xigorx

here is 19 pages that i wrote that no one will read... enjoy...

Over spring break, the Gaskets and I went on tour. More happened than I could ever explain, but I figure I will try to give you the basic idea on a day to day basis.

Friday March 12th: Raliegh, NC Slims

This was the first night of the tour. We left Richmond around 6 pm. We were pretty excited about this show because we were actually getting paid a couple hundred bucks and because it was my friend Matts going away party and most of his friends would be there. When we got there, Matt was no where to be found, but the owner, Mikey was really cool and paid us upfront and showed us where all the restaurants were so we could eat. On our way back from eating from the dollar menu at Mc Donalds we over heard someone playing our CD. Fantastic. A bunch of people showed up, but I dont think the bar was really ready for what they were about to see. The Gaskets played a short set because people didnt really seem all that interested. They all clapped and everything, but they werent really into it. However, immediately after the show was over everyone came up to us asking them to play longer, trying to buy stuff, join the high five club etc. There were a bunch of people there from the music industry, all seeming like they really loved it and wanted to help us out. I mostly talked to Matt and his stripper girlfriend, but there was also this girl who kept talking to me. She was talking latterly inches from my face the entire time, talking to me about photography and all these big name photographers she worked with. She then started rubbing my leg and demanding I call her because she was a really cool person and had a place for me to spend the night. Unfortunately she was not hot; fortunately she left. So the Gaskets did another set and again people just sat there, but they really seemed to love it strangely enough. Some people actually threw dollar bills at them. I talked to Matt and Mikey after the show and they both said that NC had nothing like the Gaskets and no one really knew what to do or something. We hung out in the bar till last call because we were staying with Matt and he seemed to have some business in the bar. See, every time I went into the bathroom there were people buying or doing coke. No one even seemed to notice or care about my presence there. Very sketch shit, but so be it. We went to Matts with a bunch of people, we were all exhausted and had to drive 7 hours to Atlanta the next morning, but they were all on coke, so we didnt get much sleep. It was defiantly an interesting first day.

Saturday March 13th Atlanta, GA - ?????

Atlanta was the one date that I wasnt 100% on. See the guy I was talking to about booking was never very informative. I sent out about 25 emails to bars in Atlanta, he was the only one who wrote back, but he never really said what club he booked. I emailed him a few times asking for directions and stuff, but all he responded with was You are confirmed for the 13th. I assumed however that he was from a bar called the Somber Reptile, because I had emailed them, and because his name was Ron Somber. I figured it made sense. So we went there. When we got to the Somber Reptile, no one had heard of us or Ron Somber, so we were fucked. We figured we would just drive to Birmingham and stay with this girl named Janet. We called her several times with no answer. We had no place to play and no place to stay and we were stuck in the middle of Atlanta. Thats when Teddy picked up a local paper. He started out calling places that had open mic nights, but they were all 21+. He then started calling bars, begging them to let us play a short set. He called probably 25 places and all of them said no. We had one bar left, but they didnt open till 830, so we just drove there. We figured we could just go to the show even if they wouldnt let us play. Then we got lost. We drove all over Atlanta looking for a club called Lennys. At this point we didnt really know where we were, but it was 8:45, so we called Lennys. We talked to a guy named Bean, and he said that he already had 3 bands and couldnt let us play. We didnt know what to do, so we just kinda drove around. As if it were an omen we passed Lennys, so we pulled in to their parking lot. Not knowing what to do we just sort of stood around. Bean came outside and asked us if we were the people who just called him. We told him we were and he said we could play right then if we wanted, but that no one was there. He also told us we should check out this art house/ bar across the street. So we did. This place was perfect; it was an art exhibit, with all these video installations and weird sculptures. What looked to be synth bands were setting up. This was it, perfect. So we asked the guy in charge if we could play. The guy acted so offended that we could possibly want to play that night. He was so stuck up and pretentious. Pissed off we drove back to Lennys. Bean said we could check out the show for free since we were on the road, so we went inside. There were about 10 people inside. A few skinheads, to insanely drunk Hispanic pool players, and what resembled a rock band. The first band to play was a group of skin heads. They were about the worst band I have ever heard. The lead singer just stood there reading off a sheet of paper. We really wanted to leave, but we had no where to go, so we just kinda stood there. Bean asked to hear our demo. 30 seconds into it, he asked us if we could set up. By the time the Gaskets started their set there was probably 20-30 people there all kinda clinging to the bar. Teddy began to rock the shit out of them and these punk rockers and skinheads had no idea what they were seeing. It was really bizarre, and they only did 4 songs, but everyone loved it. A bunch of kids invited us to play an after party, and Bean told us he could stay at his house. It fucking ruled. At the after party all the punk kids were really into the music and they wanted them to play the songs they did at the earlier show. They were all singing along and jumping around. It was pretty amazing actually. Bean showed up after he closed Lennys and we went to his house. Bean and Ross went to an after party for the Jet show that was on the same night, but Teddy and I were pretty fucking exhausted so we stayed in. Teddy went to sleep and I played Bubble Bobble with Beans roommate, kicking ass through level 71. I owned that shit.

