These crappy pictures brought you you by the fine folks at the Agganis Arena at Boston University and Verizon Wireless!

I shouldn't have paid attention to the rules on the website. The concert was listed as "no cameras of any kind," so I, like a law-abiding citizen, left my digital camera in the trunk of my car tonight. I expected metal detectors or a pocket search upon arriving at the concert, but there was none of that to be found. And everyone was running around with a camera in-hand! Flashbulbs everywhere!

I took out my camera phone and tried to snap some shots, but it was just too dark and though we were on the floor of the arena, we were really too far away. I tried different light settings and different zoom settings, but all I got was this pixelly mess.

Next time, I'm just going to sneak a camera in, rules be damned!

Yeah, I'm a rebel...

So... I completed my date dare tonight. It didn't turn out as I expected. It turned out better.

The online conversation I mentioned yesterday was an exchange of e-mails between me and a guy I met off of craigslist. I had placed a personal ad for someone to go to the concert with me, and he responded. I sent him a response to his response, and he gave me the URL to his website, as well as a piece of information that almost brought everything to a halt.

He has a boyfriend.

He made it perfectly clear that he had no interest in finding a guy to date or to hook up with, which is great. I've had enough of guys who cheat in my life, and I would hate myself if I had gone out with someone, only to find out that he was attached at the end of the evening. Still, I decided to keep the invitation on hold until a few more responses came in. Heck, someone as cute and nice and interesting could show up.

It didn't exactly happen that way. While I got some nice e-mails, nobody interested me except this guy, and I had to ask myself just what I was doing, passing up a perfectly nice person just because I knew that the "only" thing I might get out of it was a friendship.

This morning, I e-mailed him and asked him if he was still interested in attending the concert with me. He wrote back this afternoon and said that he was definitely interested, and we made plans to meet in front of the arena.

Through most of the day, I checked up on his website and read about his life and his beliefs and his boyfriend (who has his own section of the site), and realized that I was crazy to have hesitated in extending the offer. He's a great person with beliefs very close to my own, and expresses that in a really passionate way. He and his boyfriend are very happy together, which is something to be celebrated, not met with a sigh and the proclamation that "all the good ones are taken," or my cynical thought that he might have a friend for me.

Am I attracted to him? I have to admit that I am. Should that get in the way of trying to forge a friendship with him? That would be as stupid as avoiding a friendship because I didn't find him attractive. What does it matter, honestly? After awhile, your friends end up looking like just that...your friends. I no more give thought to what Laurie or Mike or Suzanne look like than I do my family members.

I made a conscious decision to put that aside and just enjoy myself tonight. It was the best decision I've made in a long time.

The "guy's" name is John. He's my age (older than me by a month), a vegan (something which I used to be many years ago), liberal, interested in technology and the environment and full of life and passion.

I met him on the front steps of the Agganis Arena just after work. We had both described what we would be wearing (my bright-yellow jacket and "Cookie Monster blue" vest come in handy sometimes), but it really wasn't necessary for me, since John looked just like his picture. There was a quick, awkward handshake and then we headed into the arena.

As we got to the entrance, I said, "I know you!" John worked in Amherst at the time I was going to school there, and we were both students at the same time (during my lost senior year). I knew that he looked familiar; it's amazing how small the world really is when you think about it.

We got there early, and the place was really empty. We found our seats (farther away than the seating map on Agganis' website showed, but still relatively okay) and started chatting about the concert, and our lives, and gay marriage and kids and a whole range of subjects. It was great, precisely because it wasn't a date. I didn't try to impress him, and if he didn't like me, at least it would be based on an honest impression and not the "date personality" that gets in the way whenever I try too hard with an attractive guy.

The lights went down for the opening act, a young woman named Juliet who has a nice voice (sort of like Terri Nunn from the band Berlin), but needs some work in the songwriting department. Her act was fairly short, and the lights came back up while the crew prepared the stage for Duran Duran.

I went to see Duran Duran when I was a teenager. Back then, I was utterly in love with both Nick Rhodes (because he was alterna-styled and pretty) and Roger Taylor (because he was really masculine and good looking and the drummer). Today, I think Nick really needs to learn to have fun, but Roger still does it for me. They had a lot of closeups of him on the projection screen behind the stage, and I kept thinking that he aged really well.

Simon LeBon was terrific. He had all the energy he did over 20 years ago when I saw him last, and his voice is just as good as it always was.

The show was a good mix of their newest stuff and their classics. All the songs I wanted to hear were on the playlist, from Hungry Like the Wolf to Save a Prayer.

Sometime around the middle of the show, I started talking with a young woman (whose name escapes me now) who lent me her binoculars to see the stage more clearly. She was with her boyfriend, who mysteriously disappeared for a long while, only to return and tell me that if I went upstairs and then back down the stairs in a certain section of the arena, I could get better shots of the stage (and if I had my digital camera with me, I would have gotten some really nice shots). The woman and I both took off for this great picture-taking spot. Running down the hall, she asked, "What year did you graduate high school?"

"1986," I said. "You?"

"1987," she said. "I feel like I'm 16 years old again!"

Indeed, we were complete teenagers as we rounded the corner and scampered down the stairs. The boyfriend was right; the view was perfect from our vantage point. We snapped pictures during Ordinary World, and I would have stayed through the next song, but I felt bad about leaving John alone. "My date's going to think I abandoned him," I said to my newfound friend. She nodded at me, and I made my way back to our seats.

The rest of the concert was truly fantastic. When I got back to John, they were just starting Save a Prayer (my favorite Duran Duran tune), and my new "girlfriend" high-fived me on the way back to her seat, because I told her that was my favorite.

I had forgotten just how much fun it is to go to a large concert. All the concerts I've been to over the past few years have been in small venues, which is nice and intimate, but it doesn't allow you to sing along with the band (since nobody can hear you over the amplifiers and the screaming fans) or to dance (I didn't do too much of that, mostly because there were people on either side of me), or to scream like a teenaged girl at the band when they finished their set.

If another band that interests me as much comes to town, I'm buying tickets, because it was much more fun than I expected.

I was going to leave John at the steps and let him catch the T home, but he had ridden his bike to the T stop near his home, which was a hike, so I offered him a ride.

I got us a little bit lost on the way back to his bike (I couldn't remember how to get to Route 9 from BU, which is just about the easiest thing in the world), so I asked if he'd rather I just drop him off at home, since the hour was so late (it was approaching midnight at this point). He agreed it would be a pain to have to ride all the way back home, so I drove the extra distance to his house and dropped him off.

Overall, my "date dare" was a terrific experience. I'd be lying if I said that I'm not a little bit disappointed that this great guy is taken, but that just goes to prove that there are great guys out there, and eventually I'm going to meet another one of them. John told me that he'd like to keep in touch, as we both said that we didn't have all that many close gay male friends.

To recap: Made good on my New Year's resolution. Went to a terrific concert. Made a new friend.

What a terrific day!