From the File Marked "Greatest Days Ever" Pt. 2

If you're just tuning in, and there's really no good reason why you should be considering Part 1 is just below, the story left off with my roommate Aaron and I on a quest for much needed extra credit so that we wouldn't fail the History of Rock Music class we were taking over the summer.

We found a possible source of extra credit thanks to a classified ad in the paper. Some silly goose was selling a pair of tickets to the KISS show in Kansas City the following night.

We didn't think there was a chance in hell such hot tickets would still be available but we called anyway. The guy on the other end of the phone said they were still up for sale and that if we wanted them we better show up quick because he was heading out the door. Apparently his snakes needed feeding and he was fresh out of mice. I felt his pain and frustration. I always hate it when that happens.

Aaron and I high tailed it over to his place, (basement apartment, black lights and coordinating posters, tasteful though- not gaudy, and half a dozen snakequariums or what have you) to pick up the tickets.

This guy, (purple cut off sweatpants that really set his forest of red leg hair ablaze, sleeveless tee, perfectly feathered thinning hair topped him off) really didn't seem like the sort of guy who'd miss the KISS Reunion Tour. And he wasn't about to. Apparently, his diligence at calling into 106.3 The Blaze- "Lincoln's Home for Pure Rock" scored him a couple of seats on the station's party bus which included a set of floor tickets.

We took the tickets off his hands and I was left with $14 and whatever change I could find in the couch to my name. Really didn't matter though. Mayhem was scheduled to begin in less than 24 hours.

But first we needed to find some beer.

Being 20 is probably the worst age someone can be. You might as well spend the entire year stuck in a waiting room until the real fun can start at 21.You're an adult but not old enough to buy your own adult beverages, which means you've gotta channel Malcolm X and obtain beer by any means necessary. For Aaron and I, that meant beggin' our permanently stoned neighbor to get off the couch to run a 5 minute errand. We had about as much luck as someone who gets struck by lightning while standing next to a Leprechaun.

And politicians wonder why so many kids turn to drugs. Could it because they're easier to purchase than a 12 pack of beer?

The big day arrived and went by all too slow. Aaron had to work until 5:30 and KISS was scheduled to throwdown when the clock struck ocho. The looming problem was that Kansas City was three hours away.

Would his little Mazda find the power to knock half an hour off our journey?

Didn't matter though. While he was at work, one of his co workers picked him up a case of beer. Aaron worked as a runner at a law firm and coaxed one of the lawyers into the breaking the law on the basis of a seldom used special occasion statute.

There was gas in the car and we had beer. The only problem was we had no ice and July in Nebraska is hot enough suck the beer right out of an aluminum can. Sure,we could have stepped up our game and spent a buck on ice but that dollar could no doubt be put to better use on the road so we lined a cooler never opened bags of frozen broccoli that for some mysterious reason had come with our apartment.

Before long, we were on the road. There's nothing barreling down the road 90mph in a car that really isn't meant to do 90- especially when the windows are rolled down due to lack of air conditioning. The sheer amount of noise kept the conversation to a minimum but that was OK. We had plenty of beer and cooler full of thawing broccoli if an unexpected emergency reared its ugly head. The miles started racking up and in just over an hour, we unpeeled ourselves from the vinyl seats that had fused to our skin for the trip's only pit stop.

If you've never set foot in Missouri, the state boasts one particular quirk that makes it a bit like the Mexico of the the Midwest. Just about every type of firework/explosive device meant to be detonated in the name of fun is available for purchase 365 days a year. Once inside the boundaries of Missurah, Costco sized fireworks stands line the highway like a never ending convoy of outlet malls that would only exist inside a redneck's wildest dreams.

We stopped at the biggest one we saw and for the first time in our young lives both regretted that we never took up smoking. Just how funny would it have been to walk into a store with more explosive devices than a lot of third world countries with a cigarette dangling carelessly from your lip and mosey up to a clerk and ask in all seriousness, "Where da y'all keep the thermonuclear shit?"

Then again 10 years later here in 2006, that same idea would probably much funnier if that someone were Arab and wearing a turban instead of a generic white guy in a sleeveless White Zombie t-shirt.

It didn't take long to make our purchases. We knew what we wanted going in. Growing up in a place like Nebraska where the 4th of July gives Christmas a run for its money, fireworks are a way of life. So much so that time and money has been spent to pass laws to banish specific types- namely bottle rockets and M-80 firecrackers. The only items on our shopping list though the might M-80 had been toned down considerably since the days of yore when a single firecracker packed as much wallop as a quarter stick of dynamite.

We were back on the road in no time. A pile of empty Busch Light cans littered the floor next to a big bag of explosives. We'd worry about where to hide the fireworks before returning to Nebraska later. Around the fourth, runs over the border in the name of really good fireworks are so popular that the Nebraska State Patrol actually sets up a major sting operation at the border. Hmm... Aaron and I thought maybe we could throw them off the scent of illegal gunpowder if we picked up an illegal alien somewhere along the way.

Downtown Kansas City came into view only 15 minutes before showtime. Riding shotgun I examined the map and feared for the worst. Out current situation was eerily similar to the last time I tried playing navigator through Kansas City. Just a few months earlier on our way to an Ultimate tournament, we drove off course for a good hour before I realized the map I was staring at wasn't of Missouri but of Mississippi. Isn't it funny how you get a little stupid when you're stoned?

