Soo....Renee is in town...which usually means that all the Social events that I’ve become so adept at avoiding ...much to my friends dismay...especially the ones who call me to make sure that I’m leaving...and I still never reach...sigh... I cannot avoid because she will not LET ME!!!@! She has no idea how comfortable I have become with sitting my butt in my favourite chair with a laptop on one side remote on the other...and book on the floor....sigh..Now THAT my friend is a Saturday NIGHT!!!

I must admit though that I’ve quite enjoyed our runs to Emerald Coast, and to the mall....( a glimpse of the maven i once was reappears when we hit downtown Miami and I see the PERFECT SHOES and bought the same one in two different colors....sigh. Four shoes in less than TWENTY MINUTES BABY!!! ..yessssssssssss)....and eating Macdonald's in the car in the parking lot...because we want to eat in peace...and THEN DRIVE...

Anyways...she Insisted that we ARE GOING TO THIS CONCERT..One Love Festival...featuring Gregory Isaacs, and Buju and Coco Tea (who did not Show) and some guy who warmed up the show...but he was wayyyyyyyy too long...and wtf was up with his 2 person fan club???? Two screaming white girls up on the balcony...who seems to be the ONLY PERSONS IN THE ROOM WHO KNEW THE LYRICS TO HIS SONGS!!!!.

And while I'm semi tempted at the thought of seeing Buju Perform live.....the fact that this concert is on a weeknight...which will SERIOUSLY cut into my sleep time is kinda daunting.....Plus the world's best commercials is on at 9 on TBS....and i DONT have TIVO...yes i know I'm crawling towards it...

Now...here's the god honest truth. ...I don't like going to revolutions....because "that BWAY" usually there...and while the attempts at civility seems to be holding strong these past months....i feel like I'm being watched....like the flippin sound track from X-files is runnin in the back of my head....and people are peeping...and i don’t just mean "that BWAY"..... But those people who knew me with "THAT bway" like I'm under inspection and investigation for responses to seeing him...I’m still waiting to go somewhere and not have to do a countdown as to how long I can have a conversation with someone without the question coming up... It usually goes like this:


"Insert name here": "Hey Cliv...how are you...where you been?
Cliv : "Oh I been around.....work and stuff...how are you?? getting ready for Carnival you know...
TICKING BEGINS..T minus 5 Seconds)

"Insert name here": "Oh yeah....it’s about that time right.(4)...I thought you left town...I don’t see you any more...(3)..(while checking me out to see signs of distress, starvation …abnormal smoking…water retention…crossed eyes…distended stomach..)

Cliv: "just been busy....well it’s nice to see you.....ok?.

(OMG am I gonna make it?? a full stinking conversation?? with out....(2)... )

"Insert name here": " So you and "THAT BWAY”……????? BOOOOOOOMM


AAAARRRGHH....wha di mudda ass....is that any of your flippin business in the first place??? And am I not enough of a person to be Just ME? You noticed me to say hello...so I'm obviously quite visible and HUMAN without…………..woooosahhhhhh...

That’s' why if I DO choose to venture out of Egypt..(cause I’m so damn far from everything including a convenient Starbucks) I prefer to go to poetry night at the district, or to jazz clubs....or go to a sushi bar..(Newly converted) because our island people tend to define you by who you are to OTHERS.....or how you are seen by others....and it's not just a Trini thing or a Jamaican thing....its definitely an island thing. The good thing is though is that I’m recovering my NAME...lol..with out the "identifiers" on it....

I digress....

So anyways.....after the Sis announces that tickets are purchased ...I have to figure out what the hell I’m gonna wear...


Shoot...i ain't no empress...earth earth ...Rasta rule the world....and you know gonna be pure Rasta......natural sisters...
with that inner glow that comes from denying themselves the pleasure of Bacon, and Pork Chops and Processed food…and salt...and real milk……yikes....
while MY glow comes from...Burger King Angus Burger with Bacon...(FYAH BUN SWINE...yes Renée...i hear you), MAC number 34 Studio Fix and that AMAZING bronzer I found for 2.00 at CVS. sigh..

Plus my other dilemma is ...since I've turned myself into the domestic diva reality TV, internet, my space, obscure novelist, foreign film, junkie, my other passion...SHOPPING...lol..has fallen to the wayside.... well I still shop ...but I get excited over that cute little throw rug I saw at the Super Wal-Mart.. (I’m rapidly progressing to that old lady with the 3 cats named Booboo, Squiggy, and Victor...hmm i think )

So do i try to go Earth sister for the night??

Hell nah....i fix the "almost Mohawk”…(details to follow), put on my jeans and a shirt...and Head out the door....and herein lies my error of the night...

My new purchases....my shoes...Now a true shoe addict knows that regardless of the price and style and design of a shoe...Jimmy Choo's to Gen Eration....new shoes need to be broken in....and while these were so fierce...and singing to me in that voice.." Mommy we need you, Mommy we need you"...i should have ignored their taunting cries...DEVIL CRIES!!....and said "Not tonight babies"....and left them at home...Buju was too much for youngsters anyways.....but no....they wooed me....and I answered...FOOLISH FOOLISH GIRL!!!....so they went with me...Fierce...even though no one could see em but me under my jeans.....