Sunday March 14th Birmingham, AL The Nick

The next morning we got up and drove to some little store to get Ross something to eat. I almost went to Birmingham without stopping for him, but luckily we stopped. Ross went in, and immediately tried haggling with the guy over the price of chicken or something. It was taking a while, so I got out and took a picture of this giant chicken in the parking lot. As I was returning to the car I noticed that the front right tire was popped and the back one was in bad shape. Ross had hit a curb last night and shit got fucked. Less than a block away was a used tire place and with in 30 min we had two brand new, used tires on the car for $64 dollars. When we got to Birmingham, Janet was busy so we just had to entertain ourselves. Let me tell you something right now, Birmingham fucking sucks. We did nothing. We just walked around waiting for Janet to call us. When she did, we went for pizza with the rest of her band, Teen Getaway. On our way to the club Ross joked about how it was this burned down building, however it turned out it was right BEHIND the burned down building. The place looked like a shack on the outside, and like a redneck bar on the inside. All it was missing was the chicken wire. The place actually turned out to be pretty cool, and we met two bands heading to SXSW with us: Ambulance and Blue Epic. The Gaskets show went pretty well and we met some cool people. Teen Getaway rocked serious ass, we got paid $50 bucks, and then we went to sleep. All in all, cool people, shitty town. Word.

Monday March 15th New Orleans, LA Hi Ho Lounge

If anyone has never been to New Orleans, like I had before this tour, I want to explain now, that New Orleans is literally this biggest shit hole I have ever been to. It is basically a shanty town. There seems to have been almost no development of the town in 75 years. There are bars that actually lean to one side or another. And they have one way streets that go the same direction four blocks in a row, so to get to a place thats just down the street; you have to drive for 15 min. That being said, its a pretty interesting place to spend a night. So Ross brother Chip had come down from Arkansas to see Ross play, so we were going to sleep in his hotel room, but before we met up with Chip and his wife, we decided to try and find the club. We drove to the intersection where it was and saw this pretty huge, nice looking club: the only nice looking thing for blocks. So we rolled down the window and asked some girls if this was the place. In a scene that should only have taken place in a bad 80s comedy, the girls just pointed a cross the street to a dump of a bar that had a bike lock on the front door. We all promptly did double takes and our eyes popped out of our heads. What they dont show you in cartoons however is that it hurts like hell to pop your eyes back into your skull. Extremely annoyed, we met Ross brother. We walked to the hotel and met up with his wife, Rosss other brother Braden, and his wife. It was suppose to be a surprise but Ross had figured it out already. We hung out at the hotel for a while and met a crack head who said he was the drummer for Outkast and 3 girls who looked like they were 14 who wanted pictures taken with us. Everyone was kinda weirded out and tried to get away from them quickly, but I stayed and told them about the show. We get to the bar to unload our stuff and despite the clubs rough exterior, its actually pretty nice inside. The whole place was done up in red leopard print and had a very nice sound system (or so we thought). So we talk to the club owner So who is playing with us? I dont know if anyone, I dont book the shows, but you are the only band on the calendar. So you are telling me that the only band booked is an out of town band with no draw? Well they might have booked someone a few days ago, but its a Monday night, no one ever comes out on a Monday night. Truthfully you guys are probably going to be playing for free, but I will give you some beer. Well if people do come, what is the cover, we have some friends coming. Oh, we dont charge a cover. No see, this is when I get a bit confused. Infectious Publicity promised us our share of the door, but if there is no door, and no local band to bring people in, we are playing for shit. Fantastic. So we are waiting around for a while, drinking free beer, when the sound guy comes up to us and explains that their PA system isnt working. So we go to our car, and bring in our god damned PA and play out of that. What kinda fucking place is this? Finally another band shows up, which seemed to be good, but we figured we wanted to go down to Bourbon street or something and explore New Orleans, so we asked them if we could play first. So by the time we start playing, there are a good amount of people there. There is the other band, Ross brothers, their wives, the three underage looking girls (who assure us they are not), about 5 of the other bands friends, and a few random people who are at the bar just to drink and two of my friends who read my web site and showed up. It was very surreal to see them randomly hundreds of miles from home. Immediately the Gaskets rock the shit out of everyone. The bar had a curtain, so they used it to do a costume change and Teddy came out in this amazing green spandex body suit. It was so tight that it started ripping and you could see his ass hole as he humped a girl from the audience during Probably Party. It was one of the funniest and best shows I have ever seen them do, and everyone was into it. After they played, we realized that we couldnt leave on account of the fact that the other band needed our PA. So we stuck around even though Ross really wanted to hang out with is brothers and I needed to see at least one boob before I left the big easy. The band started and I was really bewildered because they were something I probably would have gotten into 10 years ago. It was like this band had never heard recorded after Kurt Cobain died. Hey guy, 1993 called, it wants its music back. They played Nirvanaesque grunge for like 45 min. Ross at one point had to ask them if they would stop so we could get our PA. They told him they only had two more songs. They then proceeded to play a 15 min trip rock song where they repeated the same minute of music about 10 times. It was really slow at first and then they started to rock out, then they started it all over again. I was about to kill myself. Luckily they ended eventually, played one more song that kinda rocked and got the fuck off the stage. We then went out to Bourbon Street and saw exactly 6 boobs. It was pretty dead that late on a Monday. Oh well, all I wanted was one.