Things were a little better this time around. We only took one wrong turn and arrived at the arena not too long after showtime. In the Midwest fashionably late dosen't exist and we were probably the last people to arrive. We were so late that some people must have already left because we found a too good to be true sliver of a parking spot between a couple tour buses that appeared to be the only one available in the entire lot.

We rolled the tow truck dice, took the spot, and sprinted into the arena. The house lights were already down and the crowd was going bat shit crazy. For the first time since we scored the tickets we started to grow curious about just where we were going to be sitting. The hesher we bought them from said they were dead center but he failed to elaborated that they were dead center in the upper deck of the absolute last row of the arena- so far up in the nosebleeds that you could lean back and rest your head on the wall. But they were happily waiting for us and by the looks of things had to be the only unoccupied seats in the entire arena. Maybe it was a fair trade for such good parking.

We didn't even have time to catch our breath or even think about adjusting to our surroundings before an at least 20 year old announcement bellowed a few very important words to the audience.

"You wanted the best and you get the best. The hottest band in the world- KISSSSS!"

What happened next is a little hard to explain as it all happened about as fast as the fight between Neo and Mr. Smith in "The Matrix."

Right as the fifth 's' in KISS started to fade, Ace Frehly ripped into the opening of "Duece." A few notes in, the Vader black curtain cocooning the stage dropped at the exact same moment the whole world exploded in a ball of fire. The the falling curtain and the rising flames going up passed each other along the way leaving KISS already rocking out with the hammer down. Their opening was a very bold statement that seemingly taunted the audience to go ahead and try to catch up the pace the were setting.

Sure, you can see these guys on TV and have a good idea about what is going to unfold but until you see the chaos live you really have no idea. Aaron and I were easily the youngest people in our section and we by far the most blown away. None of the concerts we'd ever been to representing some of the finest acts of our generation did anything remotely close to the kind of show KISS delivered onstage. Not even Metallica could hold a candle to these guys. Their pyrotechnic show durning their encore of "One" now looked like a chubby little girl in a tutu waving a sparkler in each hand.

By the time Ace started his guitar solo in which his guitar A) started on fire and B) shot missiles that from our vantage point just had to somehow be fake*, we were fully lobotomized by their brand of rock and roll. True, the vast amounts of grass (as the old timers around us called it) being passed around helped too.

Just a scant 15 years earlier the very site of KISS had me running for cover after I saw their appearance on 3-2-1 Contact, a childhood scarring moment that ranks right up there with the time my mom took me to see "The Shining." Now, I couldn't believe that I was blessed enough to witness the greatest show on earth. Up yours Barnum and Bailey.

When the show climaxed with "DetroitRock City." Aaron and I were completely wasted both mentally and, well, mentally I guess. I knew the only cure for what ailed us could be found thirty or so miles in the wrong direction from home where the northernmost Waffle House (#281) could be found. Don't ask how I know.I just do, OK?

There's no such thing as a late night trip to a Waffle House that isn't weird and this one was no exception. The only other diners at midnight on a Wednesday were a group of older folks who'd also been at the KISS show. They could tell by our glazed over euphoria that we'd also been at the same place. And they had a few questions for us youngsters, specifically about the opening act we missed- Alice in Chains. How the hell could people our age think the shit they played was anything close to music? The best part was when the lady with the femme mullet who asked the question stood up on a stool at the counter and acted out Jerry Cantrell's put you to sleep style of playing guitar. "All he did was stand there like this and the blond guy just yelled stuff that didn't make sense. How is that supposed to be good?"

A couple summers earlier Aaron and I saw "Alice" play Lollapalooza and thought they were rad. Now after seeing KISS we realized we grew up in the wrong era and the folks who were our age in the 70's had used up all the fun. Lane Staley probably knew it too as that opening gig for KISS was the last show ever did.

The trip home was nothing but smooth sailing if what you'd call the events that unfolded at the end of "A Perfect Storm" smooth sailing. A textbook Midwest thunderstorm graced us with its presence. Gale force winds blew Aaron's little Mazda back and forth across the road and the buckets of rain made it impossible to see except when eye searing lightning lit up the sky a few seconds at a time. I had a hunch death was imminent and I figured there wasn't much I could do, so much to Aaron's dismay I decided to pass out and wait for the Grim Reaper with a belly full of waffles and bacon.

Turns out we didn't make it home in one shot. Woke up the next morning at dawn in the parking lot of some random Missouri rest stop with an opened pack of bottle rockets in my lap. I was confused for a moment but soon came to my senses. Aaron was still slumped over the steering wheel snoring like a freight train and decided it was best not to wake the tired fella up.

While I waited, I started to piece together the events that had unfolded just a few hours earlier but decided it wasn't worth the bother. Any day that starts with beer and ends with at wake up call in a rest stop parking lot without involving an anal buggering at the hand of a redneck trucker has to be a perfect day.

(*In regards to the asterisk that I know you forgot you even saw. A few months later KISS came to play a show in Omaha. Aaron and I went with our friend Jason who's greatest KISS moment involved singing "Heaven's on Fire" at his school's talent show. We got right up front and saw with our own eyes that Ace's guitar really did fire missiles.)