You Are The Perfect Hug

It's kinda hard to know where to put this, but since this was like the best 5 seconds of. my. life. I think it deserves its own mini-posting. So as Maise said in her review, we were separated for the onstage group photo and, really, I had no idea where I was going, so I was a little shocked when I stopped filming and realized I was standing right next to Ilan and Justin. I actually didn't even see Trent until after Rob had snapped a few shots. Immediately after that, there was this stage manager chick who was trying to quickly wrangle everyone offstage so she could bring up the next group. I let her tug at my sleeve for about two steps before I overheard some girls behind me say, "Trent, you said the donation thing included a hug so..."

That was all it took for me to shake the stage manager, but she didn't give up without a fight. I faked right, I faked left, then I sacrificed another fan by pushing him into her and running to the left again. Even so, I only narrowly escaped her grasp. In a second, she was hot on my heels as I rounded behind Ilan's drum kit. Just as she was reaching for me again, I took a daring dive over the bass drum and straight into Trent's muscly, awaiting arms, where he held me tight and stroked my hair while whispering sweet nothings into my ear. -le sigh-

Okay, so maybe that's not totally how it went down, but a girl can daydream, can't she? I did manage to ditch the stage manager, so I walked up to Trent and asked "So can I get a hug too?" He looked at me for a second (he was either totally checking out my boobs or was reading the L'orangerie Stank shirt. Both possibilities make me giggle). Then he tilted his head to the side and nodded while motioning with his hand, "okay, come on." I went in for a criss-cross hug (one arm over his shoulder, one arm under the other shoulder with him vice-versa), and this is where things speed up and slow down. It was only about 5 seconds, but in my head it was "OMGOMGOMGOMGOMG," and out loud I think I said "thank you, thank you, thank you." It gets slightly fuzzy at that point.

As a side note, I wish I could say that I maintained the slightest bit of composure when talking to the band as Maise did while we got our autographs, but I can't. No, instead I went off about the most inane shit ever and at a "Gilmore Girls" quipping-session pace to boot. It was some serious *face palm* going on. I still had the same rapid-fire pace when saying my multiple "thank you" in Trent's ear, which I'm sure wasn't weird at. all. But I squeezed him, he squeezed back, my head nearly exploded, and I floated off the stage with Mr. Iris, completely elated.

Regarding the next part, even then I was thinking "this is kinda gross," but this is what happens when you go hugging rock stars. As Mr. Iris and I were walking down the offstage ramp, the breeze picked up, and I noticed my cheek was wet. I know you all probably think I was crying at this point, but that's not the case. It was Trent's sweat, which means there was like cheek-to-cheek or cheek-to-ear contact going on while I was latched on to him. So that part was awesome, but at the same time "Eww." Before you ask, I didn't go all fangirl and save the "precious fluid" in a glass vial to use later in some weird cloning experiment. I just kind of wiped it off and later, because I'm the epitome of grace, I managed to splash my own beer on my face while trying to shuffle through my purse, hold a camera, hold a beer, and not lose my place in line at the merch table. D'oh!

So, yeah, that's my tale of hugging the seemingly unhuggable. I grabbed Maise and Ro after their group photo and hugged them both to try and share the experience. Then we staked out a spot to watch the rest of the show. Stay tuned for Part II of our review--coming at you "soon."