Tuesday March 16th Houston, TX The Side Car Pub

Remember just a paragraph ago when I said that NO is the biggest shit hole in the world? I was wrong, that title goes to Houston, TX. Houston was not exactly dilapidated, but we drove all the way through it, from the very south end, to the very north, it took an hour, and the entire time, a black cloud hovered above us. The place was nothing but sprawl and about 20 fucking highways that just run all around it like some tangle of hair. The place fucking sucks, or what little I saw of it. We showed up about 5 hours before the show started on account of the fact that Teddy wanted to hang out with his cousin. However, when we got there, and he talked to his cousin, it turned out that he was going to have to meet us there, and we had about 5 hours to kill in Houston. Luckily my little brother and 2 of his friends were on the way down from Austin, and maybe they knew of something we could do. We didnt want to get lost, so we just went across to a shitty little strip mall. There was a pawn shop there, so we checked it out. We considered buying a smoke machine and some music equipment, but decided against it. I considered spending half of my life savings on a 900 dollar .50 caliber Desert Eagle hang gun, but I figured that would be a horrible fucking idea. We eventually left the pawn shop and stopped in some sort of dollar store where I bought a 12 pack of the worst root beer I have ever had in my life. Keep in mind that I am a root beer aficionado and I drink nothing but root beer. I have tried hundreds of different types, and this was by far the worst. After buying the root beer, we traveled a few stores away to Jim Pruetts Guns And Ammo. I am not joking when I say this, but their slogan is, I am not making this up, Your Anti-Terrorist Headquarters. A huge sign on the door said that THIS was THE place to get a conceal and carry permit. Because you know, you have to be able to hide your guns while hunting all the terrorists hanging out in Houston Texas. This place was fucking scary. The guy let me play with guns and I got to drop in a clip and cock it and shit. Pretty rewarding feeling actually. Then one of the clerks started firing an empty fully automatic bb gun at one of the other employees. He seemed very fucking serious about the whole thing. Two other things of note: 1) They had a huge fucking machine gun or something on the floor. The tag on it said Rule the cul-de-sac! on it. I asked the guy what the hell it could possibly be used for, and he said, and I quote Well its mostly for collectors, unless you have a lot of acres. 2) They had free camouflage bibles. What the fuck? I guess when you are out killing things, you need Jesus to keep you warm. We then went to Radio Shack, because well, degenerates hang out in Radio Shacks and it seemed like the thing to do. My brother and his 2 friends, Bear and Monee, showed up at this point. We explained to the clerk that we came from Virginia, and they came from California, and that we figured out the exact middle point was his Radio Shack, just north of Houston Texas. Money then started asking obnoxious questions about GPS Navigational Systems, Plasma Screen TVs and 20 inch rims, so we had to leave at once before the guy called the cops. We went to Subway. It was delicious. We still had about 2 hours to kill before the show, so we asked 2 hillbilly girls what the hell there was to do in Houston. She asked us if we liked getting fucked up. We just ignored her and sat down on the side walk. After a while the two girls came over and opened up their car that was near us. The got out about 6 red bulls and a full bottle of Jagermiester and proceeded to drink all of it in the next 10 min in the fucking Radio Shack parking lot. One of them looked at us and said You know there are a lot of things better to do that to be sitting in this parking lot. Then she said, dead seriously. Like you could