total gleeks

the teen and i were stupid excited for our evening of gleeking the eff out. not to mention, we already knew exactly what we wanted to have for dinner, thanks to many many previous trips to universal citywalk -the very thought of grub from versailles made our mouths water like mad.

so you can imagine our supreme disappointment when we excitedly ascended the escalator, stepped onto the upper-level food court, and found this:

we were the saddest people on the entire planet when it sank in that there was to be no garlic chicken or beans and rice in store for our bellies. the teen remarked that we must've looked insane, standing there forlornly taking pictures of a restaurant that was apparently long gone.

so we ended up hitting up our backup plan - crepes. ha! still good, but it sure wasn't versailles. boo. afterwards, with plenty of time still to kill, we strolled through sparky's to look at their wide variety of hello kitty-themed goods and other fun novelty items. they'd done some remodeling since our last visit, and now half the store is occupied with a mini-donut shop. and check it out - a cotton candy machine!

too bad it wasn't ready for business yet. story of my life.

the store was playing music from glee, and there were tons of folks walking around sporting glee shirts (there was a matinee show earlier that day), and so we were super duper fired up and excited for the show. as we headed towards the entrance to the ampitheatre, we smirked at this chick, obviously a hard-core fan, dressed as "rachel" from the mid-season finale:

concession stand! we paused for a minute to see what prices of souvenirs looked like, and it was pretty comparable to other concerts we've been to. $35-$40 for tees, a hoodie sweatshirt for $70, programs and tote bags for $20, posters and light sticks for $10 and soundtrack CDs for $15-$18.

the box office was advertising other upcoming shows, too:

we found our seats pretty easily, and they weren't awesome, but not bad either.

the teen is a sucker for light sticks and ponied up $10 for one.

gleeks!

"the other asian" is part of a dance crew called LXD - the legion of extraordinary dancers. heh. t they were really good, very entertaining, and yeah, okay - a few of them were super hot.

the lights came up again after they exited the stage, and the "mckinley high school" logo was projected onto the curtain. and then a few minutes later, there was much hullaballoo as a line of cheerleader uniform-clad "cheerios" sashayed out. they were mobbed within minutes as they handed out something that looked like...barf bags. huh?

when "sue sylvester" appeared on the screens, spewing her typical humorous venom, it all made sense - because according to her, the show we were about to see was so bad that we'd all be sick to our stomachs.

i'd already seen a tweet that told me that "mr. shue," played by foxy matthew morrison, was at the yankees game in NYC. damn. i was hoping he'd make an appearance at some point, but it was not to be. instead, i had to settle for his pre-taped mug on the screen along with sue.

the teen and i had a bet on what the show would open with, and while she was convinced it would be "somebody to love," i had a feeling it would be "don't stop believin'." and i was right!

OMG. it was SO. STINKING. FUN. of course, our typical luck at concerts was in full effect - there were a couple of old(er) ladies in front of us who reluctantly stood up with the rest of the arena, plugging their ears the entire time. and behind us? families with small children, who complained about the noise and whined that they couldn't see when everyone in front of them sprang to their feet. we scooted over in front of a couple of empty seats next to us (*gasp* it was supposed to be a sold out show!) in an effort to help the kids see the stage, and went on with our merriment.

"mercedes," played by the fantastic amber riley, did her thang with "bust your windows."

by far my favorite number of the evening - their take on lady gaga's "bad romance," costumes and all. we were both thinking of the bean the entire night, knowing how much she loves the music from glee - not to mention, "bad romance" is a favorite song of hers.

the bean also love, love, loves "rachel's" performance of "don't rain on my parade." and when lea michele appeared down in the audience and began singing that song, the teen and i totally grinned at each other as we imagined how much the bean would have loved it. i think we're both counting the days until she's old enough to come with us on our concert extravaganzas.

mash-up time! first, the boys:

and then the girls.

giving the cast a little time for costume changes, rivals "vocal adrenaline" came out to perform too.

and then the cast reappeared to further entertain us.

"like a prayer," complete with choir.

i have a video that i took of jonathan groff's "surprise" guest appearance, but i was too impatient to upload it. besides, my friend jess did the work for me. hee! check out her video-filled post and recap here.

although she never gets to sing solo, and isn't necessarily one of the "main" characters, heather morris as "brittany" is probably my favorite out of the cast. she delivers all those awesome one-liners perfectly (like when artie says he's getting cold feet: "can you even feel your feet?") and she's a fantastic dancer. i love her.

we were so bummed when the show came to an end - with "somebody to love," so the teen got it partially right - and filed out of the venue dragging our feet. we each picked up a t-shirt and i added the newest soundtrack CD for us to listen to on our way home, and that was that.

we both still have our ticket stubs in our purses, and the teen wore her shirt to school right away. oh, and the rest of the season on DVD comes out on september 14th - which is mollydog's birthday and only four days till the best day of the year, MY birthday. oh yeah.

guess i know what i'm getting from the teen this year!