NKOTBSB!

A few months I saw this ad on the back of The Metro for a NKOTBSB concert and got really excited!  I was too young for New Kids on the Block (NKOTB) and the Backstreet Boys (BSB) were always slightly... less loved than *NSync and 98 Degrees.  (Sorry BSB, I still love you though!)  But regardless, this concert seemed like an awesome idea and look, it even says, "once in a lifetime."  Which is kinda true.. I mean, New Kids might be able to bust a move now... but in a few more years, they're hitting 50, man!

However, when I went to check ticket prices, the cheapest, nosebleed section tickets started at $100.  Hmm.  Remember how I said the love wasn't that much?  PLUS... I've only spent about $60 on my favoritest artists.  Spending $100 (or rather $200 since I wasn't going to go alone) would've been a bit more than I wanted to spend.  So I gave up on the notion of going.  :(

Fast forward to end of May.   At work, we had our fundraising gala and someone had donated two pairs of NKOTBSB @ Fenway tickets (plus two hotel rooms) for our live auction.  The winning bid was at $600!  That was still a relatively good deal since the tickets were valued at $137 each and there were two hotel rooms!  At the end of the evening, we realized there were TWO packets of the auction prize!!  Yes, a whole other set of 4 tickets!  Oh my!  Long story short, a co worker and I were going to split it... but then the boss wanted to try to sell it.  I won't go into that since... I think a pair of tickets went to waste and that makes my blood kind of boil me irritated.

ANYWAY.  I decided two days before the concert... I still wanted to go!  And I had recently discovered stubhub.com!  (Where fans buys and sell tickets -- so secondhand tickets, but everything goes through stubhub, you don't have to interact with the seller, and stubhub guarentees the tickets are real.)  I had been stalking the site for NKOTBSB tickets for a few days already.  I ended up buying from a different site but I got tickets in the same section as the auction prizes for $50/ticket!  Granted with the handling fee and overnight FedEx shipping it came out to be like $70/ticket but that's still cheaper than $137/ticket!

I was planning on going with Tim, of course, but I had somehow enticed Courtney, whom I've known since 6th grade (and basically grew up on boy bands with), to look into the concert.  (She was coincidentally in Rhode Island!)  But come Saturday (the day of the concert), she was having trouble finding someone to go with.  Since Tim would've been going with me out of love (for me and not BSB), he offered his spot to Courtney.  :]

I would've loved to go with Tim but it was fun going with someone who knew the songs too and screamed louder than you. :-D It was like 95% women at the concert!

Jordin Sparks opened

The boys hung out with the mayor earlier in the day

Mark Wahlberg introduced his brother and NKOTB!  (Found out they're from the Boston area!)

{{screeeeeam!!!!}}  They all came out in (sparkly) Red Sox jerseys.  :-D  And the Green Monster was NKOTBSB-afied.  :]

Joey!

HELLO BRIAN!!!  :-D  (He was my favorite BSB, if you didn't know)

Here's Nick

BSB

Hello Donnie!  Umm... so... NKOTB were the buffest 40-year old men I've seen.  :oP

As you can see... it started to rain.  HARD.  But all the guys were troopers and danced and sang through it.  They were even running and sliding down the extended stage!  Here they used various Boston symbols (sports team font, our transportation logo (T), etc)

Here's the guy from NKOTB that no one knows or remembers the name of sporting Celtic jerseys!

We booked it out of the park before they finished since 1) we didn't want to battle the crowd getting out and 2) it was raining really hard and I was basically.... all wet, cold, and getting pretty uncomfortable.  :(  But then when we were walking down the street, we saw a bunch of cops and then them leaving in these white vans!!!  I'm gonna say that's AJ you can sort of see in the window there.  :oP

It was definitely a lot of fun.  We had great floor seats for a steal and minus the pouring rain, it was a great time!  :]  It was pretty funny seeing who was there for the New Kids (the 30+ year olds) and the slightly younger crowd for BSB by who would dance and belt out songs for their favorite group.

I know I often post many of the same pictures on Facebook but it's more fun to tell the stories here.  :]  For the California folks, if anyone is interested, NKOTBSB are coming to San Jose beginning of July!

Is it terrible that I was listening to N'Sync while writing this post?  :oP

                                                      

mason jar dispenser

I sometimes think I wanna collect mason jars.  Or pretty jars in general.  But I don't know where I'd put them.

Anyway, Pioneer Woman posted this mason jar dispener today.  It is SO. CUTE.  Especially with the apple slices floating in it?  Ah, can I get married again and have cool decor?  :oP

It's from Pottery Barn!

(Source)

The drink dispensers at our wedding were completely functional and lovely (and totaaaally affordable -- can we say Costco, with a coupon?) but this is too adorable!

