Jack and Tommy celebrate evading security at Lollapalooza.
Jack Cantillon
Spoofer-in-Chief
Mila Kunis’s twin walks into the bar. Let the spoof begin. Accidental purchase of an additional beverage, check. Mention of the fact I’m Irish and I’m good mates with a Leprechaun, check. Mention of the fact I’m an award winning pediatric doctor who dabbles in international rugby at the weekends, check. Date secured? Check. This was going be a Lollapalooza of a week.
I was up to ninety with this date. Considering my tendency to over wear the colour pink, a complete lack of facial hair and a head the size of Kilimanjaro, I’d say I’m a five, at a push. This girl was a ten. Was she doing it for a bet? I mean it’s biologically impossible for a low five to get a high ten unless you’ve the bank account equal in size to the GNP of a small country. It’s like Brian Cowen popping out for a breakfast roll and coming back with Georgia Salpa. I had to deliver, so the right outfit was key. What could transform this bogger from the sticks into Brad Pitt over night? There was only one answer. Blazer, jeans and novelty t-shirt, this combination had served me well over the years but this was its World Cup final. This was like Northern Ireland bringing George Best back for the final against Brazil. Sadly George, much like my chances, was six feet under.
I arrived at the date 15 minutes early so I could compose myself. What would I talk to her about? I weaved such a litany of lies when I was drunkenly talking to her at the bar I didn’t have a notion if my name was Jason, who wrote screenplay for “The Notebook” while looking after orphans I’d taken in after Hurricane Katrina or Trevor, the pediatric doctor who’d been recently voted third in the IRB World Rugby Player of the year. Nevertheless I soldiered on. I wasn’t going to let technicalities like who I was get in the way of getting the shift off Mila Kunis Jr. I glanced up at the clock, five minutes late, fashionably late, this girl really knew all the tricks of the trade. I told the waiter I’d have a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc, no idea what that actually means but it always looks slick in the movies. He nodded knowingly, no doubt impressed by my feigned wine connoisseur ways, the feckin’ eejit. Thirty minutes late, beads of sweat drop into my full wine glass as my gelled up hair begins to wane disappointingly but no time to panic yet, right?
Forty five minutes late, the waiter comes over to make sure everything’s okay. I decide to play it cool and tell him she’s having some difficulties negotiating the traffic. “Eh sir, it’s seven o’clock on a Sunday?” Who does he thinks he is, Jamie from AA road watch? An hour late, I go to re-adjust my dickie bow, only to realize it was a dickie bow t-shirt, I’m crackin’ up here. One hour and 15 minutes late, he comes over again. “I’m sorry sir but you’re going to have to leave if you don’t order any food”. The cheek. “I’ll have a salad”. He looks at me bemused, “what kind of salad sir?”. “A plain salad, now please leave, you’re in the way of me seeing my date arrive”. Two hours late, untouched rabbit food below me, amadán numéro uno returns.
“Sir, she’s not coming, you have to move along, we’ve people waiting”.
“I’ll pay my bill but I’m waiting here, she said she’d be here, she’s not the kind of girl to stand me up”.
“Sir, how well do you know this women?” he enquires.
“Eh, I met her over a red Sauvignon Blanc in a bar in town and asked her out here”.
“A red sauvignon blanc, waiting on your own for two hours, a dickie bow t-shirt that underneath reads “Fancy me?”, I’m sorry sir but you’re the fecking eejit.”
Devastated, I turned to the “shiftboard” girls. Despite the girls allegedly suffering from a saliva overdose, I set my sights on getting an invite to the “shiftboard” mansion. Despite being closest to Clojobs, she had hit hard times and was offering three shifts for $5 on the local boardwalks so the other girls would have to give me the keys to the kingdom. Kazza and Kezza had returned to shift the entirety of Dublin. GAA Lover only associated with inter-county players, while Niamh (who doesn’t have a nickname for some reason) was leading the board, so as you could imagine she was a busy girl. That left me with the quite creatively nicknamed, Blonde Smiley. I approached her in the smoking area one night. Now Blonde Smiley was at the bottom of the board so common sense said she’d be up for getting some easy points. The good samaritan I am, I looked deep into my heart and thought I’d help her with her plight. We got on like a house on fire and before you could say “are you up for a spot of tonsil tennis?” she said she had a question. “Would you like to come over my house on Monday night?”. Too easy.