After a phone call from Armani Boy...I’m instructed to please be ready at 9:30. So this means that I need to start to get ready at 8....but strange enough the tickets say show time at 8...am i gonna miss Buju?? huh? but i cannot contradict Armani boy ..steups even Renee can’t....and face the wrath of his quick Jamaican wit...so I dutifully get ready for Nine....shoes and all....

So I'm thinking this is my break in shoe process...walking around the apartment while I wait for them to pick me up....No problem mon....Strap is at comfort level....nothing rubbin on the edges...I’m good...plus...IM FIERCE remember??

Okay so Armani boy shows up at 10.00. And still I’m fine...we go through the normal platitudes...Renee asks me where you get that top ? I say I’ve had this for ever....I commend her on attempting to wear her hair in a pony tail...and I squeak...what if we miss Buju...to which Armani boy chuckles...and states Nah man...

So we arrive at the club....and as we get there….the band is just striking up….thank god...I didn’t miss anything...but a nagging creeping little suggestion of an ISSUE is creeping up on me....but i ignore it...and keep going...

We have our tickets....we go inside...where its nice and cool INSIDE the club....but nothing is going on there...and we step OUTIDE in to the concert area....and Immediately....

it is MUGGY, and HOT, and sticky and blehhhh.....and that little niggling sensation is definitely there...Faint but there...hmm....ignore it....

Armani boy and Dj Friend leaves me in charge of Renee and goes off to the howdi does...lol...I do my fair share…smile pinned onto my face… with Renee in the back avoiding those she wants to ....and acknowledging those she does not...

See ..i KNOW I smile too much...if i didn’t then people wouldn’t come up and say hi and Hover and shit...

So we find a place that allows me to see from the nostrils UP of the performers on stage....not in the main thoroughfare of the party....but close enough to the bar and the bathroom ...with a vantage point of seeing who walks in and out….PLACEMENT my friend is VERY important in these events....

Armani boy buys me a drink..(I like him) and him a water....and after kissing the sister ..."Be back" disappears...lol.. At least he has the camera with him up front with the DJ crew..so we get great pictures of the artists that I really cyah identify CAUSE I CANT SEE THEM.!!!

at which point the sister and I BOTH admit....almost simultaneously....MY FEEL HURT!!!!

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH.....

So we take a drink...and try to stand up in a way that moves the body weight AWAY from the area of the shoe that is the most painful...for her its the straps across the front...(on aside...the shoe she is wearing is also brand new....and also a style that I also own...its just a different color...we have a tendency of doing that...at least tonight we didn’t have the same ones on at he same time)... ..for mine it’s the cut out area at the front…open toe?? That seems to be choosing to press against the second and first toe on the right foot….and the ankle strap on the left…DETAILS….See she can lean back, and put her weight on barricade or something and have temporary relief. MY problem is a dual one…because what fixes the one foot…aggravates the next!!

We Buy a drink...hoping a Hennessy and Red Bull and CLOSE CONCENTRATION on the artists on stage....We manage ....lol...we go to the bathroom, chill in the AC a bit...and go back outside....jus waiting for BUJU…even the brief sighting of “THAT BWAY” was a mere passing thing in light of the shoes…


AT this point we both do not want to admit that the shoes have taken control of the brain and are STEPPING ON THEM...pushing their pointy heels into the nerves that control eye watering, and sinus drippings, that the high arches have now pushed straight through from the floor up into the base of my head and was trying to force my brain out through my ears....

BUT I WILL NOT MISS BUJU!!!

lol....I give thanks to our years of pointe training....Our ballet teacher said...No one must know that your toes are bleeding and that the nail has fallen off…your face must remain devoid of pain…lol….move gracefully, light as a feather…while the nerve endings in your toes are RAW AND TWITCHING AND SCREAMING!! See? Training is everything…

Do you know what the Hilarious thing is?? Renee and I have done this before. Who can forget that night at Big Fish when we ventured testing our newly purchased, plastic still on the bottom , HOT TO DEATH shoes that we bought outfits to match…NOT THE OTHER WAY AROUND…..lol…and realizing at about 3 am that we had stopped dancing and were doing the same thing…propping our feet up…..DAMN NEW SHOE SMELL!!! EVIL EVIL THING!! We walked out of Big Phat fish that night giggling and Gingerly…lol…having to sit in the car for a few minutes for the blood to return to our cramped pinched toes…lol…fortunately those shoes got officially broken in after Big Bottom Gyal and Roll it…lol

Finally BUJU….awesome…can I Just say awesome?? And his back up singers are AMAZING…reminiscent of the I three’s …even with the dance movements which I tried to recreate much to Renee and Armani’s Boys embarrassment….lol…but even Buju singing his Pre-conscious music….could not soothe the feet…so…after trying my best to make it through to Not an Easy Road…we GAVE up..lol…picked up our food that we had ordered 2 hours before so we would take it home…said good bye to the stalkers who believed me to be Lisa from Trinidad visiting for one week to check out universities, and heading back home tomorrow…with Renee’s cell phone number…BWAHAHAHHAHAH..ah joke still..Renee….lol…we walk…heads erect shoulders back…toes dying….back to the car….or to the near vicinity…where we hold on to each other for support…while Armani boy runs to the car….we creeeeep…and Drag the offending articles off our feet reverently...

At least we know they won’t hurt us the next time we wear them…

Oh…and ps….

The Show was Good…lol Gregory Isaacs remembered twenty percent of his songs..that alone is an achievement