We got to the festival grounds early on Friday. It wasn’t even noon yet, but there were so few people going in at that hour, there was no way to blend into the crowd and the security set-up was air-tight. We started at the main entrance to scope out the situation. To get in, you needed a wristband with an RFID chip in it that went off when you walked through a metal detector like booth. Typically, guards stand off to the side of these booths and half-heartedly watch you go through, but these guards were smartly positioned inside the lane. You would have had to run them over to go through and with a second line of defense right behind them, it wasn’t worth an attempt. I saw some second-line guys with walkie-talkies, but no uniformed cops, so we figured we could try again when it got more crowded. We figured we might as well try the crash that got us in last year. Go to the booth where they help you if your ticket won’t scan, pretend the issue is resolved, pick up a schedule and walk right in. If only it were that simple.

Andy was wearing his Lolla 2011 wristband inside out and I was wearing a Rothbury 2008 wristband, so we at least had a cloth band on. We got by the guy at the opening to that line by asking him if that was the spot for wristbands that didn’t scan. He let us move up to the booth to work out our “problem” and we just stood there, pretending to talk to someone and picked up a schedule. At that point, all we had between us and the fest was a woman who looked to be in her 40s or 50s and she looked semi-distracted. I walked towards her confidently and was two or three steps from freedom, when she took one side step and cornered me, asking for my wristband. I tried to flash it quickly, and keep moving, but she was now firmly between me and the door and apparently if it’s broken, they don’t just let you go, they give you a working one. This wasn’t going to cut it. Also, it’s a pretty small area and everyone around us could tell we didn’t have the right wristband, so we played dumb and retreated. That’s a nice thing about security guards. If it doesn’t work and you haven’t made a grand gesture, you can always just walk away. Their job is to stop you from getting in. They almost never care what you do as long as you walk away and don’t start trouble. Cops are another story, but we’ll get to that.

We had just gotten a text that our friends were on their way to the American Legion party and that Big Boi was DJing at 2, so we figured we’d re-group, have a couple (or five) free drinks and then head back. Of course, Big Boi was actually scheduled for 2:30 and didn’t get to the decks until 3:15 and did almost nothing except text on his phone and repeat a couple lines until he sang “Shutterbug” at the end. That was pretty cool, and I had a solid buzz going and it was good to catch up with friends, but we came to festival. On the way out, we ran into McLovin (Christopher Mintz Plasse) and he looked even scrawnier and more awkward in real life than you’d imagine. We were like 5 feet away from him and looked at each other like “Do we have anything to say to him? Not really. Let’s go.” It didn’t hit me until I saw McLovin again at Bright Eyes that I was becoming him.

1. Self-Appointed Nickname: Like McLovin, I came up with a name for myself and talked myself into believing I could pull it off, while being blatantly obvious about it. I was either going to call myself The Festival Crasher or McLovin … or Seal

Click here to view the embedded video.

2. Blindsided by near success: When we got back to the festival grounds, there still weren’t enough people to blend in with the crowd well, but there was one guard I thought I could get by. He looked like Brian, the nerdy kid from “My So Called Life” with frizzy blonde hair, but more of a stoner. He had 5 people in his line and seemed overwhelmed. I told Andy to follow me and made a bee-line for him. The scanner next to me told me to go to her line, since she had no one waiting, but I insisted on staying. While I was talking to her, I kept moving up in line and was next. I put my Rothbury wristband against the panel and no green ding happened, but I pretended it did and took a few steps into the festival, doing my best “it worked” head nod. As soon as I cleared the metal-detector gate,  frizzy Brian started looking around, confused, saying “hey!” and I saw the last thing you want to see. A uniformed cop. Two of them actually. Shit.

Click here to view the embedded video.