                                                           

Anniversary trip to Newport - Day 2

Here you can find Newport - Day 1!  Now onto day two after a night's slumber at the Newport Hyatt.  I was woken up a few times during the because of the paper thin walls and who knew having a queen bed would make a double seem so much smaller.  :oP

Coffee by the dock!  It was fabulous!  Cute white lawn chairs and coffee!  :-D

Aww isn't he cute?  :]

Lunch at Gas LampGrill!  We randomly chose it while wandering down Thames St.  I had the Sea Side Reuben Sandwich (fried cod topped w/ cole slaw, swiss cheese & thousand island dress on marble rye, with a side of pasta salad --- because I was trying to be good since it felt like there were too much fries for the past few meals!)

Tim had the Caribbean Jerk Pizza (caribbean jerk sauce, roasted red peppers, sun dried tomatoes, & cheddar with chicken)

At the Breakers!  No pictures inside.  It was crazy bank!  As in... unnecessary amount of gold trimming and all that jazz.  :]  The outside grounds were fabulous!

It was then an uneventful drive back home!  It was a nice getaway and I love visiting new places, so that was fun!  :]  I'm not sure what we'd do next time, but it would be fun to visit again.  Perhaps hit up some of the beaches!  The nicer beaches weren't terribly close by, but if we've seen all the touristy things this time, we can beach bum it next time!  :]

                                                       

Anniversary trip to Newport - Day 1

I thought that hotel prices would be higher for Memorial Day weekend, PLUS I had to go to work (for the first-time home owners class)... so we celebrated our anniversary with a wee-trip to Newport, RI the following weekend.

Originally I wanted to do it big!  I mean... first year anniversary, no kids, lets get as many fun trips in before we get tied down.  But then the cost of flying and hotel-ing and the number of days Tim would have to take off... would've been a lot.  So my idea of a week long trip got whittled down to two days.  It worked out quite well anyway since silly people decided to get married so we have a couple weddings to go to and friends visiting from out of town that Tim will need to take days off for.  The days not burned for our anniversary can also go towards a trip in the fall perhaps!  Gotta spread out those vacation adventures for sanity sake.

I did most (all?  haha) of the adventure and we started with a train ride on the Newport Dinner Train, sans dinner.  :oP  I found a Groupon for it so it was a sweet deal.

The train is coming in!

Then we did the Newport Cliff Walk!

So.  I brought my new big camera.  And... at some point after lunch, the dial got switched to Manual but with all the wrong settings and I wasn't paying attention to the display screen, so for most of the cliff walk, I ended up with white photos.  :(  BUT.  I had my trusty point-and-shoot (you know, for arms-length self portraits), so we re-walked a short section of the cliff walk so I could snap a few photos.

Cliff walk

The Breaker's gate!  The Breakers is one of many mansions in Newport.  BIG fancy houses.   We chose The Breakers but by the time we got there on Saturday, they were about to close.  So we decided to come back the next day and take our time.

"Love is Life."  Tim kindly obliged my re-walk of the cliff walk to get this picture for the second time.  :]

Galato.  Should be a must-have on every trip.  :]  It was delicious!

So Newport-y.  :]

There was this FANCY sailing boat!  The rigging stuff was metal and we *think* the sails probably just retract out of them. Fancypants.

Our room at the Hyatt!  It was a lovely room (minus the paper thin door where you could hear everything in the hall) though who knew double beds seem so small after you sleep in a queen for awhile.  :oP  We booked through Priceline and the front desk said this was the best they could do.  Beware of resort fees!  There was a $35 DAILY fee.  Boooo.

S'mores pit at sunset  :]

The sunset and FLASH!  :oP

Newport Lighthouse

Blogger was being difficult/slow with the photos so I will be spliting the pics up into the two days we were there.  Newport was a lovely seaside town though there were already buttloads of people.  I imagine there'll be more over the summer!  It was indeed slightly snobby and apparently nautical colors and stripes are super trendy there.

We made the "mistake" of checking out cliff walk from downtown on FOOT.  Our hotel was located on Goat Island which was 1-mile from downtown.  There was a shuttle bus but sometimes we just walked it.  So from the hotel to downtown to cliff walk, down the cliff walk to The Breakers, then back to downtown, then back to the hotel... we walked like ~7 miles!  It was great exercise but we were totally exhausted that night!

Tomorrow (or when I get around to it), DAY TWO in Newport!  :]

                                                             

edible maps

How cute are these?!  I love maps.  Maps maps maps.  :]

This can't be on purpose, can it??  So.  Very.  Cool.  (Source)

Skills!!!  (Source)

Tonight, we had the craziest thunderstorm ever!!  Serious lightning for like half hour, with sonic boom thunder!  It was exciting and kind of scary all at the same time!  We had a tornado warning earlier in the day!  But nothing happened much here besides the lightning and thunder, but there were a few deaths in other parts of Massachusetts.  :(

And.

I have a strong desire to go to Hawaii.