be sitting in this parking lot, drunk. Teddy and I almost started laughing at her, but instead we just told her thanks and that we would figure something out. We never did, so we headed over to the club an hour early. When we got there, there were countless problems. First of all there were two dogs in the club, which was just completely ridiculous. Two huge labs were just licking and jumping up on every patron who walked in. Secondly there was a huge argument over how many people we could put on our guest list, and because my brother and his associates are idiots, none of them brought any money. There was some big to do over if I counted as a band member or not, but whatever happened, we got everyone into the club. The third problem arose when the woman working the door wouldnt let me go to the car to get our equipment because I didnt have an arm band saying I was 21. When I showed her my ID she said Is there any reason why you have a fake VA drivers license? I said Um because I dont? She demanded some sort of proof that I was from Virginia so I showed her both my license plates and my school ID. She finally gave me a band. I went to the car and came back and started talking to her about the club and how we were on tour, and she actually asked me Oh are you from the band thats from Virginia? I couldnt fucking believe it, so I just went inside. We were playing with three bands, two of whom were in high school. The opening band brought out so many fucking little kids. There were literally 2 girls who had to be under 8 years old there. They had a pretty big fan base, and played really mediocre straight edge Christian pop punk, it was pretty bizarre. Most of their fans left before the second band played. They were a mediocre rock band and I was outside talking to my brother and Teddys Enron employee of a cousin for their set. By the time the Gaskets started playing, my brother, his friends, Teddys cousin and a few more of my brothers Houston native friends were up front, ready to be rocked. A bunch of other underage kids had showed up for the band that was going to play after us, plus a few other kids that had stuck around from the first two bands. In all there were probably 40 people there, but they were mostly outside or playing pool in the other room. With in 2 min of the Gaskets set, the place was packed. Everyone came inside and random people just appeared out of no where. During B-A-D people were screaming out the lyrics so loudly that Teddy couldnt sing because he was laughing so hard. They played a pretty good set, that was made amazing by the crowd reaction. Only one other time I have seen a crowed as responsive, and never have I seen a crowd dance around as much as they did that night. If any AR person happened to walk in, we would have been signed instantly. It was pretty fucking great. We sold so much fucking merch, we sold out of our Michael Jackson T-Shirts and sold a ton of CDs. We even sold stuff to the sound guy and the bar tender. We were exhausted at this point, but decided to stick around for a bit of the last bands set out of respect, and because they were so into us. They were called Kristoph and the Communist Manifesto. I had no idea what to expect, but based on their age, and how many shitty bands we had seen so far on tour, I wasnt expecting much. However, they melted my face instantly and rocked the shit out of us all. Unfortunately I can do no justice to how insane this band was. The lead singer would yell out words quickly and lowly, and then suddenly he would belt out this amazing falsetto. He sounded like a god dammned answering machine. Hello this is Kristoph, please leave a message after the BEEP!!! At some point he dressed up in a monkey suit and fought a robot. The guys were pretty rad too and we all went out to Dennys. When it was over I asked them to come out to Austin with us and play a BB-Q at Bears house. They fantastically accepted.

