Report from last night:
MY SA started kicking pretty hardcore as the day went on. I was absolutely dreading going to this concert, since I knew I was going to be completely out of my element. I did end up going though. As I figured, it was a place that I was completely uncomfortable at. Here I am, a twenty-something year old straight edge kid who has no clue how to interact with people his own age, at a seedy dive venue filled with a bunch of other twenty-something year olds drinking and smoking heavily. My SA is always worse around smaller groups of people, since I don't have the ability to go anonymous like in large groups. This concert, with 100 people max, was more difficult to go to than an A-list artist with thousands of people.
As the concert progressed, I couldn't help but start enjoying myself and becoming more comfortable. The bands were great and had a lot of energy going on. I saw a guy who was obviously a professional photographer. Since I also work in the photography industry, I decided to go over and talk to him. We ended up hanging out most of the night. None of the conversations were weird or awkward, since we had a common subject to talk about.
Overall it was a lot of fun and a great exposure exercise. I'm definitely going to do with more often.