Woke up around noon, before everyone else and caught up on the usual bullshit (emails, blogging, and the battery of other things I now feel compelled to update). Jamie made everyone her wonderful, wonderful scrambled eggs and toast. Seriously, it's epic. They're so good. I think we took video of all this. She made 17 eggs.

Midway through breakfast, Ryan got some crappy news that his gramps died. Luckily (relatively, anyway), we're in Jersey and he'll be able to make it to the wake and the funeral. He told us his grandpa wasn't doing so well for a while now, particularly for the last week, so at least he's at peace now. Still can't make any of it easy for everyone else, though.

Lounged around Jamie's for most of the day before having dinner with her folks and her boyfriend Brian. We talked to her stepdad, Rick, about his vinyl collection for a little bit. Dude's got loads of records. We also wound up catching the last episode of That 70s Show and the first one, in that order. The first one was better.

Pulled into the club around 7:30 and loaded in fairly quickly. Scored an awesome parking spot outside Dr. Watson's. I've been feeling sick the last day or so
(being sick on tour is as fun as it sounds), so Jen and I headed over to Starbucks to get tea. At least this time I'm sick on the tail end of the tour.

We also met up with an old friend of ours, Zack, who's now living in Philly and spent a good amount of time catching up. He's actually a stand-up comedian, you should check his stuff out at showyourwits.com.

Jon and Ryan played a game of pool that Jon mostly captured with his badass camera's time lapse feature. Afterward, we ventured downstairs to the restaurant to catch some of Obama's speech. Couldn't get beyond watching Nancy Pelosi hopping up to clap every two seconds. Could've probably made a drinking game out of it. Also wound up meeting Mitch, from Ryan's band A Life of Riley (they happen to be ahead in a contest for a record deal and some cash.. help 'em out by voting for them here).

Got onstage at 11:30 or so. Had huge sound issues for the first three or four songs that we eventually overcame. Apparently, nothing but drum and bass were heard in the club, and onstage it was difficult to hear much of anything. Didn't even get a line check before the set, which is pretty standard. I will say that the sound guy knew he screwed up, eventually corrected this, and apologized to us. I guess every tour needs one of these. Also totally forgot it was Mardi Gras. No breasts were bared, but there were plenty of beads and giant hats to go around.

The Mikey Potato Show was on after us. They're a band that's all about the party. We'd played with them last time we were at Dr. Watson's, but for some reason I wasn't having it this time around and hid away a bit. My cold's slowly catching up with me and to be honest I was just really tired and hungry. Being crowded is not helpful. Also, they opened up with a Van Halen tune and my threshold for VH is extremely low. Very low.

Jamie squeezed into the van with us and we headed back towards NJ, in search of a Wendy's or something that was open. Along the way, someone spontaneously began singing the theme song to Fresh Prince and everyone joined in. Just one of those things you can't not sing along to. Nothing was open by the time we got to Sewell, except for the Wawa. Never been to one before, but it's pretty amazing. Probably terrible for the arteries, but hey...

Got back to Jamie's around 2:00 and ate whatever we gathered at Wawa. 2am is the silly hour, and we were laughing at pretty much anything. Mostly Jon's impersonations (e.g., Marilyn Manson performing You Got Me Wrong). I'm sure there's video of this somewhere.

Stayed up till 3:30 watching Family Guy. Jon was completely exhausted and dozed off on the floor (and who could blame him, the carpet's pretty nice). Finally passed out downstairs shortly thereafter. Nose getting all stuffed up. One more show to go. Let's see if I make it. Still need to learn the lyrics to those Stones tunes we're playing...

Henry

Labels: tourdiary