July 19th
We moved out of our favorite spot in Columbus OH, 77 W. Blake Ave. (I guess it was technically our band house) on July 2nd, a few weeks ago, and moved into our 26' RV with all of our gear, our t-shirt press, a handheld vacuum cleaner, and our 2 cats.  We'd spent the previous month taking the remainder of our belongings and dividing them between our mothers' garages and basements, after employing a super sweet Craigslist blitz, topping it all off with a massive attack on the alley dumpsters.  We rolled out for our summer tour with our rent money in our pockets, all eager to spend it on gasoline and poptarts instead.  Here are some highlights of our first ever summer tour:

July 3: Athens OH - Jackie O's
We love Athens, we love Jackie O's, and we love Jonathan, who manns the deck.  To the beautiful Amy, who bought us beer, thank you very much.  To the guy on the roof with a cat that matched ours, we hope you had a happy birthday.  To the dudes who helped us discover that the ladder on the back of our RV is a fucking MAGNET FOR DRUNKS (you were the first, but not the drunkest), thank you for not killing yourself on our first night out...actually, that would've made for a better story for both of us.  Maybe try harder next time.

July 4: Dayton OH - Canal St. Tavern
So I got some mean cat scratches today.  I guess it rained a lot, and i ended up wiping out in a huge mud puddle with a cat in my arms who clawed the shit out of my chest on his way to a hiding spot under the RV.  These scratches probably look great under stage lights...So the show -- this was such a fun night!  4th of July, double cd release party, performing with friends (Gretta, your sparkly silver Elvis jumpsuit was so badass...David was totally jealous)...Canal Street is always a great time.  We got some of the best pictures of the tour here (thanks to Jon from Mooncrowes Productions - he is seriously amazing, what a great eye) as well as a nice show review in a Dayton music blog (thanks to Kyle from The Buddha Den - we love the Dayton music scene, thanks for keeping track of it).  Also great to see old friends (I'm lookin at you Purtle and Bryan, as well as the guy I partied with in '05 at one of the monster hops - you had that crazy mouthless mask)...too bad there's not a Dayton every 500 miles on this tour.  Also, parking the RV during that wild 4th of July Jazz festival seemed kind of challenging -- thanks to Derek for helping us out. ;-)

July 5: Lansing MI - Mac's Bar
I think this was the day that our cat Sam stopped barfing.  They're acclimating to the road quite well.  Lansing was great -- we loved Mac's Bar!  Especially the staff...(Craig, your butthole monster sculpture is still one of the highlights of our tour, and Alex, thanks for the wealth of entertaining stories...also thanks for naming that shot after us.) ;-)  We got to meet stage-diving Joe, going for the world record - I think he's up to 135?  You guys were great, we're glad we got to hang out with you.  But our biggest thanks to Mac's Bar is for letting us plug our RV in (and admittedly it made us a little giddy to know that this is where Jucifer occasionally plugs in.) ;-)  (Also, Theio's Diner, amazing...)

Breakdown 1 - July 6-8
So we ended up sticking around Lansing longer than we intended.  We spent 3 days figuring out why our RV wouldn't start.  It cost a hundred bucks and two cancelled shows, and turned out to be something pretty damn simple -- just a bum rotor (distributor, not brakes).  We spent our days walking and bus-riding all over Lansing, to a few auto parts stores, 2 mechanics, and a Ford dealership across town.  In the meatime, we checked out a Lansing Lugnuts game thru the fence (Lugnuts??), we had a romantic jog thru downtown to make it to Autozone by 8:59, and we got to see our cat (Kitty) writhe all over her first batch of freshly-picked catnip (thanks, Stage-diving Joe).  By the end of it all, we were able to give directions to people (from Michigan) who stopped us on the street.  As a sidenote, we were totally impressed with our Lansing bus experiences - everyone was happy and talkative, and it felt a little like a party.

July 9: Kalamazoo MI - The Corner Bar
Delicious Bell's beer started the night off right.  (I guess just getting out of Lansing finally was a good start.)  We had a fun time in Kalamazoo before the show -- we found a dump station for the RV at the fairgrounds where a dog show was in progress...(whoa).  We passed a sign depicting Zimmerman as a superhero, which made David pretty giddy because it's such a great visual representation of a line in Song for Robert Schuller (Patrick Kenney, he wishes you'd've seen it too).  The gig was good, and we met some cool people.  Joe the soundman had some great stories about silicone implant gag gifts from the Dow Chemical plant in his hometown (Midland?).  The testicle story was my favorite. 

