Trumpets in Minneapolis

As I read through the posts on here, I notice that my test post included a promise to write more about the adventures of the Trumpets on the Concert Band tour in Europe. However, since last year I bored many of you with 25000 excruciatingly detailed words about London and Paris, I will refrain from doing so on this blog, too. Instead, I will say that the trumpets didn’t drink and followed many of the rules and leave you with this picture taken after our midnight snack of wine and bread on the Seine, featuring a cameo by Mike Carter.

Trumpets in Front of Notre Dame

With the exception of the week of the Fourth of July, I’ve had a fairly quiet summer. Like previous years, I am working with people with disabilities during the day and fairly free most of the rest of the time, so the holiday week brought an enjoyable burst of socialization with Notre Dame friends. The week began with a round of golf for Tim O’Brien, his father, and myself, and – after a full, 45-hour trip to Exira, Iowa to join Michelle Letourneau, Cat Samson, and Brett Ensor for Michelle’s family Fourth of July celebration – I got to spend most of the following weekend with trumpets!

When we last left our hero, Erik and his father went their separate ways somewhere in the vicinity of the Twin Cities at an indeterminate date near the Fourth of July. On the evening of the fifth, Erik arrived at my house for the weekend. Fortunately, the front door was unlocked and Erik isn’t shy, so he let himself in when I didn’t hear the doorbell in the basement. After a late dinner, we spent the rest of the night relaxing in the basement, geeking out over photography/Apple products, and watching the second quarter of Mad Men, Season Five.

Friday afternoon we took Erik’s new car into downtown to pickup Tim O’Brien and Kevin Kelly at the U of M before heading to Hal Melia’s apartment to meet up with him, David Bratton, Kelsey Auten, and some guy that they met the night before. The whole group then walked a couple of blocks to attend the 2012 Cities97 Basilica Block Party, an annual two-night charity concert hosted by a local radio station to raise money to repair and maintain the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis. This year’s Friday night headliners included Train, Cake, and Mat Kearney.

It was a hot and humid day, similar to the first part of the day of the South Florida game this year. By the time that we got through the entrance and found our way to the main stage, Mat Kearney was about 15 minutes into his set. Within minutes, we got caught in a heavy rain, but the show continued. After no more than about fifteen minutes, though, Mat Kearney seemed to stop his song short and walk off the stage. Moments later a bolt of lighting in the distance confirmed that he had, in fact, left the stage. Despite the fact that organizers did not have the courtesy to request the presence of Usher 800, an official delay was obviously in effect, so we attempted to quickly make our way to an overpass to avoid the rain. Unfortunately, thousands of other people were trying to do the same thing, so we got as far as the edge of the bridge. Unable to find shelter and already soaking wet, we decided that there was only one thing left to do. We bought beer.

Trumpets During the Rain Delay

Eventually the rain stopped, the beer ran dry (or, at least, our bottles did), the temperature dropped by 25 degrees, and the concert resumed, so we roamed the grounds for the middle part of the evening, catching a few songs each from Imagine Dragons and The Head and the Heart. For the final acts of the evening, our group split, Tim and Kevin going to see Cake while the rest of us went to see Train. Although Kevin and Tim raved about Cake afterwards, I was a bit disappointed by Train. Their musical talent was obvious (there was no quality drop-off compared to their studio recordings, which I always find relieving), but a late start and an early finish due to additional inclement weather made for a frustratingly short show. We took advantage of the early release to get back to the car only moments ahead of a second downpour and then proceeded to spend the next half-hour in traffic downtown. After returning Tim and Kevin to the U, Erik and I went back to my house for pizza and another quarter season of Mad Men.

Saturday night brought even more time together when Hal brought not only Kevin and Tim but also Tommy Mitchell for a bonfire at my house with Erik and me in addition to a couple of my friends from high school. We ate fewer hotdogs and drank far more beer than I expected, and everyone seemed to have a good time (I recognize that I’m venturing into conjecture here, so I’ll leave it up to the others to refute that statement). The night ended with three games of Mafia. When everyone else left, Erik and I finished the last quarter of the season of Mad Men.

Those have really been the highlights of my summer. I received word this week that Jon may be up here (more time in the car after all?) the first weekend in August, so hopefully we’ll both have more to share then.

Joel “I kept it under 1000 words!” Graczyk