Wednesday March 17th Austin, TX Grants House

We got our first good meal of the tour that morning. Teddys cousins wife fixed us some crucial pancakes. We also got to use the internet for the first time on tour. Teddy checked his email, and got a letter from Miguel from Sound of Music Studios telling us that David Lowery really liked our demo CD that we sent him and he wanted to meet with us at South By Southwest. For those of you who dont know who David Lowery is, he was the front man for Cracker and Camper Von Beethoven. He also happens to be a pretty important producer, who we have sought do to the next album. This put us in quite a good mood. Anyway, we got on the road on our way to Austin. At some point, when we were doing about 80mph, tearing down the road, Teddy started veering into the right lane, into a large truck. Ross saw this and was like Yo, truck! Teddy ignored this and continued veering. At this point Ross screamed and the scream startled Teddy so he just veered to the left as hard as he could. This caused the car to jerk left and right uncontrollably in-between the rail and this huge fucking truck. Some how we survived. It was probably the closest I have ever been to death. Fantastic. When we got to Austin we met my brother, who, by the way, will from not on be referred to as Ben, which is in fact his name. So we meet up with Ben, go out for lunch and then start getting ready for the St. Patricks day party that we were playing that night. Ben got the kegs some how, despite his underagedness and people slowly started showing up. My friend Jamie from grade school was in town and he was there. There was this very cute girl named Emily who I feel should start dating my brother was there. And um, this guy Fletch and Grant and then about 50 jerk offs not worth meeting. I dont think they were bad people or anything, just kinda boring. I dont really know what my brother was doing hanging out with these kids, but whatever, some of them were cool, but in general mostly square. Anyway, the Gaskets played and everyone seemed to know their Early Years album, but not the current stuff. This was very weird. They kept demanding the Gaskets play stuff like Disclaimer. Very weird. The show was okay, but no one was too excited, and it was kinda a let down after how great the rest of the tour was. And now we had a few day break, and a lot of work to be done.


Thursday March 18th and Friday March 19th Austin, TX SXSW

The next two days are kinda a blur. Everything in Austin was pretty amazing, so it all just seems like one or two days. We did however do a number of interesting things. First of all, I got to meet Wes Shuck, owner of Aquarium Records, The Gaskets label. He seemed very drunk and was joking about everything. It was absolutely impossible to take him seriously. Secondly I got to spend a lot of time with my brother, Jamie and my friend Sam who was also in town for the festival. I dont see any of them often, so it was rad. My brother drove us around everywhere, introduced us to everyone, and helped us pass out more than his fair share of flyers. We spent most of the days passing out said flyers for the show and generally making asses of ourselves (at least Ross and I did). We passed out something like 2500 flyers in two days. We passed out a bunch at the semi-famous Waterloo Records. On Thursday night we got to see the B-52s play with Junior Senior. Junior Senior put out my favorite album of 2003, and I was pretty fucking psyched to see them. The tickets, unfortunately cost $30. That blew and we werent going to go, but my brother magically hooked it up and got us 4 free tickets. Fantastic. The B-52s were pretty damned cool. Hearing Love Shack live was totally surreal and I am pretty sure everyone else in the audience agreed. Junior Senior also happened to be pretty good and when I say pretty good, I mean fucking brilliant. I can not explain how amazingly danceable and hi-larious Junior Senior are. I just think you need to go out, buy their album, and see them live the first chance you get. They are like a gay Jackson Five or something oh wait... Anyway, after the show we met all of Junior Senior, and gave them demos that they will never play. While passing out flyers we ran into quite a few people including the bassist for Wilco the lead singer for TV On The Radio, Katzen of the Human Marvels, the Sounds and Liz Phair. On Friday I dressed up as a Cowboy and passed out flyers. The Austin American Statesman was amused and published this photo in the paper. Good times. That night we saw Gondrys Eternal Sunshine on the Spotless Mind. It was in this theater that was like in a mall, however inside the theater it was decorated to look like a castle or something. There were fucking gargoyles coming out of the wall. Totally insane. The movie however, was brilliant; I think Gondry is going to go down as one of the best directors of all time. Good times.

