Phish ~ Telluride, CO 2010
Finally – getting a chance to sit down and post about this new adventure. Seeing Phish always requires a day or two for me to digest exactly what in the hell just happened.
Also, uploading the pictures (many, many, perhaps way too many pictures) to the gallery has taken quite a bit of time.
Last year we were amazed to have Phish practically in our backyard when they played at Red Rocks. This year we were lucky to have Phish play at Telluride. With a six hour drive this was definitely not in our backyard.
This was the plan:
Sunday – leave around noon-ish and head for Montrose and stay in a hotel. Montrose, being only 45 minutes away from Telluride, would be a perfect stopping point.
Monday – leave Montrose around nine-ish to arrive early enough in Telluride to figure shit out. We were told that they weren’t going to let us into Town Park camping until noon. We also had to meet up with our friend, Jeremiah, to get our tickets to the show. We were anticipating long lines to get to our camp site and other general mayhem.
Unfortunately I spent most of the wee hours of Sunday morning puking my guts out for some inexplicable reason and felt like ass. Thankfully, most of the packing preparations were done the night before and all that was left was to pack clothing and chuck the stuff into the car. The trip came damn close to being called off, but there was absolutely no way in hell that I was going to miss this show! So, only a couple of hours behind schedule, we left Steamboat, got to Montrose, gathered the items we didn’t get a chance to pack (stuff like food), watched some tube in the hotel, grabbed a final hot shower in the AM and headed to Telluride.
I have to stop here and give some serious props to the town of Telluride and the folks who live there. I don’t know if they had any idea as to what they had signed on for when they approved having Phish come to town. Telluride is not new to music festivals. They have been putting on the Telluride Bluegrass festival for 37 years. But Phish is a bit different. The Phish scene is generally perceived to be a bunch of dirty hippies high on various illegal substances. I’m pretty sure that this notion has been completely erased. Phish fans are a community of fun loving folks who also like to spend some cash. It’s amazing that this little community of 3,000 people could host over 9,000 Phish-heads for two days. And to pull it off so smoothly boggles the mind.
We made it to Telluride right on schedule. The deal was if you were camping at Town Park you had to unload all of your gear as quickly as possible and then park your car somewhere. At first I thought this was going to be some crazy, hectic lunacy, but things were pretty organized. Dave parked the car wherever and by the time he got back I had camp all set up complete with Fat Tires at the ready and it wasn’t even noon yet.
The crazy thing about setting up camp was pulling up alongside two of our friends, Matty & Z, from Steamboat – completely random and accidental and awesome.
With camp all set up it was time to kick back and relax, cook some brats and corn on the cob on our baby grill, drink a few beers and eventually head into line for the start of the first night’s show. The Town Park campground is practically spitting distance from the stage and we were actually able to see the stage from our camp site.
Waiting in line:
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The views all around the concert area were so magnificent that it was actually difficult to pay attention to what was happening on the stage:
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We spent our first night of Phish fourth row, dead fucking center – 4DFC baby!
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The second day we got into doing some sightseeing. We rode up the free gondola to get to the Mountain Village, gawk at the awesome scenery and grab some lunch.
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Then it was back to camp for some more Fat Tires and visiting with our fellow campers. We listened to sound check from our comfy camp site and met up with a couple more friends, Jill and Mark, that we hadn’t seen in quite some time – five years or so. In fact, we were so comfortable in camp that we couldn’t get our act together well enough to get in line for posters. We decided to take day two a little more casual and not worry about how close we could get to the stage. We managed to grab a comfy spot with plenty of room for all of our friends that we had met up with to join us.
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The music was fantastic, the crowd lovely; all in all we had a great two nights of Phish. I’m already looking forward to my next Phish adventure (whenever or wherever that might be).
