People,

Friday night I headed out with Brendo Frendo and my friends John and Linda to go see Kid Rock. That's right, Kid Rock.

Anyway, we set out and arrived at the arena confused. We wondered whether we had somehow gotten our directions wrong and had ended up at the White Trash of America convention and/or the "who has the most teeth" contest. Ok, that is horribly judgmental on my part, but later in the story you'll see why I'm not exactly backing off that initial impression.

On to the show. Kid Rock is very good at some of what he does, pretty good at some of the other stuff he does and painfully awful at the rest. What I really enjoy are his rap songs, which have an old school feel and a good dose of humor. How can you resist "I make punk rock/then I mix it with the hip hop/I got money like Fort Knox/ I'll forever be the Kid Rock/Forever". That's good stuff. Then there's the uptempo southern/country rock stuff which is ok I guess. He really wants to be Skynyrd or Bob Seger, but it doesn't really come off and his more serious lyrics are atrocious. Then, people, there are the interminable and intolerable ballads. Good lord almighty in heaven Jesus. When he breaks these songs out you really wish you had a good book with you or, alternatively, an icepick to stab into your brain. Pow. I mean, even the stoners were looking at each other and wondering whether the stuff was actually working. It was that much of a downer.

So, altogether I give the show a 6 on a scale of 10. The man is definitely an entertainer, is obviously very concerned about whether I'm both "ready to rock" and "having a good time", and has a really good band. Plus, he had strippers on stage which gave me something to do while my eyes glazed over during another in the long line of heartbreak ballads. Also, he's a class act. During "Cadillac Pussy" a huge neon sign saying "Cadillac Pussy" was raised against the backdrop. And when he hit the chorus it flashed. Now, I'm still relatively young and never got the chance to meet Shakespeare myself, but I have a feeling that if he had been there a tear or two would have slipped out of the old bard's eye.

After the final note slipped away we herded out to the parking lot with the drunkest slice of humanity I've been around in a looooong while. We got in out car and waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. Dag. While we were waiting we started to have a conversation about stereotypes. I acknowledged that I had an elitist opinion about most of the people at the show and that that was unfair. No sooner were the words out of my mouth than a very drunk, very heavy, very gross lady slipped somewhat behind a car near us and dropped trou. I say "somewhat" behind a car because she certainly wasn't hiding from me and I saw the entirety of what I am about to report. Anyway, we sat there and wondered if she was going to pee? or worse, poo? Nope, she wasn't going to do either of those things, electing instead to change HER TAMPON!!! Not kidding. She popped the old one out, put it on the hood of the car (which wasn't her car!!!) and popped the new one in. Then she walked away.

It was, without a doubt, the nastiest thing I have ever seen. Damn.