So, that was basically week 1.  I'll try to be better/faster about getting week 2 up here, since we're now well into week 3.  Also, I'll try to get some pictures (we're always too busy doing stuff to remember to take pictures of stuff...we need a photographer.  and apparently, a mechanic.)
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UPDATE Aug. 4th
We've been out for over a month now, so i guess we're a little overdue for a few words from the road.  I tried to write some kind of 3-week update essay, but i got pretty bored, so instead i went for a couple of haikus and stuff.  Some highlights of our first month on the road:

MADISON
caburlesque dancers
pulled us onstage - ooh la la
dollar in Tweed's boot

CHICAGO or "homeland security camera, fuck off"
we love Cal's Liquors
raucous (not treasonous) fun
you guys can party

POEM
 Sober-challenged males still attracted to our RV ladder
 Only this time, in
 Milwaukee, we & WWC launched a rooftop/balcony assault of heckles, and 2 warning bb's --
 Explicably or not, they immediately wanted to come party with us...
 Off to beautiful Dubuque, to the
 Nether regions of Isabella's Bar, beneath the spooky victorian mansion, painted stone & dark wood,
 Easily could be Batman's library.  Isabella's, you and your music-loving patrons are exquisite.

 P.s. The speedboat ride down the Mississippi was sweet.
 Later that week...we screenprinted shirts at a campground.  Meanwhile...
 Everyone knows AAA is worthless, but we've got the blown inner dually to prove it -
(Although Iowans, on the other hand, are friendly and helpful...even the state troopers)
 Shocked to discover our pockets were nearly empty, we found The Vaudeville Mews in Des Moines to be
 Exceedingly charming, and Lawrence Kansas

 Blew our shit away with its excessive amazingness - thanks Replay Lounge for kicking so much ass -
 Undoubtedly, you saved our tour from certain financial ruin, and we love 
 You.  Kansas kept

 Up its end - Topeka had us as part of the
 Strangest line-up ever, and that show was the best fucking party of our summer. Thx Boozehoundz. ;-)

 And KC topped it off with free pitchers AND pizza. (and good music.)(and a huge brazilian fish.)

 God hated us in Lincoln, at a fabulous club, with our
 Ridiculously crazy feedb(l)ack hole of horror distracting us out of the best show of our lives.
 Everything came up redemptive roses in Vermillion, SD though, complete with delicious pasta and
 Ass-grabbing chili-chocolate brownie, and extremely great people.  Yay Raziel's!
 St. Paul was a blast, thanks to Big V's and Company Incorporated. (and Soon, we're
 Equally amazed by your moniker-meant-to-be-ness, your vodka gimlets, &  your wee hour appetizers).
 Beautiful St. Croix Falls has an amazingly supportive scene (and a robot made of 8-tracks!), and
 Until now, we never knew how much we'd love La Crosse, WI, our 1-time performance & practice space. 
 So here's to ex-circus performers, common law drummers, and being courageous.  Thanks JB's.

*(okay, seriously, we'll take some pictures someday.)

UPDATE
December 28, 2008

And then we played 48 more shows. 

I guess I've got some work to do, keeping up with some form of entertaining record-keeping of our shows...I wasn't very good at it this last time around, from St. Louis to the east coast, then home to Columbus for a few weeks (Halloween! The Election!) and then back around the midwest - but we did get a few pictures. 

Here are some of the bands that we played with:
 
Matt Truman Ego Trip at Frankie's in Toledo

 
Superman Curl at Cal's in chicago
(please also imagine a quality photo of the amazing FCAB)

Sean and Wizard at Riverhorse in Milwaukee
(we were the only band, but Sean DJ'd and Wizard provided technical support)

One of Foxy Veronica's sexy Peach Pies at The Frequency in Madison

Kenny from Company Inc. at Big V's in St. Paul

Power of 2 at Big V's in St. Paul


Way Station at Record Bar in Kansas City
(please also imagine a quality photo of our new friends The Threes)

 
Shame Club at The Bluebird in St. Louis


The Hellblinki Sextet at The Cinemat in Bloomington, IN

Definitely Gary at The Brass Rail in Ft. Wayne