A lot has happened in the past few months so I figured I should give an update.

PAX East

I went to PAX East for the first time this year. I had never been to Boston before and I had so much fun last September that I knew I wanted to try it. There was an added benefit that I met a lot of awesome people on JoCoCruiseCrazy that I was able to see again as well.

Boston was a very cool city, I was instantly struck by “I could see myself living here” syndrome (as almost always happens when I travel).

PAX East as an experience was basically the same as PAX Prime, which is to say awesomely fun, though there were a few differences:

1. The BCEC is a better facility for a convention than the Seattle venue, it was larger and was easier to navigate.

2. One of my favorite parts of the last PAX Prime was the use of The Paramount for concerts and live events, whereas at East they just used a very large room at the BCEC. This worked out pretty well and I was happy the sound at the concerts was decent (and not a muddled mess like most convention concerts I have been to).

3. There was a bit of a different vibe, I think more laid back, to the show. Part of this might have been that with the extra space there was a lot less cramping people into small spaces.

I am not sure if I will go back to PAX East again, I would definitely like to if only to see all my friends again, but having done it once I am very glad I went.

Coachella

This year they split Coachella into two weekends with the same lineup at both. In my excitement over going last year I bought passes to both weekends, but after seeing the lineup (which was great, but not as packed with bands I knew and loved like last year) I ended up selling my passes to Weekend 2.

So the week after PAX East on Thursday I loaded up my car and headed down to Indio again.

I do not think I have the energy to write the same kind of post I did last year about Coachella, but I had a really fun time. There were a lot of great bands that I saw (Wild Flag, St. Vincent, Beirut, Florence + The Machine) and I enjoyed it.

My main gripes have to do with the weather (and also my ignorance about looking at forecasts). Last year the weather was 100 degrees every day and I sweat my butt off. At the same time I almost always overpack clothes when I travel, so assuming the weather would be the same I only brought a few summer dresses.

This was a problem on Friday when it was closer to 50 degrees with high winds and rain. I froze my ass off on Friday and then again Saturday night when the temperature dropped. Thankfully by Sunday it was much warmer and the weekend ended on an up note in terms of weather.

Looking back in hindsight, I probably should have sold my Weekend 1 passes and gone for the second. The temperatures then were 100, same as last year, so I would have been better prepared, and I would probably have had more energy.

By the time I got back after Coachella I was completely drained, having done two trips in two weeks. I think this might be age setting in, and frankly there was no way I would have been able to do a third trip even if I wanted to.

So both Coachella and PAX East were big successes. Not sure if I will do either of them again next year, based on the other changes going on in my life right now, but I would definitely like to and am happy to have been able to go this year.

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