Not much to say about this un-anticipated day off.  Some good news – the club in Kansas is going to let us keep the show, so hopefully turnout will be alright considering we aren’t the band everyone was planning on seeing.  We spend the afternoon in Starbucks using their Wi-Fi as Todd’s parent’s are Wi-Fi-less.  After that, we played a game of 3-on-3 basketball, and man, I regret not having the camera there for that.  Todd’s parent’s treated us to an evening of Colorado-style pizza, and I gotta say, it was pretty fantastic.  They make the crust obscenely large, and the tradition is to pour honey on the crust as a dessert.  Yummy.  They also had a pizza challenge that Andy was seriously tempted to try.  It was a 16 POUND PIZZA for $75 that you got for free if you finished it.  Our server told us that a couple recently completed the task.  Said couple was a 225 pound man and his 110 pound girlfriend, and apparently, the little one ate more than the big one.  And this made me miss Parisa.

The Bluebird Theater show was cancelled, but the promoter was nice enough to throw us on a last minute thing at the Larimer Lounge.  It’s normally a rock n’ roll DJ night, but they let us set up and shuck our wares.  We had to borrow all of our gear since we’re backlining with Airborne, and surprisingly we managed to scrape a night together.   Shortly before we played, I walked over to the merch table because I saw folks fiddling with shirts.  I thought we might’ve already sold a few things, but no, Dane told me, “They think you guys are Airborne.”  Of course they do.  We probably played for 20 or 30 people, which is 20 or 30 more than we’d anticipated  Made enough gas money to Lawrence, KS. 

And we saw the trail of our friends…

Plus, we me this awesome lady.

We also learned that we’re going to get our guarantees for the nights that Airborne is cancelling, and that’s great news considering our dwindling funds.   Considering the doldrums of the last few days, today made things feel a little more positive.  As long as we don’t run out of money.

We finished the night playing darts and pools at a suburban sports bar near Todd’s parent’s (our Denver hosts) house.  There was a man there that yelled really nasty things to the bartender when he left, and when she made light of it with us, something in her eyes made me really sad.  Seemed like unpleasant history.

So, we left Park City both reluctant (I mean, the place was amazing) and excited (would be nice to start playing shows again…), and I left with a new sense of  accomplishment having destroyed all the Galaga high scores (I scored 300K + twice!).

We headed to Fort Collins to stay the night with a friend attending CSU.  The drive through Wyoming was flat and mostly uninteresting, which was a little surprising as we drove directly through the Rocky Mountains.  Turns out, the Great Basin cuts the Rockies into northern and southern sections, and we drove directly through it.  Less interesting visually, but we made good time.

We had pizza in Old Town Fort Collins, then we got a crappy phone call hinting that more shows were to be cancelled.  The four of you that read this have already heard all about the details, so I’ll spare the recounting.  The rest of the night was super depressing and then super drunk.  We had too much Jim Beam at a local restaurant, threw rocks at each other to vent a bit, and met the cutest Maltese ever.  Good times, bad times.

Pics here.

Yeah, the view is far from crappy. I feel smug and superior sitting atop this mountain. My gaze upon the plebeians below is harsh and judgmental. Today, I am wealthy…

Seriously though, I tried to get good pics of the house’s exterior, but a there’s not a good angle with all the snow. Also, the lighting was super harsh, this camera sucks, and really, I’m no photographer. But you get the idea.

Also, the Galaga high score is totally mine. Read it and weep, poor people!

We got to the house around 11pm, and holy cow, who lives like this? The house is on top of Deer Valley, and while it was dark on our arrival, I knew the view had to be amazing. Plus, there’s ping pong, pool, and Galaga! We drank whiskey and sat in the hot tub all night. AWESOME.

Also, bunkbeds!

Not much to this day. Other than a few views and some unbelievable fog, it was a long, boring drive. By the time we got to Joey’s cousin’s place, we just played video games and went to bed. There’s a pretty campus in the city – Whitman college. Apparently named for and American frontiersman and doctor that pissed off one to many Indian, he was killed in the Whitman Massacre in 1847. The quote under his campus statue read, “My plans require distance and time…”. Mike, upon reading this replied, “Well, I guess he ran out of both.”

Pics here.

Now, I’d been to Victoria, BC many years ago to see the botanical gardens, but never into Vancouver itself. Downtown is FULL of high rise, residential building that all look vaguely the same. I found this somehow comforting, but everyone else in the van hated it.

We got into town, and Andy told us we were having oysters for dinner. Apparently, a friend of his donated $100 for an oyster-night in Vancouver because she’d been to a great place in downtown a few years back. We went, but I forgot the camera. Which is unfortunate, because Mike is NOT an oyster person. The look on his face when he ate the first one (an mutter, “Oh no, not for me…”) was priceless. Just imagine him pucker-faced and vaguely ill looking.

The show was weird. The crowd talked through the entire thing, first band to last. It was packed, but everyone seemed somehow disconnected. Relatively uninterested. We met a friend of the Siara brothers after the show (a great guy named Colin that they record with years ago in Portland), and he assured us that it was a good as it gets in Vancouver. Seems the BC crowds are just that way.

Funny! We didn’t have a place to stay, so Joey got on Craigslist to see if anyone needed a ticket (we had open guest list spots). He found a guy and bartered entry for a floor to crash on. Turns out, Bruce (the guy) is a friend of the guy the Rademacher folks were staying with. Small world! He was super kind to let us cram onto his floor. Again, no pics unfortunately.

Got these though.

Mikel from Airborne had been having serious voice problems all day. So much so that he got a cortisone shot a few hours before show time. After the set, he told us that we were going to have to cancel the show tomorrow in Vancouver. Boo.
Too console ourselves, we all went back to the shuffleboard bar and drank more beer. We went to sleep drunk and disappointed.

Looksee…

Day off!  Yes!  We basically spent the entire day playing shuffleboard, darts, Big Buck Hunting (shoot em up video game), and drinking beer.  Oh, and we ate the best hot dogs ever at Zach’s Shack on Hawthorne that.  I had the Chicago dog – tomatoes, hot chilies, and an entire pickle laid across the top.  Too good.

Here we are being generally unproductive.

Andy woke me up at least four times last night because I was snoring too loudly.  No sleep for any of us, I suppose.

I’ve never met a dog that barked at other animals on the TV.  Now I have.  Fergusson, the Sundseth family Terrier does not like other animals on the boob tube.  When we left, he was barking at John Candy’s character from Spaceballs.  Barf, the intergalactic dog/bear/man.

Also, Dane’s mother made us watch highlights of Mamma Mia.  WOW.  I know feel like I can say I’ve seen the movie even though I probably saw 15 minutes.  She assured me there wasn’t that much more to it.  I totally believe her.

We just got to the club, and we were notified by the manager that two nights ago a very fat couple was having sex on the couch upon which we are currently sitting.  AWESOME.

Seattle has been pretty much as you’d expect.  Overcast, rainy, and sort of oddly compelling.  I like it here, but I’m completely unsure as to why.  The show went well, but man, we played sloppily.  A touch out of control, and super sloppy.  But fun!

Here are our friends from the day:

Us with Rademacher and their friends, Micheal and Wesley.

Our new friend James, the stellar drummer for the Audrey Sessions.

Again with the generosity!  Mike met a couple of friendly folks after our set last night that agreed to let us sleep on their floor!  Thanks Yin and Amy!