3. Fuck My Life: I saw the cops and immediately started backpedaling. Not running, but moving back and stuttering. As Andy tells it, “I saw the cop look up at you, and the look wasn’t just, ‘oh, this guy is crashing’ but a ‘That’s the guy!’ recognition look.”  I had about 10-15 feet between myself and the cops and heard them calling “Get back here!” I turned around and saw them  walking towards me. “I was just … I’m leaving. OK. I …” “When an officer tells you to do something, you listen! Get over here, now!” If it was a security guard, I would have kept walking, but if I’ve learned anything about cops, it’s that you do exactly what they say. Respectfully. I had to avoid a resisting arrest charge, so I felt obligated to stop and chat. Andy slunk off, knowing we were pretty screwed if this led to me getting arrested on day one of the festival.

Click here to view the embedded video.

4. Old Enough to Party?: Cops have a funny way of talking. And by funny, I mean, they ask a lot of intimidating rhetorical questions and expect you to know how to answer them. “How’s your prison lingo?” the cop who took control of the situation asked me. “I’ve never been to prison, officer.” “Oh yeah? I’m surprised. (Knowing look.) Yeah, I know who you are. You like to crash festival gates, don’t you?” How do you answer that? I gave a sheepish smile and said “Well…I’m not trying to. I just want to go…” “Oh, no. You had your chance to leave like a man…” Since I didn’t know what to say to that, he asked for my license and wrote down my full name and ID #. “If I see you around here, trying to sneak in again, I’ll tase you. I’m serious. I’ll tackle you and I’ll tase you.” “I won’t try. I promise. I. I …” “You better be serious. This is your last warning.” “Thank you, officer. I won’t do it again.”

Click here to view the embedded video.

5. I’m in & Cops Can Have a Fun Time Too (This kid’s fucking crazy)

So they let me off with a warning, but effectively scared me shitless. I’ve been turned away from festivals several times, only to crash later, but I’ll admit it, they scared me straight. Not to mention that Andy didn’t have a ticket either and we were anxious to get in. We ran into a guy selling two wristbands and talked him down from 220 to 180 each. He even followed us to an ATM. I can taste the vomit in my mouth as I type this sentence. It was the first weekend wristband I’ve bought for a festival … ever. God, I hate this. I spent $180 I didn’t budget for a wristband and admitted defeat against my sworn enemy.

It got a bit stranger. I received a tweet from @bignastypigtax saying “@festivalcrasher Zach glad to see u honored ur pledge not to crash anymore. Buying that 3day pass was a great gesture.” That’s odd. I wonder who wrote that. One more tweet “@ZackTeibloom Thx for honoring ur raised hand pledge of no more crashing” Wait, who is this guy? They don’t even have a twitter picture. Let’s see who else they follow: Only @festivalcrasher. And these are their only two tweets ever. What’s even more bizarre is that I couldn’t get service to tweet from @festivalcrasher, so I was tweeting by text from @ZackTeibloom. The only possible explanation is that the cop set-up an account to follow me and was now tweeting me a congratulations…for not crashing. What is this world coming to? I don’t want to be friends with cops that aren’t Andy’s dad. I don’t want this at all.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Yeah, it was kinda cool when McLovin got fake taken away in handcuffs, but is this my life now? Am I done crashing? Am I just done taking risks on crashing events where they clearly have it on lockdown? I’m not ready to make any declarations, but this is a low point in crashing history. I didn’t even jump lines all week. What happened to me? What does this mean going forward? Am I going to have to go legit now?

We found ourselves on the side entrance, and decided to try our luck there. Jess and Caitlin walked in, while I stood outside tweeting and holding onto two umbrellas.** They played it coy and hung around for a few minutes inside the fest, which was a tad unnecessary, but I appreciated their stealthiness. As I got to the point of … OK where are they already … Caitlin walked out as I had picked up my phone to call her. 

