Oct 2
So we woke up in Toronto and the earth felt like it was tugging on my ear because I had drunk too much the night before. But it wasn't too bad. I again woke with the burning desire to eat Indian buffet but without the means to find it. Indian buffet is elusive because of its time sensitivity and it not really being everybody's cup of tea. We went to a Whole Foods near Hamilton, ON where we stayed and I believe I kept the lights on at a hospital for a year with what I paid in taxes. Those pay by the pound (or whatever a pound is in the much smarter metric system) systems just bend over the larger gentleman and spank him. Spank him hard. Hard. After I ate the food I forgot that it cost $8000 dollars in their colorful money and was in a happy mood.
We got through the Canadian border no sweat and started booking ass through America. We really didn't do shit. I don't know what we listened to. All I remember really is that the car stopped working for awhile on some angry digital shit. After we got it fixed I called a Dodge dealer in San Diego and asked "Ray" enormous amounts of questions about our vehicle. The funny part to us was having to randomly pick out a city on the West Coast to call because they were the only ones who would be open at the time. Out of complete silence in the car the first thing my guys heard me say was, "San Diego, California". We cracked up. Then we stayed in Albany. Home of crap. Albany: fuck you NYC, we're still the capital. We ate at a weirdo diner where I had some tight tasty shit. Me and Peter were very psyched for full on East Coast diner. That is defined by these things: A menu of at least 9 pages, Greek people working the register, women who are 39 or older but strangely cute waiting tables, Mexican folks working the kitchen and some of the bus boying, a type of video game in the front, a glass display that features many cakes, mints, toothpicks, a counter with seating, bright lights, chef salads, tuna, chicken and egg salad platters ("yes, sugar, we can do a combo"), greek omelets, and vegetarians will order the grilled cheese and the milkshake will be at least $3.00.
We slept in a hotel. I probably sat on my computer and did dumb shit on the internet. Yes I did. But I didn't watch the Meg White sex video. I've weened myself off of it. Thank you very much.

Oct 3
Boston, I can't deal with you. We woke up in Albany, which made me think that Boston might we tolerable, but I was wrong. I have problems with Boston. I think Mr. Lif is a cool rapper, and go sox, and I'm from Western Mass. But Boston can kiss my ass sometimes. It all started bad when we tried to go to Northampton but I got us off at the wrong exit so we drove through every fucking Hampton possible, east, south, and maybe west Hampton. The shit just kind of fucking killed me. And I thought I could find an Indian buffet but I couldn't. And I remembered that the exact same shit happened when I was on tour before. And I had the same solution, eat at pinnochio's pizza. Pinnochio's is just so great. I had a huge vegan piece of pizza (but the girl put cheese on it) and then some meat pie. Oh shit, that's some delicious motherfucking shit. I've been eating pinnochio's pizza since I was like 14. Going to see shows at the Iron Horse. And then of course the Mass Pike, which is just a highway of people in bad moods going to visit other people with bad moods. Now, maybe you'll see a hot girl passing you, and she'll smile at you and life will feel good. But I fucking guarantee she either has a Phish sticker or George W. Bush sticker on the back of her cute little jeep or beat up Jetta. And you know that it will never work out. It's either too much weed or not nearly enough. So keep on driving. Oh, but if you need a donut just pull over and walk seven feet in any direction and you will find a honeydew donuts. If you don't like it walk the other way and go to a Dunkin' Donuts. Massachusetts: get fat and then we'll make fun of you!
And then we got to drive into Boston. Driving into Boston is really like one long begging and merging section. The big dig parking thing didn't do shit at all. So we arrived at the club and actually found an amazing parking space. It was probably cool and not a pain in the ass because we were in Cambridge, not Boston. My friend Abby from Western Massachusetts showed up. She drove three hours to hang and I was very touched. We sat around while I got guest list stuff worked out. This was probably the first time we really had anyone on the list and now we had too many people. But, it ended up getting handled just fine. My friend Moya was letting us stay in a millionaire's mansion brownstone. I was looking forward to that and to seeing Moya. She called in to see what kind of liquor we wanted before we even saw her. That's great Moya. Whiskey, beer. Just predictable American rock band. We might as well call it a day and say we are Aerosmith, I mean we're in Boston and we're jackasses.
Before the show I ate food at the club and sat around nervously. I drank some drinks and hung out with Abby and later Abby and Moya. I was trying to warm up Moya to letting Abby also stay at her house. It's a little weird to be like "can the band and this married girl stay in the brownstone"? But everyone ended up getting along and Moya said it was fine. We played a good rock show just to spite Boston. The club was incredibly nice to us and the shows were sold out in advance. I guess I need to stop shitting on Boston but I'm so used to it. After the show we drunkenly loaded our shit and got stuff handled. Bill was only a couple drinks deep and he parked the car in a shady parking lot that was no safe bet with our van and trailer still being there. We then grabbed two cabs back into Boston and got up to the brownstone. For a millionaire this motherfucker has very little toilet paper. But there is lots of knob creek complements of Moya. Drink talk hang. Drink talk hang. Drink Drink. Abby's drinking. Everyone is drinking. That's what I got for you.

