Tennessee, Punks & Ice Cream

Saturday, 6:00pm - finally taking advantage of some Wi-fi (or, as we now refer to it, wee-fee - thanks to Rikky, Marisa and Michael's French roommate Antoine) on a street that's very similar to Tennesee Street in Tallahassee - college town gone to sleep for the summer.

Florida is finally a distant memory, after a show in Pensacola (where we played at Sluggo's and ate delicious free burritos, lusted after yachts and stayed in yet another Red Roof Inn) and an amazing 2nd show in Tallahassee where we played alongside our friends Ben, Spike and their respective bands. Before the show we hiked through the Florida woods, picking blackberries and stopping to watch sleepy armadillos emerging from their holes before taking an amazing swim with our friends in the 'Sisters' sink hole. So, so incredible. The 60 degree water was so clear that I could see the goosebumps on my toes. Afterwards we felt reborn.

Last night we played in Birmingham - Alabama is awesome, and Cave 9 (where we played) is especially awesome. Our show was sort of under-attended thanks to a last-minute Jello Biafra performance down the street. Highlights: Meeting a bunch of amazing Bama hardcore kids, cooking rice and tomatoes at the venue, selling a CD to the ice cream man who was selling treats outside the club, staying with our friend Robert's INCREDIBLE sister Rebecca, who has a lovely apartment and woke us up with the sizzle of honey wheat pancakes. Alabama is beautiful.

The drives are getting better - we're learning to be more efficient, stopping less and seeing more. Today we stopped at a cheese farm - bought cheese, ice cream, and pecan honey jelly. I wanted to go somewhere called 'Lost Sea,' an underground lake, but we didn't have time. We also were excited to listen to an episode of 'This American Life' entitled 'Road Trips,' but it was the most BORING EPISODE EVER.

Tonight we play Knoxville, and with any luck some of my family will be able to come.

We miss everyone in New York. I miss Tom especially.

Tally

Still Florida. Last night we snuck into an impossibly nice apartment complex pool to swim after the show with a few members of Voxtrot, hopping the fence, happy to get away from smoke and dusty parking lots and vast numbers of college kids. I felt terrible and spent a bit of the night lying on a lounge chair, looking at the stars and sleeping while everyone else cannonballed.

The show was as good as it could have been with our inflated expectations of PLAYING IN TALLAHASSEE (3/4 of us used to live here). Voxtrot were amazing, and watching them was sort of inspiring... We're leaving for Pensacola momentarily, playing tonight at Sluggo's with Vena Cava and then coming back to Tally on Thursday to swim in a sinkhole.

We did an in-studio performance on V89, which was truly awesome. Having not been in the studio to record anything in such a long time, it was nice to hear each other sing. We took pictures of grafitti about our friends and picked out too-big t-shirts.

1st new/invented game of tour - Shark Ball. Sadly, no pictures.

I miss New York a little.

F-L-O-R-I-D-A

By the way, in case you were wondering - Florida is incredible.
The crowd in Jacksonville blew our collective mind - even with a spotty sound system and creepily reverbed vocals, the kids at Club TSI rallied, danced, blew bubbles (!) and made us feel like total rock stars. THANK YOU JACKSONVILLE. We were sad to leave.

We've been in mama territory the past few days - first staying with road dog Michael's mom in Orlando (hi Debbie!) and then with Marisa's mom (hi Madeline!) in Bradenton. We're pretty chubby right now (biscuits and gravy, beans and rice!), like little tour bears getting ready to hibernate in the midwest, where we don't have any mamas to keep us fed.

We played Uncle Lou's in Orlando, which was a truly awesome surprise. I never thought that having our (presumed) delicate family members would have such a rockin time in one of the divey-est bars I've ever seen. Thank you to the long-haired, gap-toothed dude who alternately cheered and heckled us during our set, referring to us both as "The Go Go's" and "Lesbos." Also, Orlando kids totally know how to party. For future reference, we like it a lot when people get on other people's shoulders during our set. Also, it's ridiculous that the band we played with, our good friends For Ex Lovers Only, are not hugely famous and rich. Please make them so.

Our hometown show was mind blowing. It was like a weird dream - "Yeah, so in my dream we played this show in Bradenton, at this crazy Roadhouse-esque place with Nascar on a screen above the stage. All of our parents were there, and all of these people from high school? And our indie ex-dean at high school, Mr. Moates was there? And there was a dance party." It was surreal and great. Why did we ever leave here? Post show skinny dipping in the Gulf of Mexico and grouper sandwiches at the legendary Rod n Reel pier made us feel ridiculous for ever living anywhere besides Anna Maria Island.

Tomorrow night we play Tallahassee with Voxtrot!

Loco

Last night, as the five of us collapsed on cheap mattresses in room 335 of the Red Roof Inn in Alexandria, VA, I asked Marisa if Red Roof Inns were drastically cheaper than other just-off-the-interstate motels – she said no. I said, ‘They should be.’
It was 3:30am, and we’d been driving since 10:30pm, packing ourselves, tetris-like, into our glistening new tour van (referred to from this point on as ‘Pheobs’) after a weary, sloppy practice. Frank is still bleary-eyed from 2 weeks in China, and the rest of us are exhausted from the WAITING. We all had trouble falling asleep. There was no continental breakfast.

It’s now 4:40pm, and we’re hustling down I-85 with full bellies from ‘Locopops’ in Durham, NC. Let me tell you about Locopops – they’re the most incredible popsicles we’ve ever had. We want them to be our band sponsors. We tried: chocolate rosemary, avocado (!), cucumber chile, peanut butter banana, summer peach, rootbeer float, pomegranate blueberry, passionfruit margarita, mojito… etc. We ate a lot of popsicles. It made everything a lot better.

We want to make it to Athens sooner rather than later. Our first show isn’t until tomorrow night in Jacksonville, bur we wanted to take our time and hang in Athens for a while – at the rate we’re going, our Athens time is quickly dwindling. Thanks to pea-sized bladders and insatiable appetites, we’ve been stopping every 45 minutes. We can’t help it.

Note Marisa sipping sun tea (sweet! We’re back in the south!) purchased from a man on the side of the road (also in Durham) who was also selling incense.

La Primera Dia

It's raining and awful out. I've gone to the library to return books (unread), and my bag is half packed, with the rest of my tour things in a pile on the bed. I know that I'm bringing the wrong clothes, but I don't feel like there's any avoiding it. The wrong shoes, too.
Mostly I'm sitting and looking at the house, periodically eating Cheerios and finishing up the 'Mangodesh' ice cream in the freezer. Waiting.
Tour!