Angry, then Not Angry But Glad

I spent much of last week being mad as hell. I was about to kill my boyfriend, if I ever saw the lug again. I'm not entirely certain why, and honestly, it's not a feeling I'd like to revisit now, as the goodwill has returned in spades.

Friday was the Death Cab for Cutie show I bought tickets for. I knew Kevin wouldn't make it, and so lined up Chris to come with me. That evening, I made some offhand remark about the smokiness of clubs and Mr. Pneumonia realized perhaps his lungs wouldn't tolerate the show well. Which, really, is understandable. And strangely, okay. The Showbox is a club I've been to many times and feel confident about getting there and back in one piece. The weather wasn't hideous. And, dammit, I wasn't going to waste another night because I couldn't find an appropriate show-going partner in time.

So I went all by my damn self. After a nice cup of coffee and dark chocolate bar elevated my spirits considerably.

And then the show was great. I grabbed a spot on the left edge of the stage, a fabulous view. Of, you know, Ben Gibbard's sweaty ass. And the whiteboy-nasty-dreadlocked (uuggghhh) bassist from Nada Surf. And the beautiful punkrock bassist from the Catch who caught my gaze a couple times and gave me a truly wonderful smile in return. That was nice. The whole band was rocking that ugly-on-purpose haircut style with short pleated skirts and vintage calf-high heeled boots. Fun stuff.

DCFC was excellent as usual. Damn, are they good. But I didn't avoid the people who knew all the words; there was one cute thing with deep brown eyes staring at Gibbard the whole time and mouthing the words to every song. Which I (meanly) thought was sort of amusing when he's singing "you are beautiful, but you don't mean a thing to me."

I had to take off before they had a chance to do an encore, though, because otherwise I would've missed the last bus home, and that would've sucked.

During this long but thoroughly entertaining show, I decided the best thing to do with respect to my anger towards Kevin would be to forgive him. And I suddenly felt so much better. What was wrong had little to do with something meriting much more than an apology and just...not continuing with the way things were, and it was making me so much more angry than I needed to be about it, so...forgiveness. And it was much better. I wanted to call him as soon as I left the show, but I knew he'd be asleep.

***

In Really Good But Scary news, I booked my tickets yesterday. I'm going to Southeast Asia this winter. I'll be in Tokyo (well, a Holiday Inn at the damn airport) for New Year's Eve, probably watching crazy Japanese TV and falling asleep. The next day, I'll be in Kuala Lumpur for a stay of about 8 days, hanging out with Meesh and Winnie and getting the lay of the land, before I fly to Bangkok and meet a tour that travels down the Malay Peninsula for two weeks, then fly home from Singapore.

Anyone have any tips? Requests for tchotchkes to bring home? Sweet luggage and other reusable supplies for traveling light you'll let me borrow? Leave a comment.