Before I headed out I did a few tongue stretches. What’s the point in playing tonsil tennis if you don’t have a racket? I head over and gave the mansion’s front door a knock. Blonde Smily comes out to the door, looking well blonde and smiley. “Come on in, I’ve someone I’d like you to meet”. What some three way action? My shift stars are in a row tonight. I scan the apartment, it’s not often you get to witness something like this. Since the girls arrival, the local bars have reported a 734% increase in shift and drift activity. All the hallmarks of seasoned pros are there. Laptops permanently hooked up to the net to relay any potential shift candidates whereabouts, what seems a lifetime supply of Chupa Chup lollipops (a “shiftboard” girl trademark) and seven boxes of 42 chapsticks, one for every shiftable day of the week. She sit sits down on the coach and before long she applies some chapstick to her lips. Understanding girls like I do, I knew the signal, so I leaned in for the kill. She pulls away and I hear a cough coming from the sitting room entrance. She glances across and I recoil in horror. “Eh, Jack here’s who I wanted you to meet, this is my boyfriend Damo”.
After the week of disasters I was inconsolable, I hadn’t been this emotional since I read the Provost’s farewell e-mail. I knew the only way I could get some semblance of joy out of the week now would be one hell of a Lollapalooza. Lolla is one of the biggest music festival in America held in the heart of downtown Chicago. Think Oxegen, but instead of sheep and slashed tents as a backdrop, think skyscrapers and Lake Michigan’s beaches. Heaven. In an organized city centre festival that’s finished at 10pm, kind of way. We had one problem though, there were three of us on this J1 and we only had two tickets. We decided the fairest way to do it would be to draw lots and we made a solemn promise to whoever failed to get a ticket that we’d sneak them in everyday no matter what happened. Rab and I got ours so that left Tommy stranded.
There was no way we weren’t getting him in though, so launched Operation JAFFA (Jump A Feckin’ Fence Anywhere). There was a problem with this policy though. In Ireland, to quote Dara O’Briain, there are three levels of rule breaking. There’s “that’s grand”, then it moves on to “ah, now don’t push it” and finally “Right! You’re taking this piss” And that’s when the Garda sweep in. Over here it’s different story. I was watching the box the other night and I saw a guy get 27 years for writing a few cheques he couldn’t afford to write. Basically there’s one level of law breaking, don’t flippin’ break it. In order to get in, we had an army of Security Guards and Police, two security fences and a litany of CCTV to contend with. Tommy would be on the first flight home if he got caught “breaking and entering” as it’s called over here and probably wouldn’t be ever allowed back to America. In other words, this JAFFA certainly wasn’t a piece of cake (Ed. gag).
The festival was on for three days so we needed three different plans. The first day was simple because he was just going to walk in when the security opened up the exits at the end of the day as he only wanted to see the last act. Day two is when things got serious, Two Door Cinema Club was playing at 2pm and we had to get him in for that. Tommy had a guitar with him so we played with the idea of actually pretending to be Two Door Cinema Club. I mean we’d already convinced America we were Bono’s best friends, how hard would it be too pull off being the Choice Music prize album of the year winners, “Something Good Can Work”, right? Coming to our senses, we thought of a better plan. The wristbands had a microchip in them which had to be scanned for entry into the grounds each day. We got one of the girls we knew, who was handy with a needle and thread, to rustle us up a makeshift Lolla band without a microchip. This meant Tommy could get to the scanner before making a Shawshank Redemptionesque break for freedom. It all went beautifully; he sailed up to the scanner without a worry but then came the true test. A few lads had tried this trick earlier, so security had been tightened up. There was a person beside the scanner, just behind it and a third line of defense about ten meters away from the security gate. Tommy would need to change his name to O’Driscoll to get through this lot. He went on though, determined to have TDCC ringing in his ears and not the words of a deportation officer. Approaching the scanner, the security guy cops the fake bracelet. “Hold it right there,” he shouts. “Not a chance,” Tommy replies and with a pirouette that even Drico would be proud of he sails past the first two at the door, not a finger on him, this kid might play for Ireland just yet. He stares down his next opposition a 6’7” NFL monster. He wasn’t going to Jonah Lomu this fecker. This guy eats chancers like Tommy Browne for breakfast. He knew he had to pull out a big one. He fixed him right, so it made it seem he was headed for the wooded area to the right side. Then, he swivelled his DCU hips, stepped him to the left hand side and switched on the afterburners. He left him for dead, looking on in frustration as Tommy’s distant figure disappeared into the crowd of 100,000 plus, never to be found and one day away from a perfect score.
