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I was entirely relieved to finish this semester, it dragged on for way too long. I aced web design, and crapped out in everything else. My flight left the very first day of Summer (for me). Here are pics of my trip, to go with the following rundown of events.

After flying into LAX Thursday afternoon, Steph picked me up and took me around. I think she has more energy in her little toe than I do in my whole body. We went to the Farmer's Market to get some lunch. They had so many cuisines to choose from I was torn, so I settled with Mexican food, which I hardly ever get tired of. Then we headed to Hollywood to see some of the more touristy stuff. About 5 minutes afer we had parked and started admiring the Chinese Theatre, a man walked up to us and asked us if we would like to attend the filming of a new Comedy Central show called Crossballs. I was eager and hopped at the opportunity. 2 hours later we ended up walking off the set a bit early. It was a debate show parody (mix of crossfire and hardballs) about why animals should or shouldnt be eaten. I'm not a big fan of TV and I'm now not a big fan of live TV either. After all, who needs TV when you have the internet?

We shopped and ate some more Mexican food and called it a night. The next day it was off to Coachella, so I needed a good rest. It took 3 hours to get there from LA (including Steph forgetting her ticket 20 minutes in). We set up camp among a field of tents, hung out, socialized, played some Ultimate and fell asleep sweaty. Woke up sweaty too. Somebody forgot to tell me how miserably hot Indio is.

I had only heard of DIOS before, but wasn't familiar with their music. It was great. They went on first and were very instrumental and indie. Definitely recommend grabbing their mp3s off their website (esp the song Starting Five with its Ooh Ooh Ooohs) . Next was Sahara Hotnights (which I basically just caught because I wanted a good spot for Stellastarr). What a great surprise, they were 4 hot Swedish girls (especially the bassist mmmm) who could rock as good as anybody. Stellastarr were fantastic. A self proclaimed new wave punk pop band from NY, their riffs and enthsuiasm had me dancing. This is also the point where I met a hot local girl that I will never see again. In The Walls and My Coco are probably their two best songs. I moved on to play some hacky sack and catch a little Death Cab for Cutie. While I really enjoy thier stuff, and their latest album Transatlanticism, the performance was a little dull for my wound up taste. I moved on to the main tent and rested while Sparta was playing, to secure my spot for the headliners. The Pixies went on around 7:20pm and were everything I could hope for and more. Their voices are amazing, still, after all, these, years. Wow. Just wow. Individually one of the best performances I have ever seen. They played all the hits, even Where Is My Mind?. Radiohead (who's website is as trippy and bizarre as their music) were excellent too. I had already seen them last October, and they are on the same tour, so it was kinda funny seeing the same things again (like Thom Yorkes facial expressions during You and Whose Army? (still made me giggle when he gets his face way up in the camera and winks). He is also the coolest dancer there will ever, ever be. If you haven't seen him dance before I suggest you track down some radiohead vids, because its the most free crazy wild dancing you will ever see. Definitely worth coming to California for, and there was a whole other day!