thunderstorms, blisters & bruises

it is lightning outside my hotel room window as i look down over the city of Atlanta. pouring rain...love an excuse not to leave the room...
two days off never sounded so good. just did a 98 hour work week, maybe even more, but my math skills are shot, my brain cells are on strike and my blisters have bruises.
seven in a row on tour is a difficult run and now we are only looking at 4s and 3s inna row.

My bus driver duane is adorable, looks like a cross between santa claus and greg allman, i got up this morning to make him coffee as he drove us from texas to georgia in oh-so-few hours (again, no math today, ok) we left the venue in spring, texas at 2:30 am and arrived in buckhead district at about 4 pm. amazing to me that those drivers can do that. his last tour he was out with our amazing NEK, and he told me a story of her mouse tattoo joke, remind her to tell it, cause i can't do it justice...

it is going to be a great run, so many stories already, but i gotta do my homework for the boss, and so i better get to it. there is a sushi dinner in my future and a nice long bath as well. My crew is great and i got my favorite bunk back, bottom passenger, baby! i promise photos next time, haven't downloaded yet.
as for my stars, they are a delight, a non-diva tour, nice. haven't seen much of the show, but the load-outs are going quick, our stage manager has a magic whip he uses, i guess.
also got to see the legendary Law Engalls, he was the steward for the last venue, and it is always a pleasure to see him.
Zombie is a very sweet vegetarian fellow, and his show sounds amazing (have heard it, just not seen much, except for a quick zip out to front of house), tour is called "american witch", needless to say i feel right @ home. have toured before with godsmack, and they are wonderful as well, it is very much like the first day of school, meeting everyone & reuniting with old friends...last thing, the pyro is supposedly OUTrageous, can't wait to have a field trip into the fire room. over & out, miss all my peeps....

going back to san francisco...

Nancye & i drove up to SF in June to see our good friend Hadley, who moved to New Zealand 5 years ago and was back for a visit, and i had such a great time in that fine city. I was too busy to do a entry about it, and now here i am, going back to SF for the wedding of my friends, Cheryl & Sven...they are to be married at Stinson Beach, and i am looking forward to getting out of LA for a weekend...
as we were driving into SF, we got a phone call from a friend, "oh the Bridge is closing for the month, so you'll have to go around.." !!! what!? we luckily misheard, it was only for the night, but we had a little momentary panic as we had booked a hotel in emoryville, so that we could go back and forth in the city as we pleased...it was so good to see Nancye for such a nice long weekend, and it made me realize how awfully much i have missed her...
our trip up was based on going to different places that Hadley has missed during her time in NZ, so we made a list: cafe Fanny for the coffee , Picante for the mexican food , the drugstore for a million things she can't get there in Wellington
, Cha Ya for the amazing all-vegetarian sushi , to see Jenn Jones shop "the candy store" and so on...she also brought us some NZ treats, which i completely forget the name of, something crunchy-esque.
we found our way to the big weekend flea market, and i bought all these keys you see here, a beautiful old lacquer abacus, a FEAR comic (truly beat up, but still i had to have it) & a "wink" ginger ale glass, very happy about these purchases...
i also gave Dabiday a call, he came out and met us for a little afternoon of coffee & shopping...
and we ended up the trip by seeing young Wes, who has moved into Cheryl's old artsy workshop--always love to see the Westic, gonna miss you on tour, buddy...