My Midlife Crisis Tour 2019 – Orlando

After my night living like a rock star, I was severely sleep-deprived when I made my way to the Atlanta airport. I was hoping to sleep on the flight to Fort Lauderdale but there was a young boy in the seat in front of me who spent the entire flight asking his mom questions every 20 seconds. I applauded his curiosity even if it resulted in no nap for me.

I opted to fly into Fort Lauderdale for the car rental situation. The last show is in Miami Beach and after that, I’m going to one of my best friend’s place in North Miami; so dropping the car off at Fort Lauderdale on my eventual way home made the most sense. It made the most sense until I realized that with an hour and a half of sleep the night before that I was still going to need to drive three hours upon arrival to get to Orlando. At the car rental desk, they told me that I was upgraded, bonus! So that’s how I ended up with a white Cadillac CTS, which made me giggle because I’m not the type of person who drives a Cadillac. The CTS does have some power and it’s pretty plush so it made the drive up to Orlando a lot more comfortable.

As usual for a Nicole road trip, I stopped off at a supermarket for rations before hitting the road. For any travelers looking to drive the Florida Turnpike, just know that for whatever reason, driving north always seems to have less traffic (unless you’re unfortunate enough to be driving north when all the snowbirds head out at the end of winter). I was too tired to sync my phone with the car’s audio system and decided that it would be fine to just listen to the radio on my drive up.

And that’s when I realized that I really loathe the fact that pretty much all radio stations in the U.S. are owned by two companies. Maybe if you don’t drive through multiple metro areas in one go, you don’t notice that it seems like the same six songs are playing constantly. But driving through coverage areas for Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach, “The Space Coast”, Orlando, and Tampa radio stations, I heard “Summer of 69” no less than five times in a three and a half hour timeframe. Don’t get me wrong, I love Bryan Adams. I had his poster on my wall at one point, for God’s sake. But the first two times were enough. I must be getting to be an old lady because I would land on Today’s Hits and think, oh this song is ok, and then it would be followed by mumble-rap and I couldn’t hit the button fast enough to change the channel. I long for a classic rap station that plays real rap (I’m partial to West Coast in case anyone really wants to know – Dre, Tupac, etc. – but I would have gladly listened to Biggie and Puffy on f’ing repeat instead of whatever the hell passes for “today’s hits” rap).

I knew I hit the outskirts of Orlando when the orange barrels started sprouting up like mushrooms after a rainstorm. Apparently Orlando still has not completed any of the road construction that has been underway for like the last ten years. I finally made it to my hotel around 6:30pm and was grateful that I decided not to go to that night’s show in Clearwater. It was going to be tight timing and with my luck, my flight would have been delayed or I would have been stuck in traffic for hours trying to get there. So instead, I settled into my room with a book and fell asleep by 10pm – very unlike my previous night.

The next day was Sunday. I didn’t have any work to do (like I normally do on these trips) and I was at a loss what to do with myself for the day. While I desperately want to go to Universal, I wasn’t going to spend a small fortune for admission only to cut it short to get ready for the concert. Instead, I got the bright idea to try to track down this foundation that makes me look airbrushed (I had a sample that I used the last of in Atlanta). Unfortunately, it’s a Chanel product and they don’t sell that stuff at Ulta. Which meant that I had to go to a mall department store, and I haven’t voluntarily been inside a mall since I was in my twenties. (I’m frugal; my shopping usually rotates between Ross, Marshalls, TJ Maxx, Nordstrom Rack, and Amazon.)

With trepidation, I parked my Caddy at the entrance to Macy’s and entered the section that I normally avoid like the plague – the makeup and perfume section that has salespeople who descend on you like harpies. Of course, I had no idea where to find the Chanel section and smelled like a French whorehouse from people squirting fragrances at me by the time I located it. Naturally, the product that I wanted has been discontinued for like two years (I must have had that sample buried in my makeup bag way longer than I thought); but the saleswoman offered to bring the “specialist” over to talk about my options. The specialist turned out to be a perfectly manicured male who was way more skillful in makeup application than I will ever dream of being. He brought over three products, doled out what must have been $17 worth of each onto a mirror, applied them to my face, scrutinized my stripes, and declared that 20 was my color. OK cool, can I buy it and get the hell out of here? Oh no, he offered to show me what it would look like on my entire face first. Ummm, that would be cool to see what it’s supposed to look like with a professional application because much like my hair, I can never replicate that shit on my own.

