The night we were going to leave was Tuesday night. Unfortunately, fate took a shit on us. The wheel bearing had to be replaced on Bertrand's car and none of the part stores that were open had any in stock.
So we ended up just tearing apart the car in preparation for putting a new one in. So we had to wait until Wednesday afternoon to get the new wheel bearing pressed in. When we got close to Black River Falls, WI, we got pulled over for having a cracked windshield. We were let off with a warning, but because we own guitars, they had a drug dog come and sniff his car. (Sucks being musicians sometimes.) Apparently the dog sniffed something so they ended up pulling us from the car and frisking us. (The cop must have liked frisking me because he thoroughly checked my package. Twice.)
He then proceeded to dig through pretty much everything in the car. I guess he found pot flakes in the carpet. We told him that we never vacuumed the car after we bought it. So they told us to get some air fresheners in it so that it wouldn't happen again. I'm just glad they didn't try to arrest us for possesion when we don't even smoke...
Then we had a pretty easy drive until we hit Virginia. (The Appalachian Mountains are awesome!)
When we were about an hour away from our first gig it started raining so hard that I couldn't see more than 20 feet ahead of the car. I had to pull over multiple times and could only drive around 30-40 mph. Needless to say, we couldn't play our first gig because we were too late. The second gig we got to on time. (We checked out a Civil War battlefield in Manassas, VA too.)
Unpacked everything and find out my amp isn't working. It was too late to try and find another one anywhere and Bertrand's amp wasn't playing right either. So we drive to Corrina's (Bertrand's cousin) house and brought some acoustics. We tried playing, but no one could really hear what was being played so we gave up and left. Turned out that their power source was fucked up since both our amps worked just fine at Corrina's later that night. The last gig turned out to be the best. It seemed like we weren't going to be able to play since it was an outdoor show at a Uno's Pizzeria. We went to it anyway and there was a canopy! And most importantly, the outlet worked! We had all the workers outside listening to us along with Corrina's family, James (her boyfriend) and some of his friends. We rocked the place. Afterwards, we went to a house party. Bloms drank some beer and played a game of Ninja-Cowboy-Bear with me.
Three days after arriving in the DC suburbs, we traveled on to Richmond, VA and hung out with Nicole and John. (Bertrand's younger sister and her boyfriend.) We walked around downtown trying to set up a show, but it didn't happen.
Crashed at Nicole and John's. They made us pancakes and gave Bertrand a bag of food.
Later that day, we got to Virginia Beach, VA. After checking out the beach, it started to rain... Again.
So we walked around town in the rain. It eventually died off so we tried to make some money on the boardwalk busking. Fail! I think the people at the beach are too good to give street performers money. It started to rain again so we said "Fuck it." and went to a Pi Pizzeria. Bloms and Bertrand sat at the bar to get a pint each. I don't drink but sat at the bar anyway and ordered a orange soda. The barkeep must have thought I was cute or something because she didn't make me pay for the orange soda or the pepperoni slice. I left her a $5.76 tip.
Bertrand decided that he couldn't really afford to drive up to Ocean City, MD or go anywhere else. (He had about $20 to his name.) Sorry New York, I'll have to visit some other time. We started to head back to Wisconsin and decided to busk and try to get gigs at whatever bigger cities we drove through.
Me and Bloms met a punk-stoner named Shawn at a Subway in Beckley, WV who said he'd try to find us places in town to get money. He was really cool. He gave us some bottled water from his dorm and we got a little over $2 at the campus. (It's summer, so there weren't that many students...) He got a commemorative photo with us since he's never met any punks from Wisconsin. He suggested we go to Charleston, WV to get more money busking. So we left.
It was fairly late Tuesday night when we got to Charleston, WV. So we ate some food and headed downtown. We made around $10 in an hour of busking. We gave the money to Bertrand for gas. There was a bar nearby that had an open mic night so we signed up for it. We only got to play three songs, but we played them with gusto despite having a funky mix. My bass was louder than everything else. It was vocals, then drums, then guitar in terms of loudness. It made playing the songs interesting to say the least. We watched another band play and headed out.
The rest of the trip didn't have anymore shows. Just alot of driving, hanging out and sleeping in the car. I kind of wish that it wasn't such a long drive. (I swear my ass is bruised from too much sitting.) I'd like to thank Corrina, Rick, Karen, James, Nicole and John for giving me tours, shelter and food. It made traveling cheaper and easier for us. I'd also like to thank Shawn for the water and tour of Beckley, WV.