Best Friends, Florida, & Framing Hanley

Last weekend was a good one.
I figured I'd throw together a little post about it.
Friday morning we headed out, on our way to Florida for the weekend.
Two purposes of this trip was; 1- spend the weekend with my best friends & Doug to go fishing with M's hubby. 2- For C, M & me to go see Framing Hanley. (It was M's first FH show too!)

The show was Friday night, so we got to M's around 3 and got dressed real quick & headed out, we had about a 45 min- hour drive to the venue, which was in Jacksonville.

We leave, decide we'll get Taco Bell since we thought we were pushing time. It was about 4-something and because we didn't know where we were goin, we wanted plenty of time to get there.

Well, plenty of time we certainly had..

Let me back up..
I got an email on March 22 stating that the time had changed from 7:00 to 6:30. No biggie, really.
So that was factored into our rushing. We wanted to stop and get dinner at a sit down restaurant but figured we wouldn't have time. Even though FH was headlining & would be going on last, we wanted to get there when doors opened.
Now...then venue.
Let me set the scene...we're driving & are now in an area of Jax that M (who lives there & is familiar with Jax a little) is not too familiar with. So we just follow directions & it has us pull into a shopping center. The only legit store in the center is a Dollar General on the end. Then there is like a nail salon & a couple of other stores that I can't remember. On the opposite end there is a club (or something) that M see & says, "oh, there have been shootings there before." Holy God. Great.
Well, after driving back and forth & being blind, we finally see the venue's sign on the building, which happens to be right next to the other club.
I called to double check that we were in the right spot & to ask when doors opened, thinking it was at 6 or 6:30 since, ya know, that email. Nope. Doors open at 7. What?
So, here we are, in a sketchy ass area with an hour and a half to wait for this place to open up.
We pulled across the road to a nicer looking gas station & I ate my food while we sat and talked.
Finally it's almost 7 so we went back across to where the venue was. Thankfully there was a small line formed. So, we found a parking spot as close to the door as we could & then got out.
We felt a little better then & finally at about 15 or 20 after 7, the door opened.

There were 4 or 5 openers. That's a lot. And I didn't get into all of them.
Actually the only opener I really like was the one right before FH, and there were called Avenue of the Giants. (Check 'em out).
We got our merch & chatted with the guys before they went on.
And then around 10:30, or maybe even 11, Framing Hanley went on stage and all was right with the world! They played a lot of their new material & of course some of their songs from the past 2 albums. As always it was an amazing show. I may be biased but, that's honestly besides the point. If you've never been to a show, go. Tickets are always reasonably priced. :-)
After the show we chatted a little more & M & I took a picture with them.
We got home about 2am.

The rest of the weekend was good & bad. My lovely husband was supposed to go fishing Saturday with M's husband. BUT, poor D, he ended up waking up with a stomach bug. So, while M's husband went fishing & us girls went to do a little shopping, he stayed on the couch allllll day. So much for hoping he could have a little break. :(
We stayed in and watched a movie Saturday night.
Sunday we just sat around until time to say good-bye. Thankfully D was feeling better so the long ride would be too miserable.
After saying bye, we stopped at Chili's for lunch. (At which we saw a woman who looked like she was about 8 months pregnant enjoying the hell out of some margaritas. -We are bout 90% sure she was pregnant, it wasn't like a fat belly, it looked like a pregnant belly, belly button sticking out and all-)
And then we took the looong drive home.
And viola! That was my lovely weekend! The only thing that would have made it better was is D wouldn't have gotten sick.
Did you make it to the end of reading?
If so, yay!
Remember how I said I took a shit ton of pictures at the show & only a handful came out. Here they are...

Blurry, but I love it.

Avenue Of The Giants

Guitarist, AOTG

Devon, lead singer, AOTG

Nixon
Framing Hanley

Jon
Framing Hanley

Nixon
FH

Ryan
Framing Hanley

Jon, Brandon, Nixon, Chris, and Ryan
Framing Hanley

Jon & Nixon
FH

Nixon, Jon & Ryan
FH

Nix

Ryan
FH

Chris
FH

Brandon
FH

Framing Hanley & Me
4.11.14

After looking if I did a little editing, there are a couple more that would probably be halfway decent, but oh well...

Framing Hanley has a new album coming out April 29, it's called The Sum of Who We Are.

If you're interested in following or keeping up with them you can either:
Like their FB
Follow their Twitter
Follow the FHan Twitter
Follow the Street Team Twitter (A lot, not all, but a good number of the tweets from it are me)
And then of course there is their Website.
And the FHan site

Look for The Sum of Who We Are in stores on April 29.
You'll here me mention it more, obviously! :-)

And, I'm out!
Lovins!
♥♥♥
Brandy