Everyone’s all, “Pickathon is such a cool festival. The food is so good. The bands are awesome. It’s such a civilized affair!” True, true true, but here are some things they don’t tell you:
You are surrounded by hippies, who do everything in their power to crush you in their soppy dank grossness. Let’s not even talk about how inconsiderate these miserable fucks are—actually no, let’s talk about it!
3 a.m.—First off, I did not realize that bands would be playing ALL NIGHT LONG right by my tent, but it’s cool because a great pickin’ ‘n’ grinnin’ old-timey band starts playing, with a female dynamo singing.
5 a.m.—Band clears out for bed. Group of musically challenged hippies take up the reins.
5:30 a.m.—Clogging happens. Really loud clogging, with some spotty tambourine playing and enthusiastic bucket beating.
6 a.m.—Hippies make up their own song as the sun comes up. It goes, “Walking in the morning/walking in the morning/walking in the morning/walking in the morning.” These are the only lyrics to their song. Rinse and repeat for an hour. Seriously, rinse and repeat, hippies! There are twigs in your hair!
7 a.m.—With the Grateful Dead playing in the background on a stereo, the hippies mistakenly and boisterously believe they know all the words to Neil Young’s “Heart of Gold.” They are wrong.
7:30 a.m.—Hippies crawl back into the dirty hole they came from.
7:45 a.m.—Nearby generator kicks on! It sounds like this, “RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!” Thirty minutes and 50 decibels later, it mercifully shuts off.
8:30 a.m.—Feral hippie child shouts, “Mommy, I have to go potty!” The remaining li’l hippies in the tent village perk up their ears and come screaming from their tents.
Moral: Bring a bottle of Tylenol PM and some earplugs. Why did no one tell me this?
Other hippie boner-killers:
* Alison was struck by a runaway hula hoop.
* Ned saw a baby being bathed in a porta-potty sink.
* An intimidating hippie lady told Raquel the shower line would move faster if she just stood in line naked.
* A football huddle of four trustafarians untangled as I was walking back to envelop me in their hug circle maw. For two petrifying minutes, Aaron, Matt, Amy, and Ryan “hugged” me. I don’t think I breathed the entire time, my body rigid, suspicious, and full of peace-love-and-understanding opposites. Reluctantly they released me. After chugging a beer, I walked back by to see them with two new hug-receivers in the belly of their hug beast. If only I could’ve warned them.
They’ve all gotta be trustafarians.
No normal person can afford $150 tickets
This sounds like Hell on Earth. What those people did to you is legally considered battery and you would have been justified in violent retribution.
yeah you should have pulled out your blade and ninja’d those fuckers. nothing like a bitta ultra-violence ta show ’em not to fuck with you.
Lemme get this straight:
Folk music, camping and hippies.
What did you really expect?
Earplugs. This was my 2nd year in a row volunteering for Pickathon, and when it comes to camping amid winding forest trails illuminated by the soft glow of X-mas lights and filled with the sounds of late-night revelry, earplugs are a MUST.
I learned the same lesson last year that you just did, Courtney, and I feel for you.
Great journalism! I felt like I was there.
Hmmmmm, sounds like SOMEone could use a puff, puff…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQe4XVrJFGQ…
This almost makes up for all the boring Discomfort Zones. Kudos.
Hey Courtney, that kind of sounds like my Pickathon experience! I heard that same horrendous late night/ early morning caterwauling, but as I’m just a member of the general public I had to pay through my nose to pitch my tent on the side of a steep incline to spend three sleepless nights sliding down a hill while out of tune hippies screeched away.
Seriously, though, Pickathon’s a great festival. But the organization is just shit. I mean, did I really pay for the privilege of having my ears bleed due to some clueless wannabe Jackstraw types? And I know that there is a living legend doing a workshop in the barn, but doesn’t common sense dictate that if hundreds try to cram in & see her the deck might just break? And by allowing volunteers- which made up nearly 20% of the attendees- and the media come early, set up & stay for free you’re basically sticking it to families that- did I mention- pay a shit ton to learn how to sleep at a 45 degree angle.
So, yeah, just like you I have some complaints I’m bitching about. I just perhaps feel a bit more entitled. (Did I mention I paid through the nose yet?)
“Hippie boner-killer.”
Redundant. There’s only one kind of hippie vis a vis the boner.
@trueslicky Yeah, I was totally scrunched at the bottom of my tent by the end of it. Hope you had fun though–hippies and angles and ticket prices notwithstanding.
We’re definitely being trolled. The only legitimate discomfort zone so far was something these people willingly attended.
You have to understand that it’s never night-time when you’re on acid. Or it always is. Or something.
Earplugs ? I just used a liter of Tequila and cradle my head in an ample bosom.
We’re you not partying? Pickathon was not as hippy as I thought it’d be.
Hippie-dodging is an acquired skill at Pickathon (i.e. convenient campsite = obnoxious campsite). Just think what it would have been like if 20,000 of ’em weren’t in the Gorge watching Phish instead.