreen on last year (really freaking expensive shit, too). I still ended up with chunks of skin falling off. I did not limit my exposure to the sun. This year, I ignored the fact that I had brought sunscreen and just let the sun toast my skin. I am paying for it dearly now and probably will in the future as well.

On Sunday, the following bands played on the main stage (in this order): Pilate, Hawksley "Smoke baby, smoke baby, more alcohol baby, cocaine in Montréal" Workman and the Wolves, gob, Tea Party, Sum 41 and ZZ Top. Well, apparently Jeff Martin of the Tea Party, bitter about the fact that nobody really gives a shit about his band anymore, told the Edmonton Sun (actual Sun headlines: "Osama bin Hidin'", "Cow or Never", "Krall that Jazz" and the most recent one referring to the cost of repairing damages to the roads after the giant rainstorm, "What a Me$$") that Sum 41 was brave for coming after the Tea Party's boring (and I don't even really have anything against the Tea Party. I'm just telling it like it is) set. Deryck Whibley of Sum 41 did not like this comment, so he let out a long string of expletives and hurled insults to Martin and former Creed frontman, Scott Stapp (Whibley called him "the shittiest singer to be kicked out of the shittiest band"), who is apparently working with Martin on an upcoming project. Sum 41 was also obviously extremely intoxicated. Pilate put on an extremely good show. So did Hawksley Workman, who proved himself to be a very talented singer, even if his brand of music is not my favourite. gob's set had some humourous antics. More on ZZ Top later.

There was an Australian camped somewhere near our campsite, although I'm not really sure which campsite was his. He just hung around our area a lot. He called himself, get this, "Aussie". Last year, I met an Aussie in the beer gardens, possibly named Justin, who was quite a bit more attractive than this year's Aussie. Maybe because he was about 20 years younger. Last year's Aussie noticed three things about Canada that he was not expecting: 1) It was big (way to look at a map there, buddy). 2) There weren't mad cattle running all over the place. 3) Canadians weren't walking SARS victims.

j-roc aka Teen Wolf (starring Michael J. Fox) aka Chill Bill Vol 1&2 consumed some interesting items this weekend. During the day on Saturday, we walked by a big message board, where people could write messages on paper, the old-fashioned way, and post them up on the board. There were about 4 when we walked by the first time, all addressed to some individuals named Les and Gilles from Amanda, who was obviously quite desparate to find them. We ridiculed these messages. Later on Saturday, after Evanescence played, j-roc returned and ate some of the messages, giving the leftovers to M. Daddy. They bonded over the fact that they both felt that the messages tasted like spruce. j-roc also tried to clean off the insanely dirty car with his mouth. We love j-roc.

Yes, ZZ Top is cool. They were wearing massive beards and massive sunglasses (Cheap Sunglasses?). They were some sharp-dressed men (I'm serious...they were wearing glittery suit jackets). An un-named source took some close-ups of the band for me.

There were several make-shift bridges built over the ditches in the campground, as the ditches were actually mini rivers, due to the excessive amounts of rain that the Camrose exhibition grounds received last week. And what lives under bridges? TROLLS!! j-roc was adamant about warning people of the potential hazards of running into a troll. We began to loudly yell at people whenever we saw them crossing a bridge..."Beware of trolls!". On Sunday, we posted a sign near one of the bridges. "Bridge ahead, beware of trolls" it said. There were harsh gusts of wind on Sunday afternoon, and our tent was partially collapsed, but the sign was still standing strong.

One of my favourite sayings: "Where there is a portapotty not secured to the ground, some drunk dipshit will push it over, especially if said portapotty is located in the loud section of Stage 13." After hearing horror stories about the tipping of portapotties last year (it did not happen to me this year or last year, thank goodness), being tipped in a portapotty became my biggest fear. I always had someone guard my portapotty (except when I was in a state of mind where I was not concerned about being tipped in a portapotty). j-roc and Marinara would sometimes bang on the sides of the portapotty to scare the shit out of me (not literally...I never stayed in one of those long enough to have a bowel movement). While we were walking through the loud section on Friday night (we were camped in RESERVED section D-3), we all discovered that we needed to use the washroom facilities. And we didn't have toilet paper. Eventually, some kind-hearted man came along and generously donated some of his toilet paper to us (we had foolishly left our rolls back at the campsite). Then another kind-hearted person offered us wet ones napkins. We were saved.

At S13, there was a booth selling "Straight Pride" clothing. I wouldn't have had a problem with it, except one of their slogans was "One Way". I did not appreciate such a slogan, seeing as there are many ways of doing things in life, just ask Dan Savage. Much harassment was endured by those wearing the clothing (Mostly by me).

Ahh, Stage 13. This year was fun, but we had much more fun last year. That's why I say we can never go back again. It saddens me, and it saddens j-roc. Back in the times when two rival cities could get along (ok they still can, probably). Don't get me wrong, I still had a good time (for I am a young Barbara Walters). Got to know Marina's friends better. They're good guys, although they emit much heat when crammed into a tent with six people in total.

Raging Squirrel, Pickle Juice and Trapping Stephen in a Room

Mine and Stephen's eldest brother (ok, Stephen's only brother), Mark, used to torture Stephen as well as bribing him to hurt himself (Think jumping on risk pieces for money). One game I fondly remember being a spectator to, involved Mark chasing Stephen. It went like this: Our laundry room and bathroom used to be connected. This large multi-purpose room had two doors. Mark would trap Stephen in this room by jumping from door to door on the outside while Stephen would try to escape. It was great fun (for Mark and I).

Another game they used to play was called Chatter Chatter. It involved a trampoline. Mark was the Raging Squirrel and Stephen was the Battling Chipmunk. They would jump around on the trampoline while Mark attempted to beat up Stephen.

Another memory I have of my childhood was on a night where Mark was babysitting. The three of us were watching TV downstairs, when Mark and I went to get cans of rootbeer. Mark poked a hole in the bottom of one can and drained all of the pop into a cup. He then filled the can with picklejuice and sealed the hole with tape (To this day I still don't know why Stephen wasn't suspicious about the length of time it took for us to get the beverages). Anyway, it's safe to say that Stephen did not appreciate the pickle juice-in-the-can trick.

Also, I am not an ugly lesbian nun, but I do have a boyfriend.