It seems so funny to be reading about Andy's struggles in some wierd ass country. Man, why the heck don't ya just travel out west where life is easy and you have family with places to stay and stuff like that. Who ever gave you the idea it would be fun to do battle with your cultural relativism and linguistic incompetence?

Me, I took off after our amazing art gallery opening on January 18th. Qe met our construction deadline and hosted the first Three Ring Circus party at our new "Big Top" event space. It was so wonderful. There were something like 400 people there and two bands and all the new walls had all new art on them. We made something like $1700. You can't imagine how proud we are that we've pulled this off and how nice this once almost torn down building looks now.

I certainly can relate to being over packed tho. I had to beg my way onto a plane with a bag that weighed over 80 pounds. It had my ski boots, two microphone stands, and an amplifier. My other bags were a gig bag for my keyboard, a side bag that had my synth and cables and another bag with underwear that didn't fit in the other bags. All extremely useful materials. So I cabbed it over to the hair port with Ronald, our communal cabbie who takes me where I need to go, and he told me that the time for revolution is upon us. I hope the rest of you live in places where people give a shit. Down in New Orleans it seems as if all anyone cares about is music. I guess that has it's place in the post apocalyptic world, but WWOZ has a pretty different beat the KPFA. Bill Crawford, Silver Dog, a long time friend of Tad and mine scooped me up at Oakland and within an hour he had me listening to KPFA free speach radio and sitting down to a nice burrito.

It was good to be home in the west. In the morning Bill lent me his car and let me drive up to Berkeley and hit the North Face Outlet, REI, and Wilderness Exchange in one fell swoop where I bought some new pants, and a new set of ski bibs for less than $100. Then I crossed the bay to SF to visit my friend Johnny who had dressed himself in green and went upon the scene and told me all about the 200,000 person protest on Market street the week before. The press had reported 20,000 people but in reality he said there was no walking room from the ferry building out to the Castro. It had been packed. There was an article in the Oakland Trib that day correcting the official estimates. Johnny always has something interesting to say and he told me about how Bush knew in advance about 9/11 and that he and Rumsfeld are pretty much decendants of powerful Nazi's. We had best watch out what they do.

Bill wanted to come up to Portland with us but we had to get him out of Jury duty. So I drove back to Oakland and the two of us went down to San Leandro to the courthouse and we actually talked his way out of it. I mean really this day was going way to well. Bill bought himself a ticket to Portland then took me to the airport for my flight out.

I saw Tom waiting for me as I came down the escalator and within an hour of landing, he had found me a very lovey Deschutes Black Butte Porter down at Jax, the club that we were scheduled to play at on Saturday. Seein as it was only Wednesday, we just had a few pints and introduced ourselves to the staff and figured out where we'd be playing and such. Later we went to the 715 and hung out with Abdulah from Ghana. Thursday we swooped Dan up at the hair port and chowed on a delicious burrito before heading over to Jason's house for a rehearsal. We got through a bunch of Tom's tunes and called it quits before it got too late. Later we hooked up with Wilson from Peevish, the band that was opening for us on Saturday and we stayed up til Tom's neighbors got totally pissed off at all the noise we were making.

Friday, we saw the Two Towers flick in Vancuver Washington and jammed thru some of my tunes at Jason's.

So finally it was Saturday and time for the big show. We set up early and things were looking good. but reality sunk in after the amazing Peevish show. Fork opened up with an awesome version of Turkey in The Straw as taught by my Nana and then we wailed through a slew of Tom and Dan's tunes and my Party Time smash single. By the time we ended the first set, the audience was screaming for more. We really put the hoyt on em with Cissy Strut and Dear Prudence and Well You Needn't and a few others. With Wall as the MC, Tad on Trombone and Larry on the Tuba we couldn't go wrong. I really couldn't believe how totally on we were for all of that. It was certainly the best set I had ever played and by far the best set Tom, Dan and I had put together. It was funny how some people thought we were better in the first set, but we all knew the second set was smokin and we left with big shit eating grins on our face knowing that we'd be happy for a long time about traveling so far to make this happen. With more than $700 in our pockets to send to India to help handicapped kids, we called it a success and packed it up.

Sunday was the Stupor Bowl and Sue came in from Corvallis to hang with her little brothers and Jeff and Jolyn and we had a horrible time watching Gannon choke. After Sue took off, we ended up at the 715 suckin PBR's.

Monday we got Tom's muffler fixed and played two nice sets without a drummer over at the 715. Tom actually has some of it recorded. We had a couple of the regulars sit in and play some classics like Mustang Sally and everyone was saying it was the best live music the place had seen. A drummer would have been nice.

