only in you-know-where, kids

[pic via stereogum]

I was deciding whether to write about my wonderful weekend with the boy, E (I think the Cute Canadian IBWIMIRLF is now ingrained enough in my life to be referred to by the first letter of his name and not some cutesy acronym,) my not-so-thrilling but still amusing because it happens so often now celebrity sighting of the week (Ray Liotta, outside of Pastis, natch,) or the deer hunting fiasco in my home state, when my interest was piqued by a slew of consultants looking out the window of a conference room across from my cubicle. "Oooh looahk, there's a rahk beeyand playing on the beeyack of a truuck!" proclaimed a sincere midwestern lady. Though it was impossible to discern which rahk beeyand this was from the 37th floor, thanks to Gothamist I alone knew it was U2. I grabbed a cigarette and the iPod (though in hindsight the cellphone and wallet would have been better choices) and made for the elevators.

U2 is and always will be one of my favorite bands of all time. I got hooked on them in early high school, and my trip to Berlin (Achtung Baby!,) arduous college application/persuasion of the parents process (Angel of Harlem, what,) and both boyfriend breakups (With or Without You, sadly I'm not kidding...) wouldn't have been the same without their music. I don't listen to them much anymore since they represent a different and increasingly distant time for me and now I'm mostly into bands that would take a little longer than five minutes to sell out MSG, but when the last boy I briefly dated stated several times that he vehemently hated U2, I just couldn't bring myself to call him again.

So this afternoon in a carpe diem moment, I found myself running in high heels down Seventh Avenue for a mile and a half, just ten feet away from Bono and the boys (all of whom were looking sexy as hell) as they played their next single, "All Because of You," and filmed the video for it (look for the girl with the blonde frizzy hair--it's humid here these days--and the stunned stare.) People were leaning out of high rise windows, Bono was giving shoutouts to foreign deli workers, and I didn't care how far I got from work even though walking perched on little three-inch sticks was my only means to get back to the office. At least, I didn't care until I re-sprained my bad ankle somewhere around 27th Street. I decided my time was up, waved goodbye to the band, and limped back to work while listening to U2 songs on the iPod and thinking. How E would've loved to be there too. How much more awestruck I'd have been if I'd experienced this as a sheltered high schooler and not a semi-jaded New Yorker. And, of course, how I'm never going to be able to leave this city for good, no matter how many midwestern retreats I need to be able to put up with the stress and insanity.