Hi to whomever decides to read this. For those of you who don't know, I'm a huge, and I mean HUGE Constantine Maroulis fan! I was so excited to get to see him play in a small intimate club and even get a chance to meet him (though it didn't happen)! This is going to be a somewhat-detailed view of the exciting day! The night before I was freaking out because I decided I didn't want to wear what I originally planned. So I thought I'd wait and decide on that day, but I didn't wake up as early as I wanted to, and I couldn't find anything better. I finally decided to where what I was going to wear at the begining, although the shirt didn't look the greatest on me. The drive up wasn't too bad. It was a 3 1/2 hour drive, the first 3 hours are nothing but country interstate. Then the last part is fun Chicago. We got into Chicago at rush hour, yay. We were so close to the exit, yet it seemed so far away because we were going like 5 mph. There were a couple times that we almost got lost (if you get in the wrong lane on the expressway your ruined.) But we didn't get lost like for the idols concert!!! It was at about 4ish, and got my car parked VALET! Yeah baby! The first people we ran across were a bunch of drunk middle aged women, who were hilarious. They couldn't really help us to where we were supposed to go because, well, they were drunk. There wasn't a line outside, and we could walk into part of the House of Blues and look around and warm up. There was a line inside that you had to have a fast pass for, but we didn't know how to get one. About an hour later we asked someone where we were supposed to wait in line and they told us outside. And you had to buy $30 of HOB merchandise each to wait inside, which was a load of crap. It should be first come, first serve! So we decided that it wasn't worth it and we waited outside and froze our asses off for an hour. We were the very first ones in the line outside that reached all the way to the end of the sidewalk, and talked to some people that drove almost as far as we did, from Indiana. We told them about the meet and greet, which I feel bad enough now because we got their hopes up FOR NUTTIN! We couldn't take cameras, but I thought I'd be a little rebel and sneak mine in. I SUCCEEDED! I hid it in a pad wrapper and stuck another pad in front of it in that little pocket in my purse. They made me open it up but the security dude didn't see my camera! So we got in and got in line for merchandise so we could get out bracelets. We waited in line for a little while, longer than I would've liked. My friend Kacie didn't even want to stand on the floor, she was wearing these crazy boots, but I convinced her otherwise. Basically because I wasn't allowed in the bar area where they had the stools anyway. I didn't get front of the stage, but maybe 3-4 people back. The first opening band wasn't that great, just really loud. They did a cool cover of the Cars Just What I Needed. The next opening band was a lot better, I liked them a lot. I can't believe how many people were incredibly wasted at the concert. I mean, you're there to see the incredible CONSTANTINE, wouldn't you want to enjoy it and, I don't know, remember it? This one drunk girl, who I could've sworn called me Mandy, was talking to us about meeting Constantine earlier and how she wanted to f'ing lick her camera that had the most adorable picture of her and Constantine. And this other girl that Kacie and I talked to was saying how she wanted to lick her f'ing camera. And during Big City Rock, this guy cuts in front of us with this drunk tall blonde he just met hanging all over him. Thank God it was only during the opening act and they weren't there for too long, because there would be some ass kicking going on otherwise. Then the time came for PRAY FOR THE SOUL OF BETTY to come on the stage. I can't believe how close I was to Constantine. He was SO gorgeous. Of course, they open with one of my least favorite songs but at least they got it over with. I can't remember exactly the order of the songs but they did a mix of songs from the CD (they sang my 4 favorite ones), new songs, and some covers that I really didn't know. During one of them closer to the beginning, Constantine was moving around and spinning, and the next moment he was flat on his back on the stage. I didn't know if it was intentional or he was just being his klutzy self, but he mentioned afterwards that he fell on his ass, then corrected himself and said butt, which really wasn't all that necessary since later on he sang "Some of my **** up world." The band was SO much better than the CD, but maybe it was just after being apart of it in the audience and the environment. It was just so much fun dancing along to the songs. I have a new respect for them. I was too scared to take too many pictures since security kept on staring at me, but a lot of people had cell phones and were taking pictures like crazy. Hopefully some of those will surface on the net. Close to the end Constantine jumped off the stage and inbetween the stage and the little guardrail keeping us apart. I moved up as far as I could in the crowd, and was so close to touching him or him touching my hand, litterally inches, it's so surreal. Then the concert had to unfortunately end. For the meet and greet, you had to buy merchandise and they gave you a bracelet with a number. I had number 32. They waited like 10 or so minutes to announce that only 51-100 could go to the meet and greet. I was so f'ing pissed off. I tried to ask the security guy if he could let us go, explaining our extenuating circumstances and he basically said we needed to get out of there. Then I asked the coat check guy, who was very nice to hold my sexy Constantine picture for me (though I wouldn't have bought it knowing I wouldn't meet him, I could've just printed it off and save ten bucks.) The opening bands were there too, and I feel now that I was kind of rude to them, though we did say we thought they were awesome too, just not Constantine. So as f'ing pissed off as I was, I figured there wasn't going to be anyway to meet him. We went outside and while Kacie was smoking we were talking to these people with VIP passes that said they might be able to get us into the meet and greet. But they left and never came back! They weren't even with Constantine, I guess the Rolling Stones, yes THE ROLLING STONES were having a private concert in the same building! How crazy was that. The drive home was horrible, I could hardly stay awake, plus I kept on thinking on how easily it would've been to change the 3 to an 8 on my wristband if only I had a sharpie. I feel like now that I may never get the chance to meet him, but it still was a f'ing awesome concert. Being that close to Constantine, being able to see facial expressions, getting a couple stares-at, and listening to his beautiful voice made it an awesome night. Just too bad it couldn't be SUPER-AWESOME!