We walked a few unnecessary blocks and then she handed me the wristband. I was able to slip it on my wrist within 15 seconds and it felt incredibly snug. We walked back to the entrance and didn’t even wait the 15-minutes that they make you wait before re-entering the fest. Caitlin was waved through and I was waved through, but towards a security checkpoint to see what was up with my wristband. What happened was that Caitlin was unable to scan both her and Jess’ wristband on the way out, so Jess’ was still checked in. I walked tentatively towards the checkpoint of four employees huddled together, but was already past the entrance. As I got closer to them, one of them saw my secure wristband and waved me through with a “Oh, don’t worry about it” look. I didn’t. The entire process took all of 10 minutes. I gave Jess back her wristband and she was pretty beat, and intended on selling that bad boy***. Many thanks, Jess and Caitlin. Rock stars, the both of you.

(1:4) And the Festival Crasher saw the pass back and it was good. And the pass back divided the crashers from the suckers.

*You know we’ll write one one day. We have ideas. Big ones.

**Those umbrellas really had a hell of a journey. We needed them to get to lunch when it was pouring, but once we got to the fest, these oversized umbrellas were a huge burden. It was muggier than a mug full of muggles, held by a mugger all damn day, with no sign of rain. Then, around 5 p.m. there was a big chill through the fest followed by a torrential downpour. We made a lot of friends with those umbrellas, danced with them, and I even knocked Andy in the face with one.

*** “‎ An hour later and $120.00 richer I walked to the El with a sun burnt nose and a smile on my face. You’re welcome.” -Jess’ explanation on Facebook.

20 minutes later, we came to an impass. We were at the far end of the field at a bridge that connected to the media entrance, but they weren’t letting anyone in there, since media check-in was closed. Never mind the fact that there were three of us and none of us had media credentials. I had slipped on a green SXSW ’11 wristband and a blue Rock ‘n Roll hall of fame wristband in addition to my commemorative Lollapalooza laminate that said “Not valid for entry to the park” written plainly on it. Why? It never hurts to have extra passes. Someone could just assume it’s the right one. Security wasn’t buying it. They made us go even farther around. Every 15 feet, there was a guard waiting behind the fence, with this sign, clearly posted everywhere. Not a great start.

There’s one long road that is your ticket in, if you can make it past a few checkpoints. At that point, I knew it was our only hope to get in. If you make it, you’ll find yourself at the Perry Stage. That’s a long ways away. Going backwards from the final destination, you’ll find a VIP area w/ free red bull (in the festival), then the row of port-poty’s (still in the festival), then the media entrance to the fest, (A possible way in) the media lounge (not in the festival, and not worth crashing) a cluster of C3 employees (not in the festival) and one guy deciding who could get by. If you didn’t catch all that the first time, you’ll get a second chance as we now do that in reverse.

First we have to talk to the guy at the entrance to this street. All he needs to know is that we’re meeting up with our team at the media entrance and we hear it’s this way. One down. Harder to talk our way past is the cluster of C3 employees, who want to know which media group we we’re with. I panicked. I literally said nothing for 10 seconds before saying “I can’t remember…” Jordan stepped up and said he was with ABC news, I made up a blog for Jeff and mumbled “Festival Crashers” for myself. Anyone reasonable could tell that we were full of shit, but somehow that worked for the main C3 guy at that checkpoint.

We’d successfully joined a big group walking into the media entrance last year, so instead of being tactful and doing that this year, we just walked up and made a super lame excuse about how we’d stepped out to make a call. The guy wasn’t fooled for a second, and we were stalled. Thankfully, we were now at the wall of port-o-potys, which is an ideal place for a pass back. Jeff and Jordan went ahead, as I waited for Andy and Caitlin. They found me and both decided they weren’t ready to pass back either of their passes on a Saturday. No hard feelings, but if that’s your stance, I can figure it out. They left and I got a text that Jeff and Jordan had made it in. I decided to press on, past the wall of port-o-

potys, to one dude watching the VIP area full of red bull. I saw a fellow security guard bringing him a styrofoam container just as I was approaching him, so I said “Looks like lunch finally got here,” as I flashed my commemorative badge at him. He nodded and smiled and I walked right in. I grabbed two red bulls, turned the corner and danced my way to Andy and Caitlin as Fitz and the Tantrums started the first set of the day I wanted to see.

