Assorted Thoughts From Coachella

- If I were a musician, I would find it infuriating how crowds can't clap in time, but keep getting faster and faster. I find myself always clapping a tiny bit later than most people (on the beat, of course), vainly trying to maintain a rearguard action to stop the acceleration. It never works, of course, unless you get an audience of musicians. Which you never do.

- Concerts are a fast way to increase misanthropy, because there's always some tool there doing annoying things - talking really loudly while the song is playing, pushing past you to get to the front, stepping on your shoes, dancing into you, being really sweaty etc. And all forms of toolishness get more intense as you get closer to the stage, which is where you'd ideally like to be located.

-On that front, is there any concert behavior more obnoxious than starting an impromptu 'mosh pit' of just bashing into each other? There's always some bunch of imbeciles that think just want to bump into each other, with complete disregard for the fact that they're also bumping into the people at the edges of the spontaneously forming circle (as everyone tries to move away from the tools). The circle just reinforces the problem, as the turds run further out, guaranteeing that they keep bumping you. In a better world, it would be acceptable to punch anyone who ran into you.

-Coachella draws on an audience primarily of rich, young, reasonably socially adjusted white hipsters. And when you select on those things (the first three much more than the fourth), it's amazing how attractive the average person is. There were hardly any fat people there, and there not too many real weirdos. Demographics is attractiveness.

- There was a fair amount of pot being smoked at the concert. And you know what problems this created? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Personally, I have zero interest in marijuana, and have never tried it. But it's hard to see these situations in action and not find yourself thinking 'Wait, why exactly are we sending people to prison for doing this? What exactly is the harm we're trying to prevent?'

-Musicians really are addicted to cheap crowd-pleasing lines. 'Hello Coachella' [WOOO!!!]. 'Is everyone having a good time? [WOO!! YEAH!!!]. And the really controversial -'It's great to be here in California!' [ALRIGHT! ROCK!]. Who can blame them though - it works!

- White people seem unable to listen to reggae that isn't made by someone with the surname 'Marley'. If I were a reggae artist, I'd change my name by deed poll to Shylock Marley, just for the extra record sales.