Firefly fashion: They didn't get the rain memo

With driving rain a sure bet in Thursday's forecast, Miriam Karunakan dutifully brought along her boots to the Firefly Music Festival this year.

She just refused to wear them.

"They would get ruined," she explained.

Instead, Karunakan, from Harrisburg, Virginia, went barefoot in the squishy mud at her Dover campground. By early afternoon, heavy brown splatters desecrated her calves, but she remained upbeat.

"It's Firefly," she said. "Why wear shoes?"

At least Karunakan planned ahead. Several other festival-goers, including repeats from last year, never got the rain memo, ignored it, or used it as an excuse to break out the bikinis early.

"I literally woke up soaking wet," complained Brooke Carney, who set up camp Wednesday night.

Shopping for a raincoat at Dick's Sporting Goods near the festival, Carney, of northeast Maryland, blamed her friends who stuck her in the far corner of the tent. She and her boyfriend, Kyle Hamilton, were looking forward to the music starting Thursday evening to serve as a distraction.

"This is our learning experience for next year," Hamilton said.

Bre Dushok, of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, scoured Wal-Mart and Wawa for a raincoat but came up short.

Besides, it would've ruined her patriotic-themed baseball hat-glittery tank top ensemble. She was saving the American flag underwear and a bandana for another day. Nearby, a blowup llama wearing an American flag headband stood watch on an SUV.

To beat the rain blues, Dushok and her friends played the dizzy bat drinking game, which involved chugging from a hot pink plastic bat, spinning around, then trying (and failing) to hit a ball.

The yucky weather meant that most campers saved their outlandish outfits for another day. Sorority sweatshirts, cutoffs and yoga pants were the norm. Some men wore wide-brimmed straw hats with gym shorts and knee socks.

For the second year, Kristin Short, owner of Grassroots in Newark, brought her fashion truck to Firefly's campground Hub.

Short expected brisk sales of bandanas, floral headpieces and reef flip-flops, similar to last year. The truck has also visited Bonnaroo in Manchester, Tennessee, but Short said she sells more at Firefly. This year, she brought an outdoor dressing room.

Rachel Szerny, who drove from Ohio, busted out the crochet crop top and floral headdress before the sun came out around 1:30 p.m. Like others, she didn't bring a rain jacket but she didn't forget her sea salt spray, which she said was absolutely essential to keep her wavy blonde hair looking sharp.

Szerny said she was most excited about headliner Paul McCartney's performance Friday night.

"I like all the music my parents like," she explained. Nearby, a young woman groaned as her plastic flip flops got swallowed up by the soupy mud next to the porta-potties.

The fans weren't the only ones stuck in the mud.

Shortly before noon, a white Lexus sat on a tow truck in an Enterprise lot near the festival's main entrance. Mud caked the driver's side along with a gigantic dent. Four forlorn women huddled nearby.

"Driving conditions are hard," explained one, who declined further comment.

News Journal producer Sarika Jagtiani contributed to this report.

Contact Margie Fishman at 302-324-2882, on Twitter @MargieTrende or mfishman@delawareonline.com.