I jogged about five or six blocks before I was sweating enough to take off my jacket and keep running, while awkwardly draping it over my arm.. It’s really hot down here. I then ran into Bennett, a good college friend of Andy and I, and the first person I knew in Austin. “Teibloom? Why are you wet?” “In a rush. See you later.” That was the only time we saw each other during SXSW. I kept alternating running and walking quickly when I ran out of still kind of drunk breath, refreshing my google map until it was clear I’d beat the estimated arrival time. I arrived, dripping sweat, at 8:23 and found @kibbe just in time to check in. That was when it was revealed that her pass would let her into the venue and mine was only good for the red carpet. They gave me a purple, square MTV sticker that looked official. It would come in handy later. As cool as that could potentially be, I had to make sure I’d get into the show. I was told the ticket I had printed had to be retrieved in line in the garage. I figured I could just grab the ticket (since I had priority ticket seating) and come back for the red carpet. It was far, far more complicated than that. As soon as I got into the garage area, I found out why everyone was @sxswhine*ing about the wait. There were two insane lines on either side of the garage and neither was moving. I walked right between the lines to the front and saw they weren’t even checking anyone in yet. I was redirected to two different staff members who told me I’d have to get in line. That wasn’t going to happen. As I was trying to figure out what to do (It’s really hard to jump a line when they aren’t even letting anyone in) an announcement was made that anyone who was given a notecard needed to step out of line and come with them. I took this as my cue. There were three different colored notecards. I later found out that pink meant you were up front for Sleigh Bells, white meant you were front row for the entire show, and I don’t remember what the other notecard was. I folded up my ticket so it was notecard sized and went with that group. This is when it turned into a crash. We were huddled into a corner of the garage and asked to hold our notecards up. I held up my piece of paper and texted @kibbe that I may not be able to make it back to help cover. I never saw her again. She took to the red carpet (pics here from Austinist) and I kept trying to crash.

My friend Alex asked if there was a way to get into the Woodies and told him he’d need a white notecard. He made it to CVS, got a loose one and started to make his way over. After twenty minutes or so of waiting under the garage, they herded our group over to the side of the building. As we were crossing the street, Alex called at the exact perfect time to join the group, unnoticed. He had nothing but a white notecard and all I had was a purple sticker that only let me on the red carpet. That was when we noticed the purple wristbands. Everyone had one on, but us. Somewhere in between trying to look inconspicuous and meeting up with Alex, we managed to not get the essential purple bands.

We got right up to the gate and I flashed my (folded up piece of paper) notecard and pointed to my purple MTV badge. They stopped Alex and asked where his purple wristband was. He turned to walk away, dejectedly and I jumped in and said “He’s with me,” pointing at the MTV sticker. “He’s my writer.” That got us past that checkpoint, but we still weren’t in. We had to line up against the venue, where we were then subjected to a metal detector and ID check and finally, we were finally inside, front row, against the rail. For the most bizarre, fake night of entertainment I’ve been to.

What happened at the Woodies? Why did Pete Wentz forget how to count? Why did the audience get yelled at? Who had the most SWAG? Click on…

*I started @sxswhine during SXSW this year, mostly because I got bored of watching everyone tweet about SXSW while I was bored at work. And the complaining about non-stop free music, food and drinks is preposterous. Check it out. Some good laughs in there, even though it’s now @austwhine.

I found Meg in line before they’d started letting anyone in and line checkers actually came around and asked us to have our ID’s out and were checking for badges. They briefly stopped me in line and I tugged on the top of the lanyard, with an exaggerated “ugh, do I have to tug this out of my shirt” look and the checker said “Oh, sorry, just wanted to make sure you had your badge.” Safe for now. Half an hour later, we started moving into the venue. I held my ID out prominently with one hand and tugged at the lanyard, as if I couldn’t get it out of my shirt and never had to reveal it. In. Meg and I set-up front row, right in front of Ira (the bassist, her favorite) and enjoyed my favorite show of the festival. I don’t know why I was nervous the first two times I went to get free drinks. No one was looking to kick me out at that point.