He probably used $38 worth of this stuff on my face, applying it with a makeup brush made out of unicorn hair that likely cost more than all of my makeup combined. He even got that redness around my nose sorted out. I looked in the mirror when he was done and thought, holy shit, my skin hasn’t looked that flawless since I was 6. Give me a bottle of that! Oh one small problem, they’re sold out of my color, but they can order it and have it delivered in two days. My face must have showed my despondency because he then offered to call Bloomingdale’s and see if they had it in stock. They did, which now meant if I really wanted this stuff, I was going to have to trek clear over to the other side of the mall to get it.

I mentally prepared myself and then stepped into the fray. Walking as fast as humanly possible, I dodged moms pushing strollers, packs of teens that don’t know walkway etiquette, the couples that look like they’re playing Red Rover with oncoming pedestrian traffic, and those annoying-ass people that must have never been out in public before who come to a sudden dead-stop in the middle of the walkway to stare at random shit. I finally made it into Bloomingdale’s worried that I may have sweated off some of my precious face. I located the Chanel display but of course, there was no one there. I wandered around waiting for someone, anyone, to come help me. Finally, after 5 minutes of lurking like a totally conspicuous shoplifter, a saleswoman asked if she could help me. Turns out that the person I was sent to find was watching me from another display the whole time. I really didn’t want to give her the commission for basically just ringing me up but at this point, I felt like I had gone into battle and didn’t want to leave empty-handed. I spent more cash than I have ever spent on that tiny bottle of magic and made the arduous journey back across the mall to get to the safety of the Cadillac.

Back in my hotel room, I realized that my dumb ass should have washed my hair before going on my adventure; because now I had an expensive and artful foundation layer on a face connected to a head that needed to get into the shower. No amount of dry shampoo would be enough to control the oil slick on my scalp. I resolved to protect my face as much as I could in order to preserve the $38 worth of product. Basically, it looked like I was playing a slightly dangerous solo game of water Twister. But I somehow managed to get clean hair and body without doing too much water damage to the masterpiece.

I got an Uber over to Universal. The show was held at Hard Rock Live and I had zero idea how large City Walk is. The park was kitted out for Halloween and I longed to play a round of the Beetlejuice-themed mini golf. But there was no time because I still had a 20 minute walk to get to the venue. Unfortunately for everyone in my vicinity as I was walking, the Jonas Brothers song Sucker came on the loudspeakers and I seriously could not control myself from quietly singing along and bopping around (yes, I’m a teenybopper at heart, get over it and be thankful there’s one of Today’s Hits I can stand).

The Hard Rock Live is a cool place to see a concert. I sat in my fourth row seat, people-watching before the show began. Adam Ant concerts really do bring out the most interesting people: people dressed like pirates, people with the white stripes across their cheeks and noses and tiny braids in their hair, people wearing random 1980s concert t-shirts that have no relation to Adam Ant (looking at you Journey-concert-shirt-wearing-guy), people dressed like the dandy highwayman, and the 50 year-old women of all shapes and sizes dressed like hoochie mommas. It really is a fascinating scene.

I ended up sitting next to a woman from Tampa who also goes to multiple shows. We danced and sang every song. It was fun to meet yet another member of the tribe. She even told me I looked too young to be such a passionate fan of Mr. Ant (I told you that makeup is miraculous). After the concert when we both realized that we were going to be in Miami next, she got my number so we could meet up again in a few days. I wandered into to the Hard Rock Cafe for a nightcap and was thoroughly entertained by the bartender who poured me a very stiff drink. Mindful of the fact that I had to work the next morning and then drive four hours down to Miami, I had a second. At midnight, they kicked me out to close up and I seriously just loitered around City Walk, enjoying the balmy weather.

I realize that in these posts, I’m not really talking too much about the concerts themselves. That would get annoyingly repetitive: the concert was awesome, the band sounded amazing, the music is incredible live, Adam still performs like nobody’s business… Do you really want that? You can just insert that into every one of these posts if you’d like; because unless the band sets fire to their instruments at the end of the set, my descriptions of the concerts themselves would be pretty much the same every single time.

What I am trying to convey is how much fun and adventure I have doing these midlife crisis tour stops… that if you really want to go out and do something to go do it. Who cares if you have to go solo? Solo trips are a hell of a lot of fun and even a misanthrope like me manages to meet people. You’re never too old to go do something that others may think it silly or frivolous. Hell, being silly and frivolous might keep you feeling young (either that or a bottle of Chanel Ultra Le Teint Velvet – Chanel people, I’m totally willing to do product placement in my blog in exchange for free bottles of that; my color is 20).

Stay tuned for my last tour stop of the 2019 Friend or Foe Adam Ant U.S. tour – Miami…