It's been a pretty hectic couple of weeks, hence my lack of updates... well now I'm back home in France (at last) and I can babble away to my heart's content!

These past couple of weeks have been AMAZING to say the least. Mr Psychiatrist Man upped my pills but I can't let that take credit for my good mood - it's been NIGHTWISH.

Oh, and Pain of course.

Not my normal type of Pain.

I have a confession to make. I'm a metal fan. I always have been but it's had a brief hiatus... but going to two Nightwish gigs in Paris with Naomi last week made it rear its head again and now I'm kind of obsessed.

Oh my god. The concerts were... amazing. Day One completely opened my eyes and made me fall in love with each member of Nightwish in turn (yes, even Marco, he of the incredible beard). We were about five or six rows from the barrier and it was just... SO good. The support acts were Indica and Pain. Indica (Finnish female metal group) were pretty awesome, and Pain (Swedish metal group) were absolutely INSANE. It was to Pain that I had my very first moshing experience, which totally took me by surprise but I soon got into the spirit... you can't have hips the size of mine and not use them in a mosh! And Nightwish... oh, there are no words. I thought nothing could top it.

Day Two - topped it. We camped outside Le Zenith for roughly eight hours and ended up right on the barrier: well, we would have been right on the barrier if this enormously tall fat (and bald) guy had moved a couple of inches to the left. He didn't matter. We were There. Right at the front. Oh. Holy. God.

Because we knew how long we were going to be waiting for, we'd decided to take something to do in the queue for Day Two (ooh that rhymed), so we went to Galeries Lafayette early in the morning and bought the ingredients to make a poster to wave at the bands. Our clever decision was to write "BRITS ROCK HARDER IN PARIS" with a Union Flag. After much measuring, drawing and colouring, our sign was complete, and it looked pretty amazing.

However... after five minutes of Indica, the poor sign was in tatters as we were being shoved all over the place by people trying to displace us from our awesome place at the very front. We had to make a split second decision between Indica and Pain - the sign had to go. Only two parts of it remained... the Union Flag, and one word.

"HARDER."

Of course we waved it at the bands - OF COURSE. I'm a good foot taller than Naomi, so it was my job to project 'HARDER' as high as I could, while she brandished the Union Flag. Up it went for Pain. The two guitarists seemed to be trying their hardest to ignore it, though one of them (the hot one, yay) seemed to be desperately trying not to giggle every time he looked in our direction (and before anyone questions this, we were wearing flashing devil horns, none of the acts could miss us). The lead singer, Peter, took one look and nearly burst out laughing in the middle of singing/screeching. It was a moment of triumph... especially when Peter announced that they were filming the music video for 'Monkey Business'. Me and Naomi nearly died of happiness right there and then, and every time the camera came near us we waved 'HARDER' with all our strength.

Then came Nightwish.

The first song: 7 Days To The Wolves.

I had to time 'HARDER' very well here. I didn't want to wave it at Anette by herself, I didn't think she'd appreciate it quite as much as the men would. Tuomas was of course tied to his keyboards (in a boat) on the other side of the stage, so I decided to target the guitar-boys. Marco and Emppu.

Marco first, and he DEFINITELY gave the best reaction. As soon as he glanced in my direction, I thrust 'HARDER' up as high as I could and started jumping up and down with extra zeal. Marco looked down... and gave a very obvious double take. He then looked me right in the eye with a very questioning expression. I screeched with delight like the fangirl I am and winked at him. He laughed out loud, winked back, and gave me the thumbs up. Cue me nearly exploding with joy - I managed to give a thumbs up back before he launched into the chorus of 7 Days To The Wolves.

My next target was Emppu, the impossibly cute (and very very tiny) lead guitarist, otherwise known as The Metal Elf. He's so ickle, I want to put him in my pocket and carry him around. I'm sure he wouldn't mind... Anyway, when 'HARDER' was thrust towards him, he also did a double take, then threw the full force of his incredible grin at me and winked at me too. Talk about happy - I nearly fell to the floor with joy.

The entire concert - both nights - was immense. I honestly have never had such an epic experience in my life. I love Nightwish even more, and Pain have a new place in my heart (read their tour blog; it's absolutely hilarious). Oh, there just aren't enough adjectives to describe the true fantasticness of those two days.

We went to Disneyland right afterwards, but for the first time in my life, a trip to Disneyland was eclipsed by what went on before it. In other words, the gigs. I love Disneyland (and I'm very pleased to finally have a photo of me with my first ever crush, Robin Hood) but I've been a few times now. Nightwish was a completely new experience and now I want to see them again and again.

...which is in fact a possibility. They're going to be playing a few festivals this summer and me and Naomi are thinking of going on a trek to see them. So far our favourite option is one in Norway - should be interesting. The pair of us in a tent... my god. The people in the tents around us will have to watch out! I mean, while we were in our hotel room in Disneyland we pissed off everyone anywhere near us by loudly discussing not-entirely-savoury things until three in the morning. In a tent, we'll be even louder... well, we'll be exactly the same volume but with less walls to protect bystanders!

I'm currently sitting in front of the TV, on the living room floor, having finally connected my own laptop to the French network, which feels very good. And what feels even better: I have rediscovered Chipstick. Well, the French version at any rate. I'm gonna end up putting on three stone just in Chipsticks over the next three weeks.

Hmmm, I really should stop babbling on now. I think if I carry on rambling about Nightwish and Pain everyone and anyone who reads this will get very very bored, my mum certainly is already and I've only been back three days. Nightwish and Pain have been playing almost constantly, and 7 Days To The Wolves has become my new favourite song - it's even overtaken Amaranth and Sahara, which were my previous two favourites. Bye Bye Beautiful is coming up the scale as well, even though they didn't perform that one live (and sadly, Tuomas has announced they never will again, though I do see their reasons: they've said goodbye now).

Oh dear. I think I'm obsessed.

Ooh, I just saw that Niki has 'tagged' me in a thingy on her blog, yay! It makes me feel very happy :) I shall do the attached whatsit soon, I think this entry is as long as it could possibly be!

Misty x

EDIT: I now have Twitter, I'm JPLeather, and it seems to be an amazing invention. Also if anyone fancies a look at one of my Nightwish videos, it's here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTP6_PqOYqs Not very good quality, but I felt the need to share it. The moment where Emppu attempts to play Marco's guitar but fails because of Marco's alarmingly sweaty armpit is GOLDEN!