The World's Saddest Britney Spears Album Release Listening Event in the Whole Wide World

So I just got home from the world's saddest Britney Spears Femme Fatale listening party at a local movie theater. Was this put together at the last minute? Some ads said it started at 6pm, some said 8pm. I got there at 5:40. I even parked far away so I wouldn't have to pay street parking. I walked in and they told me to come back at 6. I think I actually got there before some of the people who were working the thing. So I went to Fantasy Headquarters and looked at halloween costumes. I went to an ATM at a Walgreen's and took out some cash. I went to the dollar store (meant to buy toothpaste, forgot by the time I left).  At 6pm when I came back and I walked in and some guy ran up to me and goes, "Can I help you?" And I said, "Um, I'm here for the thing that's going on tonight." He said, "Oh, we're opening in about 10 minutes, you can go wait over there." So I went and waited over there. "Over there" was in a corner with a table and a copy of the Illinois Entertainer. I thought, "Hmm, maybe I can see what U2 cover bands are playing out in the suburbs." Or "Perhaps I can see if Huey Lewis will be playing at the Horseshoe Casino soon." A young guy with a fancy video camera was walking around so I asked him what he was filming for. He told me he was hired by the people running the event to film it, having answered a Craig's List ad from the day before. We talked about Britney a little, and he wasn't really into her the way I was -- he was there because it was a filming gig. Then I noticed some people sitting at a table with microphones in the lobby, one being an obese gentleman, and he was surrounded by a couple other nondescript people, and one other person who kind of looked like they were maybe high school age or a little older with a Manic Panicy orangey fuscia-y mohawk thing which I thought was adorable and cute and totally precious, and I have no idea if that was a boy or girl or somewhere in-between. I have no idea what they were talking about. I wandered up to the table where there were some Britney-related things, namely some of her scents. They weren't for sale (I already owned some of them anyway). They were on display as part of the raffle. I talked to the young girl sitting at the table. Her mom worked at the concession stand so apparently she got suckered into working this event. We talked about what she planned to do for her spring break, which was soon, and she seemed to think sleeping was a good way to spend it, which sounded good to me. At some point I just kind of maneuvered away form "over there" into the concession area and ordered popcorn and soda and told the lady there that her daughter seemed very nice.  The popcorn was delicious. I decided to Tweet that the popcorn at the Britney Spears Femme Fatale Release Event was delicious. In fact, I decided that I was going to do a live Twitter feed of my experience at the event, which seemed like a good idea until my friends Stefanie and Sarah got there, who I am sure did not appreciate my constant face up all in my smart phone, but I couldn't resist. They had a little red carpet-y area up in the concession stand foyer that had that advertisingy background you always see behind the celebs at press junkets with logos, and this background thing had a bunch of logos of Sony and Zomba/Jive (Britney's record people) and whatever else. I demanded my friends take pictures of me in front of it with my popcorn bag and soda looking as frumpy as possible, and the more disgusting I tried to myself look the funnier the picture was. When I get the pictures off my camera, the next time I load them in, I should probably post one of those pictures because it was pretty preposterous.

As we were waiting the Cougars played, and the leathery Cougar ladies played covers of songs from Cheap Trick, the Ramones, Joan Jett and the like. It was cheesy, but we were entranced in watching the audience, all 23 people (in a theater that hold about a 1000, as I overheard someone say earlier when I was waiting "over there.") One lady in the band looked a little bit like Seven Tyler and one lady looked a little bit like Richard Simmons but considerably shorter and kind of trannyish. I couldn't figure out why they were performing at a Britney Spears release event because they didn't play any actual Britney songs and they are not, on the surface anyway, everything Britney Spears is not: middle-aged women, rocking out, playing their own instruments. A huge Britney poster hung to the stage right, a photo obviously from the Femme Fatale album cover photo shoot. The stationary Britney poster -- there's something poetic here, but I'm not sure exactly what it is. Aging women next to a poster of Britney -- but a lot of the songs the Cougars covered were written by men, just as many of the songs Britney does are written/produced by men -- as if to say that women "rocking out" are still being pulled by strings of men  -- or something. I don't know. I decided to settle the issue once and for all by heading back out to the concession stand for Swedish Fish. I also went to the bathroom and saw that above the hand dryer was an ad for the Britney album.

After the Cougars, some local radio announcer got up on the stage and tried to get the audience to say "Britney Britney Britney" over and over which got really tiresome, especially since there were so few people in the theater. Then he tried to get the audience to call and response the spelling of her name but he spelled it wrong with 2 T's. It's not fucking Brittney. It's Britney, bitch. And! The audience participation thing gets old really quick. I HATE IT. That shit should be outlawed. I will not be told when to clap and shout stupid shit or sing along. I and I alone will decide when to clap and shout stupid shit or sing along. Then he wanted to work with the impersonator on some moves and asked for some music and they put on Sometimes, which is a cheesy almost sort of ballad thing, not the easiest thing to dance to, and he tried doing that Russian slavic dance where you squat down and kick your legs out, and  it was so awkward, and everybody felt really embarrassed for him too.

Then they had some model come out and they showed a preview of a cheesy horror movie she's in and play some dance song she recorded, while we watched a screen saver on the movie screen. Then they had a Britney impersonator come and do a montage of Britney songs, which was OK except that the moves seemed a little languid and like s(h)e didn't have very much actual choreographed moves. I did recognize some of the moves as being from certain videos and live Britney performances. The lip syncing wasn't great but whatever. Then the performer was hanging around and I neglected to get my picture taken with them but oh well. That's what Photoshop is for.

Then the DJ guy came back and tried to get the Britney call and response thing started back up again and he was awful. Like it was someone's dorky dad.

Then another model actress person came out and talked about her fragrance she's launching. And then the obese man came up and talked about his internet radio station.

Well I'm beat so I will have to leave you on a cliff hanger about what happened next because i have to go to bed. I'm sure you're devastated by that news.