Karma verdict?
So, against my desires, I sold my pair of tickets to see Pearl Jam a few blocks from my house last night. I just figured it was not in my financial interest to see a $55ish ticket for a second time whilest unemployed, so I sold the pair off for $120, deposited it in the bank, and went to Whole Foods and got some produce on the way home from the sale.
But having heard tales of people just handing people free tickets, the massive amounts of scalpers, and the close proximity of the venue, I figured I would head down to the venue about 5 minutes before Pearl Jam hits the stage and see if I could score. To ensure I didn’t cave, I set my wallet with only $25, with no backup (often when I go to buy from scalpers, I’ll set my wallet with what I want to pay, and the rest in my jacket pocket, so I can open my wallet and hand them every bill I supposedly have).
I walk toward the venue, and when I hit the corner closest to my apartment, at the back of the venue, it opens up and someone says something and closes the door again. I’m normally not too curious about weirdness happening in this city, but I ask the guy sitting there what that dude just said. I was informed that he said for $40 he’d let anyone in… so I walked up to the door, and as I approached, he opened it.. the guy in front of me hands him $40 and walks in, and I say "I only have $20," he says "whatever, whatever, just get in here." I hand him $20, and enter the side of the building, set up with bars, off the main auditorium.
Within ten minutes, I am about 30 feet from the stage, on the floor this time (wearing my messed up sneakers that got trampled in both the Green Day and Arctic Monkeys pits, now known as my concert shoes), the lights go out and the band plays another amazing set.
Of course, my question is one of karma. I had sold all of my previous tickets to PJ for cost, not making any profit. The hope all along was to get a reluctant scalper to hear pearl Jam playing and just unload the ticket before he had to eat it, or finding someone just handing them out because they wanted to quickly get inside. Those seemed like fine alternatives, as the scalper likely made money already for the night, and the other guy is just giving up on making his money back (and I’ve done that dance before myself).
I’m just not certain that my karma would line me up with a security guard (oh yeah, I don’t think this was a random attendee, but someone paid to make sure that door remained secure, heh) who would be sudsidizing his income by letting people into the show on the cheap.
I did go there with the intent of seeing the show for $20, and I did, but I’m not sure if karma is just supposed to "work," or whether this was some randomness that happened to intervene. I always ascribed more altruistic methods to karma.
In any event, with the $8 markup I got on the initial pair (I always round ticket sales to the nearest $20 anymore, since people are always coming from ATMs, and I don’t care to ensure I have proper change), I got an extra Pearl Jam show for $12. Not too shabby.