August 9, 2010 Set-list:
Set 1: Down with Disease, Camel Walk, Ocelot, Light Up Or Leave Me Alone, Summer of ’89, Stash, Cavern, The Wedge, Possum, Julius
Set 2: Sand > Backwards Down the Number Line > Prince Caspian > Tweezer > Boogie On Reggae Woman > Piper > Mountains in the Mist, David Bowie, A Day in the Life
Encore: Quinn the Eskimo1, Tweezer Reprise
August 10, 2010 Set-list:
Set 1: The Squirming Coil, Stealing Time From the Faulty Plan, Ya Mar, Timber (Jerry), Let Me Lie, The Divided Sky, Walk Away, Roses Are Free > Limb By Limb, Bouncing Around the Room, Run Like an Antelope
Set 2: Party Time, Mike’s Song > Crosseyed and Painless > I Am Hydrogen > Weekapaug Groove, Destiny Unbound, Carini > Free > Heavy Things, You Enjoy Myself
Encore: Shine a Light
Controversy From the German Grand Prix 2010
The 2010 season of Formula One has been relatively controversy free; no major scandals or upheavals to even report about. That all ended yesterday with Ferrari blatantly giving team orders to Felipe Massa to let his teammate, Fernando Alonso, through to win the race.
Formula One is comprised of twelve teams with two cars and two drivers in each team. Team orders, which have been banned since 2002, are part of the strategy for teams to gain as many championship points as possible. After all, it is the team that comes first; drivers are second. However, in order for the team to successfully grab the championship one of their drivers must also win. As the season progresses and the number of championship points dwindles, teams may choose one of their drivers who may have the best chance at clinching the championship. This driver will then receive the full backing of the team and assistance from his teammate. Even though the regulations ban this type of behavior all of the teams do this. Ask any of them, however, and they will vehemently deny it.
So, if they all do it and everyone knows that they all do it, what’s the big deal? It was the manner in which the team orders were given that has most people pissed off. The orders were so obvious to anyone watching the race and the lying that ensued afterwards was downright embarrassing.
Here is how the race played out –
Fernando Alonso qualified in second position with his teammate, Felipe Massa in third. Massa was able to get a better start and got by Alonso and Vettel for first position. Alonso also got by Vettel and claimed second. The rest of the race was rather uneventful with Alonso posting fastest lap times and Massa responding with his own fastest lap times. Ferrari should have been happy with a 1 – 2 finish the problem was that the wrong driver was in the lead; Alonso was leading Massa by 21 points in the championship.
Alonso did eventually manage to catch up to his teammate and tried to get around him during lap 23. Massa, however, held onto his position. A frustrated Alonso was then heard over the radio saying, “This is ridiculous”. Massa was able to pull away from his teammate and looked fairly secure in his lead. Alonso, once again, caught up to Massa and by lap 40 had closed the gap down to 1 second.
This is when Rob Smedley, Massa’s race engineer, is heard telling Massa that “Fernando is faster than you.” Not shortly after this transmission, Massa is seen dramatically slowing down, Fernando went by and Rob Smedley is heard apologizing to his driver.
The FIA have fined Ferrari $100,00 for this indiscretionary use of team orders. This is mere pocket change and amounts to nothing more than a wimpy slap on the wrist. The case has been handed over to the World Motor Sport Council who have the ability to impose whatever sanctions they want; if they decide to do anything at all.
Meanwhile, Alonso gets the win, Ferrari garner more points towards the championship and fans, like myself, feel cheated at not getting a clean race. This is, after all, what Formula One is – a race.
Rhythm Devils in Steamboat Springs
The whole town came out to Howelsen Hill yesterday to listen to the Rhythm Devils. The show was part of the Summer Free Concert series; huge thank yous for the promoters for finally getting a band other than the Wailers.
For those of you not familiar with the Rhythm Devils, the band was founded by Bill Kreutzmann and Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead. Over the years their band has had a revolving troupe of members. This summer the Rhythm Devils include the one-man band of Keller Williams (guitar, vocals), Davy Knowles (Backdoor Slam – guitar, vocals), Andy Hess (bass), and Sikiru Adepoju (talking drum).
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Set-list:
Sitting on Top of the World Encore: Almost Cut My Hair |
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Show notes: Voodoo Zombies was awesome; Davy Knowles is amazing and Mickey Hart managed to screw up Iko Iko. Seriously, how many times has he played that damn song? Pretty funny.
If you want to give the show a listen, you can download it here: COTapers.org. You will need to register if you are not already a member. Once you are a member you will have access to a treasure trove of wonderful music. Thanks to phrog for flying the mics.
Why is Rubens Barrichello Such a Baby?
It’s the hot story coming out of last weekend’s Monaco Grand Prix; the fantastic crash by Rubens Barrichello.
