it was a beautiful day.

i grew up in a family full of u2 fans. my sister, my cousins, my friends. there was no escaping it. i knew the words inside and out to almost every song on zooropa, achtung baby and rattle and hum before i was even 10.

i went to my first u2 concert in 2001 in minneapolis, with the rest of my crazed family (can you find me?):
and in 2005, i was fortunate to see them again with kent and some friends (although we all sat separately - ha!).

so when u2 announced they were finally coming back to winnipeg again, i wasn't sure i wanted to go. but then i came to my senses, and realized that i would probably regret it if i didn't see them (knowing that i live about 5 mins from the stadium where they would be playing).

come concert day, i stood in the general admission line with my friend trish and her sister, jessica to make sure we got a decent spot on the floor.

and here's what we got:

picture taken by my friend jay, sitting in the upper deck. thanks jay!

spelling fail. thank goodness bono acknowledged it as soon as they came out.
hands down, the best moment of the show - bono and the edge singing stay (faraway, so close). one of my all-time faves! i recorded the song, but i'll spare you since i may have been singing along and may sound horrible and off-key since i barely had a voice left at that point

oh, and if you're wondering why kent is not in any of these pictures, it's because we spent the entire show apart. yep. he didn't want to wait in line with us, so we (stupidly) thought we could find each other later. what we didn't anticipate was a gridlock on the cell towers because of the sheer number of texts, phone calls and tweets going in and out of the stadium! we weren't able to get ahold of each other, save one short phone call that got cut off, so we couldn't find each other. thank goodness kent was able to find some of our friends on the field (that's winnipeg for you!), so at least he stood next to someone he knew throughout the concert.