Our big night out

Thursday afternoon, Jason and I drove to Oakland to see AC/DC at the Oakland coliseum. It was so nice to get out of town for a night. Big D got to stay the night with grandma and grandpa Robertson, which my mom was just tickled about.

We roll into town and took the BART into the coliseum. I was really looking forward to doing some serious people watching and seeing some die hards. I was not let down. When I worked at the State Park one summer, I always knew who was playing at Konocti by the appearance of the campers rolling in during concert nights. I saw it all from the Willy Nelson fans to Salt N Peppa fans.

My personal favorite were the fans that showed up to see Rock Doesn't stop (Poison, warrant, etc.)

They checked into their campsites in the afternoon looking like the average person. When I saw them all leave around concert time, I see them looking all glammed up. It was great.



I was trying to be stealthy with my picture taking, so this is the best shot I could get of this one guy. He was dressed in a little school boy uniform and had the cap with devil horns coming out of it. I guess I could have been bold and just asked him if I could get his picture, but I didn't.

The fans that showed up Thursday night were pretty much what I expected. The majority of the folks were over 35, wearing their old vintage concert T shirts. There were a surprising number of families, and a few whipper snappers thrown in, but not many 18- 20 somethings. a few people dressed up as Angus, and lots of people were sporting devil horns. I was bummed that I had packed up my devil horns with all my halloween stuff.

We made our way to our seats and find Art Garfunkel sitting in front of us. Not really, but he looked just like him.

He is sitting there on the right with his two sons. He was having the time of his life, he had the biggest grin on his face and even though he seemed to be a pretty reserved little man, he did get up and dance and sing along with the best of them. His two boys were duds. At one point, one of his sons, who was probably 12 or so, sat down and looked very annoyed by the whole thing. Kids today apparently do not know how to party seriously.

Then there was this guy.

He showed up with his buddy and they looked like they had done some pre partying out in the parking lot. Anyway, he happened to walk in when the opening band was playing. Note: opening band was horrible. Anyway, this guy and his buddy came walking in, he was playing air guitar the whole entire time, even to this crappy opening band and looking like he was on top of the world. I am glad I captured this picture of him without being too obvious. I just wish I had captured him in an air guitar moment.

Finally, the opening band finishes and after a short wait, out they come. They opened with a song from their new album but played plenty of their oldies, which made me happy: Back in black, Dirty Deeds, the Jack, Thunderstruck, Whole lotta woman, TNT, Shook me all night long, etc. etc. I'll just let the pictures do the talking here.

**** Note the devil horns hands here*******


Angus did a strip tease and showed us his little bum

Their stage was awesome, there was this big train (With devil horns of course), when they played Hells Bells, a giant bell came down and Angus jumped up and hung from it. Those guys have not slowed down a bit and you could tell they were still so into putting on a great show for their fans.

After the show ended, we walked back to BART, stopping from time to time to watch some scuffles between some drunkards. We don't get out much so we were taking in all the excitement we could get. We bought a couple of discounted, unlicensed T shirts in the BART station, and headed to our hotel with some ringing of the ears but otherwise very pleased.

The next day, we headed to the Oakland Flea market and looked for some bargains.

I almost bought a stolen Nano Ipod for $80.00 but decided to pass and got a John Denver's greatest hits CD instead.

Wow, look how young and virile he looks here. This is not the John Denver I remember. John, why did you have to leave us so soon?! I still love you despite all of your faults. (And I know there were plenty)

Jason got some tools and fishing supplies and we headed on home.

Well, my ears are still ringing but the show was well worth our time. I am proud of those old guys and I hope they will be rockin for some years to some.