It is a pretty amazing crash when you consider that cars are going somewhere in the neighborhood of 120mph into this turn. An investigation into the crash by Williams has determined that a loose manhole cover was the culprit. As Barrichello came around turn 2 he hit the cover which flipped up and hit his left rear tire causing him to lose control of the car. In the video you see Rubens throw his $50,000 steering wheel onto the track. This is actually a breach in FIA regulations as the steering wheel must be reconnected after abandoning a stricken car. However, Rubens Barrichello, the man who has an excuse for absolutely everything as nothing is ever his fault stated:
“I threw the steering wheel because I wanted to get out of the car as soon as possible. After the shunt I was facing the wrong side of the track and the car was on fire.”
First of all, I didn’t see any flames shooting from the vehicle. Secondly, why couldn’t he have simply placed the steering wheel on top of the car, gotten out and tossed it back into the cockpit if he didn’t have time to reconnect it? Instead, he had a typical Rubens baby fit and tossed the steering wheel onto the track and into traffic without a second thought regarding the safety of the other drivers. Rubens Barrichello of all people should know the danger of debris on the track. It was a spring that came off his car last year during the Hungarian Grand Prix that hit Felipe Massa in the head sending the Brazilian hurtling off the track unconscious. Massa required brain surgery and subsequently missed the rest of the 2009 F1 season.
In this video you see the Hispania Racing Team car of Karun Chandhok run over Barrichello’s discarded steering wheel and drive off with it:
The steering wheel finally came dislodged before Chandhouk entered the tunnel only to be run over again by his teammate, Bruno Senna. Luckily, neither driver expeirenced any mishaps.
You may also remember the famous “blah blah” incident where Barrichello lashed out at his team during the 2009 German Grand Prix after he went from first to sixth place:
There was a great show from the team today of how to lose a race. I did all I could today, I got first at the first corner, and they made me lose the race.
If we keep going like this we’re going to lose both championships. To be very honest with you I wish I could get on a plane and just go home, because when I go to the team afterwards there will be a lot of ‘blah, blah, blah’ and I don’t want to hear that right now.
Formula 1 is generally depicted as the crème de la crème of motorsport; a gentlemen’s sport if you will. So, why does Rubens stomp around, throw fits and continually make a horse’s ass out of himself? Sometimes errors are made in team orders, sometimes incidents occur that are the fault of the driver. Never once have I heard Rubens take responsibility for what has happened on the track. And to publicly lash out at the team, whoever was at fault, is quite unheard of.
I’m not a Lewis Hamilton fan mainly because he does his fair share of whining. However, Rubens has just knocked Hamilton out of the “least favorite driver” list for me. Perhaps Rubens should take a lesson from Fernando Alonso. Alonso crashed his car during Saturday practice at Monaco, causing such damage that he missed qualifying and had to start the race from the pit lane. Pretty upsetting and frustrating especially considering that he is considered to be one of the top drivers to win the championship. He admitted to his crash being due to driver error. No whining. He simply pointed out that Michael Schumacher had started from the pit lane in 2005 and ended up in fifth place at the end of the race. Alonso managed sixth.
Random Photos of the Weekend
This is no ordinary exercise ball; we call it “The Orb”. It has been in our yard for well over four years, completely inflated. Every now and then it gets untangled from the willows and floats around in the creek.
The creek was quite high as it had snowed heavily during Friday night and Saturday morning. This Dandelion was caught up in the flood waters.
It’s next to impossible to get this dog to pose for the camera. This is one of the rare times when she decided to oblige.
These Daffodils looked so sad with their heads bowed over looking at the snow wondering when it would ever be Spring.
2010 F1 Schedule
Date Location Mar. 14 
Sakhir - Bahrain Mar. 28 
Melbourne - Australia Apr. 04 
Kuala Lumpur - Malaysia Apr. 18 
Shanghai - China May 09 
Barcelona - Spain May 16 
Monaco May 30 
Istanbul - Turkey Jun. 13 
Montreal - Canada Jun. 27 Valencia - Spain Jul. 11 
Silverstone - Great Britain Jul. 25 
Hockenheim - Germany Aug. 01 
Budapest - Hungary Aug. 29 
Spa-Francorchamps - Belgium Sep. 12 
Monza - Italy Sep. 26 
Singapore Oct. 10 
Suzuka - Japan Oct. 24 
South Korea Nov. 07 
Sao Paulo - Brazil Nov. 14 
Abu Dhabi - United Arab Emirates -
