Railroad Earth

The main problem w/ hippie music is all the hippies it attracts. Particularly this one older Ann Arbor hippie I've run into at shows over the last 15 years. He's this late 40s rich asshole I first saw at a Deep Space show, but I remember him from H.O.R.D.E. fests, Further Fests, Phish shows and Allman Brothers concerts. I think I heard once that he's a doctor or something which affords him the opportunity to see so many shows. Unfortunately for the rest of us, it has also given him the ability to act as though he is the shit. I imagine some of you know him. He can often be seen drumming or prancing around in his afro-like mullet (until recently when he finally cut it). I ran into him again at the Blind Pig the other night. Or rather, he ran into me... w/ both hands as he moved me over and took my spot on the floor. Asshole then tried to do it again, but that's when I took it upon myself to spill my beer on his back. Other than that, the hippies were alright, but the young ones made me realize how ridiculous we must have been back when we were younger. Other than him, the crowd was fun though & I ran into a bunch of people I hadn't seen in a while. The staff at the Pig was another story though. We walked in & had to get our hands stamped & get a wristband. We waited for the door guy to take our tickets while he then ignored us & talked to his buddy. Dawn finally asked if he needed them; his reply was, "No, you're all set." As we started walking away, the douche yells "Hey! here are you going? I need your tickets!" Dawn & I looked at each other & I had a really hard time not giving him shit for his attitude. We proceeded to the bar where I got a $3.25 mug of Guinness... which turned out to be the smallest mug of beer I've ever seen. To make matters worse, the bar tender charged me $3.75. When I pointed to the price list & questioned his pricing, he just said, "$3.75 tonight." While I'm n expert in consumer rights, I know that one can't charge more than the advertised price. I didn't have many options though, so I just gave him a 25 cent tip to go along w/ my middle finger. Nikki & her friends then got a pitcher but had an extra glass. I took it & placed it on a table for them w/o realizing the table was the Railroad Earth merch table. Their self-important merch lady came running up to me yelling, "Hey, don't leave you shit on my table! What's your problem?" These 3 incidents happened in the 1st 5 minutes we were there so by the time asshole hippie started pushing, I'd had about enough. I don't know how I maintained my control & avoided getting thrown out. If it wasn't for the fantastic bluegrass, I'd have left right away. Railroad Earth is damn good though; they played for about 2 1/2 hours & they're really tight. I can't wait to see them at Dunegrass next month. It should be a great time.