It's a Beautiful Day!

For my birthday this year, Alex got me tickets to the rescheduled U2 concert at TCF Stadium (U of Minnesota Football). The concert was sold out originally and I couldn't believe he was able to get tickets. I was absolutely thrilled because my biggest college regret is not seeing them when they came to Notre Dame my senior year. I fell in love with them during college and still kick myself for not standing in some ridiculous line to get tickets in some ridiculous manner that ND set up for the students.

However, it was worth the wait.

We didn't do a lot of planning for this event, which I think worked to our benefit. Alex had gotten General Admission seating which meant that we would be on the field. My only concern was would we get close enough to see the stage and U2. People lined up (rumored) at 4:30am to get in. Alex and I left our house at 4pm and got in line as they opened the gates. The line wrapped around half the stadium.

The line moved quickly and we were in the stadium by 5pm. And boy am I glad we didn't come early to get in line. We got amazing spots about 10 feet away from the outside of the stage (you could go inside the stage – but after watching the show – you would have missed a lot of the effects of the stage.)

So there we waited for 4 hours for the show to begin. Interpol was the opening music group and they entertained us for about an 1 hour or so. We were then treated for the next hour with a million different statistics and times around the world.

Then the show began and there was Bono. It was amazing to see him so close and to actually sing the songs that I have been singing for the past 10+ years with him.

All week weather forecasters were predicting severe weather during the concert. I was a little concerned more about lightning and tornadoes than rain. They did have an escape plan in case that severe weather surfaced. Half way through the show it began to rain, actually downpour, but it was a lot of fun either way. It actually added to the effect of the show and U2 was a good sport about it. Bono actually gave us a rendition of "Singing in the Rain" complete with an umbrella.

{Aplogize for the horizontal view of the vertical shot – I still cannot figure out how to rotate the file.}

Unfortunately, with the downpour of rain, everything electronic went into a bag under my rain jacket, so we weren't able to get anymore pictures during the show. At the end, we were able to get a picture of the stage to show the enormity of it. It lit up and moved. The bridges moved around the stage. It was pretty neat.

Not that I have been to many rock concerts but this definitely ranks up at the top. Celine is still an amazing performer but in a completely different way. Very hard to compare Las Vegas to this production.

Thank you Alex for an amazing gift and time. This is something that I will remember forever!!!