chicago has been good to me though nothing horribly exciting happend. Working at the merchant mart here is nice. Most trade shows are filthy But this one is on the 8th floor of an old chicago brick building. There is carpet everywhere and you don't ruin your clothes working. They also have free coffee. Nites were spent with Kraig, jose ( cuervo ) and a few P.B.R's at a little dive bar called Rossi. On my first day off I went deep south on the train to hunt down an old one stop. One stops were old distrbution centers for records. If you run across them these days they are full of mint copies of the music that for what ever reason was not popular with record shops. Jus the kind of records a guy like me wants. I took the train almost to the end then had to walk a half mile just to find this place. It was kind of out in the ghetto. I think that I saw only one other white person the whole time. I found the place and was greeted by mr Fletcher the mumbling 80 year old proprietor. He informed me that I was going to have to wait two hours and that I had better be ready to spend some money. "how much money you bring with you?" he said "hundred fifty" I replied. then he asks "you got a credit card?" I ended up spending 180 on 45's. The basment was full of records. 30 thousand records I would guess. All in little boxes on shelves. I was in heaven. the next day off I went to the art museum I spent the last few days hanging out with Ezra and Heather up north. They were nice enough to let me crash on their couch. Tomorrow I meet up with Murad (the muslim film maker that I met on craigs list ) at around 11am and he is going to drive me to toronto if I help out with the gas. It should prove to be an interesting trip...

Van took me out to this great state park on saturday with most of her family. We rented canoes for a 3hour paddle through the park. We packed sanwiches and beer. That was good fun. I took lots of photos and got to see some great southern wildlifeThat night Mo and I met up with some locals at a great bar called the red light. They decorated the whole place with trees shrubs etc. The dj played some weird 60's and 70's rock. The band wore costumes and played in the center of the space. My favorite guy was playing a sitar in a bumblebee suit.. whoa trippy dude! The whole experience was great. I worked on sunday and monday and this morning. tomorrow I get up at 7 and watch the rest of our crates get loaded into big trucks. Then I'm done for real. That is untill chicago...

I have been in florida since the 20th of Jan. I arrived late due to a missed plane - due to an awesome allnight party - due to my 33rd birthday. The first few days were filled with work, pub dinners and hotel breakfasts. Thursday night the boss took us out for sushi dinner. Last night Van took me and a handfull of others out to "lee and Ricks oyster bar". This place is amazing. The outside is shaped like a boat the inside has over 80 foot of tiled bar backed by about 10 shuckers. 50 year old buisness. They set a whole column of saltine crackers in one of those plastic baskets and then split it open with a knife. Big mugs of beer. lots of hicks and a jukebox full of kid rock and toby keith. I ate about 3 pounds of oysters and I didn't think that I even liked oysters.

After that I drove over and met J-rod for a beer. one beer turned into a few and before I knew it I was 2am and loaded and stranded. I lost track of Jared and since I had lost track of my cell phone earlier in the day at the record store I was unable to call anyone. Lucky that I ran into Wheat and Alex on the street. They let me stay on their couch with Martini ( wheat's very friendly cat ). I woke up to the sound of two cars colliding in the intersection outside. I watched the aftermath while I contemplated my own crashing headache.

Wheat droped me off at a great coffee house. I nursed myself back to life with coffee and lots of juice, found a record shop across the street, met up with jared, got my phone back, took a shower, and I have been at my hotel watching the discovery channel since.

I can't wait for tomorrow