The last day was always going to be the hardest. We had done the impossible and got Tommy in two of the three days and we desperately wanted the full set. The security had tightened up to Fort Knox type levels. The gates now had a wall of people guarding it and our fake bracelet approach just wasn’t a runner. We stood outside Lolla stumped trying to brainstorm our final plan of attack when a mass of about 250 people gathered around us and we instantly looked at each other. Were the urban legends true? We had heard stories of an individual who every year at Lolla would amass an army of 300-500 ticketless people and charge Lollapalooza. A liberator from the shackles of the promoter’s tyranny of astronomical ticket prices, but to be honest we didn’t believe them. A William Wallace of overpriced musical festivals? Not a chance, we thought. Then, in disbelief we gazed up, to see William, okay more likely Shaquille, rallying the troops. “Motherfuckers, are you ready?,” he roared to a deafening cheer. Usually, over here such language would be treated with a tap on a shoulder and a reminder to mind your p’s and q’s. I decided not to point that out. “We’re going to destroy these bastards and get all you fuckers into Lollapalooza for free, are you with me?” Yeah, they were with him. “At my signal we’re going to jump the fence to this east side and then we will split up and negotiate the second security fences at either the left or right side”. Now at this point I had a ticket, so like the civilised citizen I am, I was going to make my way over to the security gate and queue politely. Then, he screamed “Mo Fo, let’s dance”. I was hoping for “FREEDOM” in a Scottish accent but anyway. Tommy looked at me, “You coming?”.
Ah, fuck it, I’m breaking into an event I have tickets for.
We charged forward 300 ticketless brethren and one gobshite who’s a sucker for peer pressure and idiotic pursuits. We scaled the first like a champion hurdler but now the security knew what was happening and they were swarming on us. The adrenaline had me so pumped that in my infinite wisdom, I started shouting abuse at security. “Come here the fatty, I’ve got some sweeties for you.” Not my exactly my smartest move when he could move like Jamie Heaslip and was coming straight for me. In the chaos I couldn’t see where the hell Tommy was. Had he gotten over the second gate? I saw a gap and went to scale the fence and break for freedom, already paid for freedom but, you know, I’m a gobshite. Then just as I was about to throw my legs over the other side Heaslip grabbed me and flung me to the ground. I was fecked. My whole J1 flashed before my eyes, my attempted Rickshaw business, my drink of choice, Four Loko (a drink so good its banned in 30 states), the “shiftboard” girls, it all went up in flames with this stupid idea of being a “ledge” and breaking into Lollapalooza. Suddenly, a ginger haired, pale skinned phoenix emerged from the embers of my J1 dream. Tommy. He tackled the guard to the ground and I bounded over the gate. I was in. But what about Tommy? Summoning the strength of Samson he pushed the guard to the ground and scaled the gate with the grace of a man who has scaled one or two fences for Trinity Ball in his time and we pegged it. He was in. We were in. A Lollapalooza is defined as “a place or experience that is particularly incredible”. After getting Tommy in for free everyday, this was a Lollapalooza.
