Where did I leave off? Oh. The parking lot of Doom.

We thought we were gonna make a quick getaway, hardly anyone was leaving Coachella yet and we were exhausted.

CONES!

Yes, someone put up cones blocking the only lot exit.

Uh…

Panic.

Now, the cones weren’t stuffed with explosives. I don’t know why we didn’t just roll over them.

Oh, there was a parking lot attendant standing behind them.

Expendable!

There were about 10 cars trying to exit. 2 lines of them converging on the sole exit.

Clusterf***

Everyone hung their heads out the windows screaming at the attendant and the cop that had arrived.

As the guy was barraged by verbal boots being thrown at him, he got pissed, told Confucious “The city’s not letting anyone out for two hours!” and got in a golf cart and sped away.

We look and see cars from the other lots driving away seamlessly.

Everyone was going ballistic. People were getting out of their cars, trying to find someone to yell at, getting back in their cars and repeating the futile routine.

Eventually some girl got out and moved the cones and the security guard moved them right back.

Well, finally the cones were moved and we raced out of their, thanking the guard with a bouquet of profanities.

We later heard, they blocked off the lot shortly after, making some folks wait FOUR HOURS before leaving!

We stayed a famous tiki hotel in Palm Springs called the Caliente Tropics. We stayed here last year and, while we did find a blood stain on my pillow, we decided to give this place another try.

Things haven’t really changed since the place opened, as the orange pool chairs can testify.

Elvis, Nancy Sinatra and… Anna Nicole Smith used to hang out here.

For breakfast, I was able to enjoy a delicious turkey sandwich at Sherman’s Deli at the insistance of Thelma and Louise.

As boring as turkey sandwiches are, this one was the tops! “The ulimate most!” – Marcia Brady

Saturday, we repeated the same system as before. See a few songs of one band, move on to the next.

In the early afternoon, it was quite pleasant. Not too crowded, not too hot.

More important than the music, I noticed a few disturbing trends:

FEATHERS. Worn by almost everyone. Why, I ask.

Full on BODY SUITS, in the intense desert heat!

NEON! The 80’s are back folks. Seriously. This was being worn by a non-nerdy, middle aged man.

We rocked out to about 1005 bands and danced our butts off. We wore ring lights and tried to write words in the air.

HI!

That evening we escaped the parking lot unscathed. Thank god.

The next morning, we got bagels. Jalapeno bagels!!

Day three. We were pretty tired.

And people really began to stink.

Many of the attendees camped on site.

We had a nice bed and shower to utilize.

At any given moment, I was always downwind from someone who had not that luxury.

Either someone’s human stink, someone’s cigarette, or someone’s mary jane.

I read somewhere that 9 drug arrests were made on Friday. Hmm. Out of 75,000. Crack team of enforcement officers, clearly.

We staked out our food options early. Before we knew it, we had every meal for the entire day planned out.

Tacos at Border Grill! (They were just ok)

We left before seeing the final band on Sunday, tired, hot, sweaty, stinking of smoke, mouths’ covered in Indian food residue (I ate it at least once every day)

We had once again conquered Coachella, somewhat unscathed, never to return again.

Until 2011.