Saturday March 20th Austin, TX BBQ At Bears

We had spent the last three days planning for this party and we were pretty sure one of two things would happen. Either the most likely conclusion, no one would come or there was also some possibility that 500 people would show up and we would get the cops called and we couldnt afford enough beer or meat. We went over to Bears house pretty early and woke up Monee. Monee said he would cook the food, if we got it. Ross, Teddy and I each said we would spend 20 dollars out of our own pocket and $50 out of the Gaskets fund. So we had a budget of $110. Not bad. Ben, Teddy and I went to Price Club while Ross, Bear, Monee and Bears roommate Andrew cleaned up and got the grill set up. When we got to the store we found out that the smallest quantity of hot dogs we could get was 80 and the smallest pack of burgers was 40. I couldnt imagine we would need 120 things of meat, but they were only 10 dollars a box, so we hooked it up. It was literally less than a dollar a pound. This food was going to be great. We ended up spending $70 dollars at price club, which put us over budget. The keg was $60 and we spent some more on lighter fluid and charcoal. All in all we went 30 dollars over budget, no big deal. When we got back from getting this stuff we were in for a surprise. The guys had completely cleaned everything up, gotten this 10 year old rotting grill in good shape, they had set up a table and cooking area, and some how, they had gotten a huge stage. Evidently they drove to a frat, and stole this stage out of their back yard, lifting it over a fence and under power lines. They then put it on the roof of a car and drove back with out tying it down, just reaching their hands out of the window holding it on. Amazing. The only concern at this point was their mean next door neighbor. She had called the cops on Bear before and she was a problem. Bear talked to her roommate, and it turned out that neither of them was going to be around. Everything was coming up Gaskets. Thats when the homeless people showed up. The party wasnt going down for another 2 hours and already there were 3 homeless people. We told them that the party wasnt for a while and then I went inside and played with Bears pet baby squirrel. When the party finally started a few of Bears friends showed up and Kristoph and the Communist Manifesto finally arrived, however there werent really that many people. Right then Bear's wack ass neighbor showed up and started screaming at us when she saw the drum set. Bear settled her down and she said she wouldn't call the cops. Eventually she left all together and we taped up her front yard with caution tape. Anyway, about this time it started to get weird. About 5 homeless people showed up, as well as one 50 year old man who we gave a flyer. The guitarist for The Manifesto came with his parents too. So basically the party consisted of 50% collage kids and 50% 40+ people. Teddy was freaking out. Luckily a bunch more people showed up and our label made it right before the Gaskets went on. It was the first time that Wes had seen them live and he was in for a rocking. Once again the Gaskets rocked peoples necks in half. It was just like SNAP! SNAP! SNAP! The label loved it and so did this elderly couple who was there. Wonderful. Then The Manifesto played. They were pretty great. Everyone was a bit weirded out, but I think people mostly enjoyed it. By the time they were done the party was winding down a bit. All the beer was gone, and all but like 4 hot dogs. We made $33 dollars in donations, we paid back the $30 over budget and we gave each member of Kristoph one dollar. It was pretty much perfect and everyone had quite a good time. It was rad. After the party, a rousing game of hamster basketball was played. This entails taking one of the 30 hamsters Bear owns, and throwing them through holes in a card board box. It is not quite as cruel as it seems, and was mostly just really funny. The hamsters recovered nicely. Then we all split up. The Manifesto went home, Ben, Ross and Monee went to play poker and Teddy, Bear and I went to a club called La Zona Rosa to see if we could meet up with David Lowery. He was playing back to back sets with Cracker and Camper Von Beethoven. Everyone told me I couldnt park down there, so Bear and I just dropped Teddy off to see if he could make contact, while we went in search of parking. I dropped him off in the back and we drove around to the front and parked in the very closest place to the club. It was a god damned miracle. It was probably the most amazing thing that happened all trip. When we left we actually charged a guy $5 to take our spot. Anyway the security guards were being assholes and wouldnt pass the word on to David so we just kinda stood near the back stage hoping he would come out. While we were waiting two guys tried to get back stage and were stopped by security. But we are in Cracker! they said, and were finally let in. Teddy shouted out to one of them. Hey could you tell David that Teddy from the Gaskets is here? The guy just looked strangely at Teddy, so Teddy says I figured you knew him since you are in Cracker. Ive only been writing music with him for 20 years! the guy snapped back. Yikes, looks like we pissed that guy off. We waited a bit longer thinking maybe he would pass the message on anyway. Finally he came out. Teddy called him over and said something along the lines of Its funny meeting you here instead of in Richmond. David just looked at him confused so Teddy explained who the hell he was. David was really cool and introduced us to his manager and such. It was very cool. They tried to get us into the show, but the security guards were being dicks. The other guy from Cracker came back out and wasnt pissed off at all like we thought. He was really cool and was trying to think of ways to sneak us in. We never did get in, but it was quite spectacular and we talked to everyone for a while. All in all it had been a rad trip.

Sunday March 21st and Monday March 22nd Texas, Arkansas, Tennessee, Virginia

Despite getting lost several times, we drove continuously for 22.5 hours until we got to the Village Diner in Richmond, VA. We had food. It was mediocre as always. We were back. I realized that day that if I could tour for the rest of my life, I would totally do it. This was probably the most fun I have ever had, and I can not wait until we get out on the road again. The End.