I stood by and snapped the pictures of Conan I used in this post and tried to figure out how I would make my way into the theater. I started by getting right next to the entrance, standing behind Conan as he did his interview, pretending I was just taking pictures. I realized I would have to get through 7 or 8 guards lining the 20 feet entranceway. At one point in the film, Conan says he has to remind himself to “act as if this is completely normal” when doing things like interviewing President Obama. It’s a good thing to remind yourself when crashing as well.

I hovered by the entrance, waiting for the first three guards to lose focus. The moment to make my move was when Conan was ushered into the theater and the guards scrambled to make sure he was secure. I noticed that the first round of attendees they let in had film badges as well as bright green tickets. I folded a grey schedule, walked inside and handed it to the attendant. I only made it three steps before they realized I’d handed them an awful fake ticket and they mockingly told me that was not a ticket. I decided to wait outside for the next group who only needed a badge. Sometimes you can use the amount of guards they have against them. They’ll figure if they don’t catch you, someone else will.  I moved quickly,and when two guards asked where my badge was, I said “oh, they have it,” or “I’m with them” and pointed at no one in particular. No real tricks. Just persistence and knowing the difference between “Stop! You just handed us a piece of paper and we know it!” and “Wait, I didn’t see your badge, but I don’t care all that much.”

Once inside the theater, there was a genuine electricity in the air,  since this was the first time the  film had ever been played and Co Co was in the building. I found a seat next to @coolinaustin who told me my new favorite word: “concrashulations.” The head of the film festival came out and said that once she saw this film, she knew they had their big get. They really did.

This documentary was exactly what you want from a documentary. It was well-paced, revealing, and captures the subject as they really are at their best and worst. We start with Conan driving in his convertible by a Hollywood Tour bus. He pulls up next to the bus and yells “Hi, I’m Conan O’Brien, host of the Tonight Show!” with a big wave and drives off. From there we’re with Conan on his journey when he’s recently been fired from the Tonight Show as he plans and goes on his grueling Legally Prohibited from being funny on Television Tour.

As he said in the Q and A afterwards, Conan told him the director said “From the very beginning he said, I think this could be documentary gold. I don’t want this to be a slick Conan O’Brien product. I don’t want it to be something that shows you as this heroic person. I don’t want it to be a concert film that’s just showing how amazing the concert was. And I was OK with that. I was going through something and just thought. Let’s be completely honest. Let’s let people see everything.”

We see Conan as a stubborn, perfectionist, work-a-holic who demands the most from everyone. We see how he obsesses about being in the spotlight, but detests the meet and greets and photos anytime he leaves the house. He can be miserable to be around, but he’s a non-stop joker who has a truly kind and giving heart. He’ll always stop for an autograph or picture, but it’s clearly torturing him. We see touching moments of Conan with his kids, and see how his wife irritates him by being loud putting away dishes. He’s a complex character and is presented as such through relentless filming.

Adam Carolla says you need to film an hour of footage to get one good minute.  They shot 140+ hours to get the less than 90 minute film, which makes sure the laughs never stop. It was so bad (good) that I feel like I missed a third of the movie from the audience laughing over it. The guests were plentiful, from Eddie Vedder to Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert and not nearly enough Jack White. I could have used more Jack (there aren’t even any scenes of them talking or recording the album) but I have few complaints about the film. It felt authentic and true. It made me like Conan more, after giving up on watching his show, and I don’t know if I felt bad for him for having to live this non-stop life, It made me appreciate it more.

*** 1/2 out of ****

Afterwards, we were treated to a very quick Q and A, I found a link to. The highlights were Conan running around the director when he was asked how he keeps up with Conan’s energy and someone asking Conan how he deals with his anger, which he clearly has a lot of. He seems to be doing it the only way he knows how. By never stopping.

Here’s footage of the Q and A:

Click here to view the embedded video.

