The summer festival season is almost over (though RS.com will still be live at this weekend's Outside Lands event, as well as Austin City Limits, Bumbershoot and others down the road), and having attended two of the bigger events myself and edited much of the rest of the content on the site, I feel as though I've seen every set in every field in every city in America. There are a whole bunch of patterns that developed and observations I made on the ground that didn't have any room in the blog posts themselves. Luckily, all of my leftover thoughts can live here — think of them as the demos and b-sides of the actual posts. Enjoy!

• One of the most amazing moments of Lollapalooza was when I was walking to see the Black Keys and saw Jason Segal. Upon further inspection, I realized that it in fact was not Jason Segal, but clearly a gentleman who had decided that looking like Jason Segal was a good idea. He clearly wanted everybody to think he was Jason Segal. A strange choice.

• My other favorite lookalike at Lollapalooza came during the Black Kids set, when I saw not one but several young girls who had decided to look like Natasha Lyonne (circa Slums of Beverly Hills, not her pseudo-homeless look).

• Another fashion question that occurred to me during the Black Kids' set: to the young women of America, what is up with the Wonder Woman style headbands? You always look stupid.

• I have never been to a festival 100% out of fandom, and after spending three days at Lollapalooza, I can safely say that I would never go to one of these things. It seems like an awful lot of money for performances that, while sometimes great, never match the types of shows these bands play independently. I also had access to free water and food all weekend; the amount of money I would have spent trying to stay hydrated and keep my energy up would have easily matched the cost of a ticket.

• That being said, I don't think a festival could be run better than Lollapalooza. There are plenty of bathrooms, food stands and water stations, the stages are spaced apart relatively well and Grant Park is big enough to feel comfortable amongst 50,000 people while not being so gigantic that it's impossible to navigate. Kudos to the organizers.

• Speaking of organizers, one of my favorite on-stage moments of Lollapalooza weekend was when Perry Farrell materialized seemingly out of thin air, spouted some gibberish to introduce Love & Rockets, and then vanished just as quickly. He isn't so much the festival's organizer as he is its magical patron saint.

• I watched several sets from back stage (the first time in my journalistic career that I watched stuff form that perspective), and though I was physically closer to the performers, the whole experience was overrated, as the sound is muddy and the energy is not as direct. I especially wish I had been in the crowd for Lupe Fiasco's Saturday night set, which was probably my favorite performance of the summer.

• My favorite bit of overheard conversation was during the National's peformance on Sunday evening. I was standing in front of three or four teenage girls, one of whom did not know who the Jonas Brothers were. It's reassuring to know that there are still people out there who do know who the National are but are unaware of Disney stars.

• Here's my biggest pet peeve: If you are camped out close to the front of the stage waiting for the headliner and you decide you need to leave the crowd to get a drink or go to the bathroom or whatever, you are not automatically entitled to the same place you were. First of all, camping out in one place for one band all day is insane — the whole idea of a festival is to experience as much music as possible. Secondly, when you try to get back into the thick of a crowd, you will inevitably annoy every single person in front of you, especially if you're constantly stopping to figure out where you are and standing on people's feet. I was constantly accosted by idiots like this at the festivals I attended. I know it's a big crowd, but that doesn't mean that personal space laws should be completely cast out the window.

• To 75% of the guys attending festivals: as Chris Rock once said, take off that stupid-ass hat.

• Another fashion question for women: is wearing the top half of a bikini all day really that comfortable? I don't have breasts of my own but I can't imagine that's a good way to spend the day.

• Finally, I have one more thing to whine about: in general, I cannot fathom why people talk about how awesome something is while it's happening. Having seen a lot of concerts and judging them professionally, I can say that the truly awesome stuff doesn't come very often. If you're really enjoying something, just let it happen.

[Photo: Getty]