Livin' the Sunbird Life: "Tonight's Gonna Be A Good Night"...

October 25, 2009
Las Vegas, NV

After getting warmed up with the cheesesteaks, it was time for evening entertainment. The ladies were off to see the Cirque du Soleil show Zumanity at New York New York, and the guys headed to Sam Boyd Stadium at UNLV for the sold-out U2 concert. We found a place to park just before the stadium, which paid dividends in terms of easy-in/easy-out, and found our seats with little trouble: second row up at about the "fifty yard line" (of course, the stadium wasn't set up for football, but you get the idea). I'd gotten the tickets during a pre-sale (before availability to the general public) on u2.com; since U2 is my favorite group, I've been to see them on every tour since 1987.

The opening act turned out to be The Black-Eyed Peas, a pretty popular group in their own right. They opened with "Let's Get It Started", a perfect way to begin and ended their 45-minute set with "I Gotta Feeling" (the chorus is "Tonight's gonna be a good night").

U2 did their standard 2 hour+ show, opening up songs from their new album ("No Line On the Horizon") and then mixing in both new and old material for the rest of the show. Like many of the other shows I've seen, classics from early albums like "The Unforgettable Fire" and especially "The Joshua Tree" got the biggest fan reaction, with the newest material receiving a more muted response. This seems to be pretty typical, as there aren't any new break-out hit singles and the album seems to need time to grow on you (at least for me). It was similar a few years ago when "Pop" and "How to Dismantle and Atomic Bomb" came out.

It was interesting to see the varied age spread in the crowd. There were parents with kids in the 10-12 years old range down on the floor dancing around, lots of twenty-somethings, and even a few gray-hairs like me. The area we sat in (well, stood in - at a U2 concert, you're on your feet from the beginning until the lights come up after the encores) was filled with die-hard fans, not surprising since we all bought the tickets in the pre-sale. There were a couple of guys behind us who were on a three-week trek to see as many shows as possible (pretty good at $250+/ticket), and a couple that already had tickets to see them in Helsinki next year, as the tour continues. I'm pretty sure I'll hold off on buying a ticket (Geri's "retired" from U2 shows) for the next round of North American tour dates unless there's a follow-up album that will change things up.

Overall, it was an exceptionally good show, and I think Al and Mike enjoyed themselves as well. It's not "classic country" or "classic rock" like some friends enjoy, but U2's music continues to be my favorite...

Saturday was a time for breakfast in the morning, then some preparation for Sunday's travel in the afternoon. We went to "Hash House A G-Go" off the strip for the biggest plates we've ever seen. The ladies all had hash, and each one came in its own cast iron skillet - full. Leftovers? You bet! Back at the coach, I dumped and flushed, put the bike back on the Range Rover, and brought the awnings in. Geri straightened up the patio furniture and put away most of the stuff on the inside. We knew we wanted to get a relatively early start in the morning, since she didn't want to be driving after dark - and it gets dark so early! We definitely got spoiled with the "midnight sun" up in Alaska.

We had one more event to handle, though. Mike had made reservations at Lawry's for a final (for us - the Connecticut Crowd was staying in Las Vegas until Tuesday) for prime rib, so we continued our Adkins-like culinary experience with more beef. We had a great time, Al picked out perfect wines, starting with a lighter Pinot Noir and finishing with a Cabernet blend (Paraduxx from Napa Valley). We made friends with the six ladies from New Orleans celebrating a birthday at the next table and finally left when we noticed that the staff was standing around the edge of the dining room waiting for us to get the hint that they wanted to close up. Typical for us...