SXSW 2012 Diary, Day One: A Camel, Angry Bartenders and Delta Spirit

Last year, I was part of the AOL Music crew that did 70-something video interviews during SXSW in the Convention Center. This year, I've been given a little more free time. Here's a recap of my first day there.

-- 10:30AM First celeb sighting: My favorite comedian Mike Birbiglia. Unfortunately, this sighting occurred when I nearly knocked my suitcase over onto his leg while boarding our seemingly blogger-filled flight to Austin. He didn't notice, thankfully, and his headphones saved me from sputtering out some awkward words of fandom.

-- 4PM: The theme of SXSW this year seems to be waiting in lines. Between RSVP check-ins, barbecue joints and shows with big-name acts like Santigold and Miike Snow, it seems that people here don't mind queuing up for what looks like at least a 45-minute wait. They also don't mind telling the people doing the check-ins that they're a-holes with bad attitudes and, in what I'm pretty sure was a comment directed at me, "some VIP douchebag." Uh, that's journalist douchebag, ma'am.

-- 6:30: Drinks at Iron Works BBQ with the Consequence of Sound crew and Sami from Rock It Out Blog! AOL Music editor Theo Bark nearly gives up his vegetarian ways after seeing a giant plate of ribs and sausage.

-- 7:48: After about four or five hours of not really seeing anything that lived up to the "Keep Austin Weird" slogan, I saw a camel riding in a trailer behind a truck, a pedi-cab driver blasting AC/DC with a giant Darth Vader statue in the back of his ride, and a dude on stilts meandering down 6th street. Good to be back!

-- 8ish: My first real show of SXSW happens to be a comedy one. I watched a taping of this IFC game show called 'Bunk' (hilarious, btw) and got to stand near Reggie Watts, Eugene Mirman, John Hodgman and, I'm pretty sure, Justin Long. It was also around this time that, in conversations with my colleagues at HuffPost Comedy and Moviefone, that I realized that I had no idea what day it was or how long I'd been in Austin. It was about 8:15PM. I was not drunk, though the margaritas there were tasty.

-- 10:12: Yelled at by bartender for the first time. My offense? Ordering a beer that they no longer had in stock.

-- 10:21: Chastized by concertgoer for being too tall, also for the first of many times. "Can we switch spots? You're two times my size and just stood in front of me."

-- 10:30PMish: Caught Santigold at La Zona Rosa. She was dressed like an insane Barbie and had two back-up dancers that, at one point, I'm pretty sure were swinging around croquet mallets. So that happened.

-- 11:15: Saw M. Ward at Stubb's. Conversation between me and Spinner Canada editor Josh Ostroff:
Him: "This is good, but it would be so much better if Zooey Deschanel showed up."
Me: "I could pretty much say that about every situation in my life."
Then we talked at length about how much we like 'New Girl.' Judge us.