I come back home to see @Shiftywhiteguy engrossed in his NBA 2K11 Pacers season on Xbox and he seems disappointed in me that I’ve returned so soon. Not to worry. I dig up the passport and head back. I quickly stamp my hand in the car and it’s barely registering. It may be time for a new stamp. This thing has carried me for three years, but I have to get it wet just to make any kind of mark. I attempt a small square on my right hand with a blob in the middle and head in. The set-up inside is a door guy right at the door who is just checking ID’s and giving you the stamp. OK this is important. I didn’t need any kind of stamp, just the passport. He stamps over my feeble stamp and it’s on to round two. One guy checking a will call list and a second guard blocking the entrance.

Miniature Tigers are a song or two into their set and no one else is walking in, so it’s just me and these two guards. I decide I might as well try the “I’m on the guest list” trick. I glance at the list and consider saying one of the names that isn’t crossed off yet, but he’s half reaching for my passport, so that doesnt’ seem wise. I just say “Teibloom” and he confirms I am not on the guest list. “Are you on the guest list or will call?” “Ummm.” “Did you pay for a ticket?” “Oh, I’m with Freelance Whales.” He half heartedly looks at the guest list, and just waves me on in. I’m not saying he was high and didn’t care, but I did see him putting in eye drops later.

Did I do anything smooth in this entire transaction? Not in the slightest. It was just commitment to the bit. And not even a bit at that. Just literally be standing near a venue and unless it’s an expensive sold-out show like The Strokes and Stubbs decides to be super strict, you’ll just find yourself inside. Just go to the venue.

Does this remind you of a different C3 festival? It should. At Lolla I made it in two different entrances without a pass at all and had to rely on a pass back on day 3. Here’s why you love the final day pass back. No one needs their wristband at that point, so they’re far more willing to pass it on. The same guy who we taught to crash his first festival on Friday acquired a legit wristband for Saturday and Sunday and was happy to return the favor and pass back his band. I pretended to hand him my sunglasses over the fence as he slid his wristband back. Somehow he was able to take it off without breaking the seal and I slipped it on with some difficulty.

I took my new legit wristband back to the line, had it scanned and … the scanner flashed red. This wristband has been scanned too recently. I tried three other guards and the story was the same. Finally one told me to come back in seven minutes. I spent that time realizing that when the guards confiscate sun block in cannisters and bottles of water, I could just take those and re-confiscate. I waited the seven minutes and then came storming back through the gates proudly.

We met with “The Internet” at her office where she gratefully gave us four fake wristbands that looked shockingly good. They even had the scannable barcode on them. The question became: would the wristbands scan if we used them one after another? Would they scan at all? Really only one way to find out. As we got closer to the gates, we saw other wristbands and noticed ours looked almost identical to the real thing, but were a few shades darker than the real thing. No worries. We’d just look for someone with sunglasses on. Andy decided to go first (can you blame him? If one would scan, it would be whoever went first.) We filmed him walking in and his wristband scanned and they let him right in (even though he’d already ripped it in two places and athletic taped it back together. I went next and … it didn’t scan. They sent me to a table for people whose wristbands weren’t working for whatever reason. From what I could tell, they’d have you write all your information down and then let you walk by. The beauty of this check-in was that once you wrote your info down, there was no one there to stop you when you walked around the table. Good news for me! I acted as if I’d just written all my information down and walked right by the table without looking back. This process took a total of three minutes. Unfortunately, this wasn’t the end of the crashing.

We still had to get our new festival friends in and they looked scared and overwhelmed. Andy distracted the guard, asking her if she was allowed to sneak off and see shows later and she loved the attention, telling him how she didn’t have a job last week, yadda yadda yadda, our friends started making their move. Just as our boy was sliding by with a family, his foot got caught in a baby stroller and was stuck behind a man with an over-sized backpack. These are actually perfect blockers, and once he freed his foot, he slid right by and incredulously said “I can’t believe how easy that was!” That’s what we’ve been trying to tell you. Our other  friend had even less trouble and there we were. once again crashing as Blues Traveler played. Thankfully we didn’t have to try to “Run Around.”