Tuesday morning we dropped Dan off at the airport and drove out to Bend. After visiting the mecca of beer drinking, the Deschuttes brewery, Tom steered us over to Ben and Sharon's where we cooked up some of my famous carne asada quesadillas and yakked all night long.

In the morning Tom and I headed to the Mt. Bachelor and ran into a foggy snowstorm. I was stunned as I struggled to keep up with Tom on his sit-ski on the blue runs and was pretty impressed that he was willing to take on some black runs too. But the most unbeliveable sight of my life was watching him take off thru the terrain park. He dropped at full speed to the big jump and when I lost sight of him he was catching big time air in perfect position. I was floored. I hadn't seen the All American Tom in the air in over six years and he really looked like a natural in the air and got some serious height. I can't express how amazing it was to watch this. I was in histerics. I did happen to find him upside down at the bottom of the jump, but we were both seriously elated by the experience. Then the fog rolled in and we headed back to The Brewery and met up with Tad and Adele and had a bunch of the best beer on the planet.

In the morning we met up with T&A to go skiing again, but it was pouring rain, so we were about to blow it off, but then we decided to not blow it off and play a little Dan August on a 11,000 foot mountain. We all remember Dan August, don't we?

I was pretty happy that on both days, my new ski bibs and old goretex jacket kept me perfectly dry.

We hung at Bens' place for a few hours with T&A and then drove through the nasty rainy mountains back to the 715 for more PBR's.

On Friday, Sue came through on her way to the Galapagos Islands. We chowed some pretty great Ethiopian food and toured NW Portland. Saturday, my friend Ram came down from Seattle and after we picked up another New Orleans friend of mine Randoni, we drove down to Dallas to hit the T&A party at Ms. Ardele's sister Vonnie's place. Tom, Tad, Larry and I played another shabby and a not so shabby set and Tad and Adele fell in love with Gumpfy the kitty. When we all decided to head up to Portland to hit the clubs, Tad made sure Gumpfy was with us. We convoyed up to Club Ohm and saw some ok trance music and then of course went to the 715 to have some PBR's.

Tad and Adele tried to get Gumpfy on the plane in the morning, but were denied. Luckily Larry was there to rescue her and take her to her rightful owners and I wasn't forced to drag the cat kicking and screaming for the next ten days.

YEah, this was a pretty great trip. On Tuesday, I stole Tom's van and drove up to Seattle to check out my friend Ram's situation. He is a professor in Computational Human Genomics at the UW and has an unbelievable computing cluster that's grinding away trying to draw connections between genotypes and phenotypes 24 hours a day. He and his wife who we met in Thailand live in this completely awesome house 200 feet above the Puget Sound. We went out and saw some really killer techno and had a ball.

So one more night at the 715 and I was headed back down to Oak town. Upon arriving back at Bill's place, I crashed his computer. Upon trying to take it to get serviced, I locked the keys in his car. Saturday, I visited my good friend Joannie and had a breakfast crepe on College avenue. Yum... then I went up to visit Dee Vee and jammed out with him. Together we went down to my friend Jessica from Thrive's party on Potrero Hill and watched the moon set over Buena Vista Park. It was pretty great.

Sunday I had a quiet little party with a dozen close friends... Joe Paykel and Niella, Erica and Anita Mondale, Josh and Janet from the Ambulance Chasers, etc. We had a pretty nice little jamboree.

So then Monday I went and checked out Joe & Niella's place that overlooks the bay from the beach in Alemeda and then we went out and got a burrito to die for on Fairmount and we went up into the hills to check out the sunset and walk Maggie the dawg. That night Bill and I went to McGrady's on Lincoln in Alemeda and checked out a bluegrass jam that was going on. I sat down and played the stand up they had and at least I had fun with it.

So that's the story. I made it home without incident to find Mardi Gras settling upon the Crecent City. This weekend after the protests, I went out with Wall and my housemates Bruce and Aliceann, but learned the hard way that the Crew De Vieux parade marches on time no matter how hard the rain is falling. After wandering thru the French Quarter, we did make it to the ball at the State Palace Theater and saw Anders Osbourne and Ceril Nevil and the Mardi Gras Indians get funky til four in the morning.

So gosh, what can I say. Life is indeed extremely not too shabby down here in the big easy. It was hard leaving the West, but we do have a lot more fun down here and now that I'm done with the Three Ring Circus Big Top event space, I've been getting a little more serious about finding a band and talking computers a bit more and may have some luck working for the Contemporary Arts Center and this new Beat Street Magazine if I stop writing and finish my portfolio. But with the majority of Mardi Gras parades starting Thursday, the whole city will start to shut down for ten days. Don't worry, you don't have to pack 11 bags of stuff and come visit. I'll have enough fun for all y'all. Besides, we have ta learn y'all how to talk all over.

Bagus