I did have one big crashing regret. I fully intended on letting two other friends (a doctor and a Johan Sebastian ‘bach) in with a pass back as soon as they got there, but due to having horrible cell reception and the fact that our new friends were incapable of understanding how to meet up at a location, we had to delay an hour and a half and they missed the Black Keys. Sorry friends. Glad we got you in eventually.

(UPDATE) #39: On Saturday we had the wristbands all set to go, but this time none of them scanned correctly. No worries. Back to the “Issues with Tickets” line. The weakest part of any line at any festival I’ve been to. The only possible exception is the first few days of Jazz Fest, when they completely left the exit line open to walk in. Anyway, the end of this line leads to guards sitting down who think they’re just dealing with frustrated paying attendees whose bands won’t scan for whatever reason. Andy asked one of them what time it was. The guard was embarrassed she didn’t have the time, but they asked someone else who said it was 12:30. 12:30!? It’s Grace Potter time! Let us right in.

I strolled up to the plate with my batting gloves on,  wondering if I should just combine crash #37 and #38 into one story, since I’d never bothered to write up my easy Ween Stubbs crash and this one would be just as easy. You need to be confident for a crash, but that level of cockiness is a recipe for disaster. It’s like I was calling my shot and only Babe Ruth can pull that move off. 

By the ever-growing cheering from the crowd, I could tell The Strokes were about to start as I walked up to the front entrance. I held out my pink wrist-banded wrist and flashed my ID, expecting to walk right by.  The exact process has worked easily a dozen times before. This time they asked me for my ticket. I didn’t expect the curve ball. I probably should have. They throw that one a lot, but I froze and got caught with my bat on my shoulder. Two guards in front of me seemed to know what I was doing before I even tried. They could tell I’d re-applied the wristband and escorted me out. OK. Strike one.

Not a big deal. Adjust the batting gloves and choke up a little. I’ve often had to take a few hacks to score. I headed to the restaurant entrance and was waved right in through a couple checkpoints. I got downstairs and could see the rest of the crowd just from under the stairs. I was being allowed in. I took a big cut on a low heater and pulled it deep. I moved swiftly towards first, watching it go back, back, back. Just as I started to walk that last 20 fee one guard said to hold on until they could finish clearing some tables and chairs out of the way. Cool. Should just be another minute…”Oh, we’re not letting anyone in this way tonight” one guard said. The ball was hooking foul. “OK- can you let me in that side entrance then?” “Nope. You’ll have to go around to the front.” Foul ball. Strike two.

With an 0-2 count, I knew I was in a deep hole. I had I could get another look at a fastball (guard who wouldn’t ask for a ticket.) I waited for the guard who denied me to get distracted and just tried to make contact. Another request for a ticket and I came up empty on a pitch in the dirt. Not only did they deny me, it was the most humiliating strike out imaginable. The swinging third strike where the ball gets away from the catcher and you don’t bother to run to first, you just let the overeager catcher tag you out as you slink away back to the dugout, defeated. They grabbed my wrist and turned it over and saw the white of the wristband that shouldn’t show unless it’s been taken off and re-taped. They stripped me of the wristband, threw it in the trash and the original guard said “Oh yeah, we already got him.” Strike three.

I can chalk up the strike-out to a few things:

• Overconfidence- It prevented me from noticing that I’d need a ticket. I could have probably used any piece of paper. That was just lazy.
• A lack of dedication- I wasn’t dying to see the band. I was alone on the crash and saw The Strokes last month. Crashing requires a “I’m not quitting until I get in” attitude and I just didn’t have it in me.
• A lack of shiftiness- I didn’t wait for the right guard. I didn’t try to slide by anyone. I was obvious and under-prepared and acted like I’d never crashed before.

I could look at this as a bad sign as I have no real plan to crash ACL this weekend, but maybe it’s a good thing. I need to get sharper if I want to crash this bad boy. A wake-up call if you will. Batter up.