Oct 4
I woke up in permanent tour pain. Hazy, cranky, feeling weird, having trouble getting along with Moya and Abby. It's hard when tours meet people not on tour for a couple of days. To pace the relationship and the highs and lows and all of that with new faces is hard. We made it over to a coffeeshop and picked up some fancy coffee. I basically got a cream party with a bit of ice. Moya cooked us pancakes. I ate a shit ton of pancakes. Thanks Moya. And then we just couldn't think of shit to do so we raided the millionaire's netflix and found some weird ass movie called "final cut" with robin Williams. I'm not feeling Robin Williams in this film. It's just weird and un fun and weird weird. And so poorly acted. The guy who plays Jesus in Passion of the Christ is also a shit actor in this film. We should somehow fund people's lives after they play a role like Jesus because everything they do becomes comedy because you imagine it's jesus playing it. But in this case you just imagined it was a shitty actor, or in fact, it was a shitty actor. We got sandwiches and finished the shitty film. I tried to sit outside and do some work. Moya sat out with me and I couldn't get any work done. Not because of her but because of just the gchat army and the aol chat army and all the emails and check my myspace and check trivia's myspace and check it all and suddenly I'm sweating out whiskey, holding in a fart and Moya's leg is across my leg and I'm sitting on a chair I think I'm going to break. I'm dying.
We finally get headed to the club in another cab and I'm dying. But getting there feels great and I'm happy to be back at the Middle East. People are super nice and I'm excited to eat their food again. There is a bartender who is super nice to me and I get a bunch of free drinks and really watch some of the sets by Minus the Bear and Subtle. I sell some merch and hang out with Moya. Abby has returned back to Western Massachusetts. How can sold out shows in Boston just feel bad. It's like when you're having sex and you're having a bad time. It's supposed to feel good, but for whatever reason it doesn't. But, that's Boston for you. Ok.

Oct 5
We drove through Connecticut to get to New York. We stopped at a Roly Poly. I got a great salad. Whatever whatever Connecticut. Drive drive drive. Get into Brooklyn. Pay so so many tolls. Ok, we're parked in Brooklyn and it turns out that the production guy is friends with Bill Sullivan from Minneapolis and has worked with a bunch of our friends. We are playing at the Warsaw in Brooklyn. This is an old Polish hall that is really interesting. I get merch all counted in. New York kind of paralyzes regular tour duties because everyone has super friends in New York and people get distracted by all of that. I'm no exception. Kevin Hunt, my best friend in this world, shows up and I am immediately so happy. Kimani, the gentleman that ran the first label we were on, Third Earth, and is a rapper in many groups, including Roosevelt Franklin and Masterminds, is here. Okay, how many fucking commas is that? So many. Me Kevin, Peter and Kimani decided to get quick food. We went to a chain of the soup nazi, of Seinfeld fame. I got the bisque which always sounded the best from the episode. And I hate to say it, but it really was just fucking amazing. Delicious. And I got a free piece of fruit. Who loves fruit? Everyone. I went green apple.
Back to the venue I sat and worked some merch for awhile. And I forgot to mention I saw one of the dudes from TV on the Radio. Tunde I believe. He was guest singing on a song with Subtle because they're friends. In another lifetime TV on the Radio actually played before Heiruspecs at the Triple Rock in Minneapolis. They were really nice guys then and still are. I didn't know shit about their music then but like everyone I now think they are great.
Our set felt just phenomenal. We were laid back and strong which is hard to do in New York. It's easy to get stupidly intimidated in a way that really doesn't matter. But our set in Brooklyn was lively and relaxed and I felt an immense amount of energy and happiness. Bill broke a string before the second to last song but I handily went and grabbed his spare guitar. The set went great. Knol's girlfriend made nice nice with our patrons and sold lots of our shit before we even got off stage, which was great. After we got loaded out we got our car situated and we met up with Maris, my friend from Massachusetts who is now a school teacher in Brooklyn. And Sarah White, the rapper from Traditional Methods showed up with a friend and we are all drinking the knob creek I bought back from Moya in Massachusetts (fat cute boy discount, 25 bucks for a shit ton). There's a dude hanging out with Subtle named Pete Agoston who wrote some nice words about Heiruspecs in URB a long time ago. It was really nice to be with friends and especially nice to be with Kevin who I never get to see now that he lives in NY. After the show Sarah White's friend Laura let us stay at her apartment that was fifteen blocks away from the club. Thanks Laura. Bill was staying with his wife in a posh Manhattan hotel and Knol was staying with his girlfriend at someone else's house so it was Peter, me and Laura at Laura's house. Peter was the designated driver and was not down to go out so we had plans to drop him at Laura's and go out to a bar. But, Knol and his gf, Emily, had left all their stuff in the van so Peter had to drive back to bring it to them. Then Peter got backed into by another car and he thought there was a shit ton of damage. But there wasn't. So Peter came back to the spot I was holding and we got Peter into bed. I went out to a bar with Kevin, Laura, Sarah White and some friends I didn't know. Kevin was drunk and kept on catching a little sleep at the hipster Brooklyn bar we were at. After awhile Kevin grabbed a cab home and me and Laura headed home. After a hot night unairconditioned Brooklyn air I woke up and got involved in some work at the computer. I also got really happy when I saw that our car hadn't been stolen or broken into. That is just a joy when on tour in New York City. Especially if you are staying in a residential area. Me and Peter took dry ninja showers while sitting out at the car and trying to devise a plan of what to do with the day.

Oct 6
New York is really different than any other city in the U.S. when you are on tour. You can't really use your car and you have a bunch of friends most of the time, and you can never find anywhere to take a crap. One ends up most of the time just hanging out at coffeeshops or parks with random friends of yours who don't know each other and taking craps in au bon pain (cause starbuck's wants to see a receipt). Au Bon Pain you witless French cocks, I love shitting at your store.
Me and Peter took a walk through Poland, I mean greenpoint. It was some wild shit. We came up to Union Square where we met up with Kevin and tried to find a place to eat. We found some fancy ass diner where the NYU dropouts who were hosting couldn't figure out how to seat people even though there were fifteen open tables. So, that was special. Our waitress was sort of cute and she also dressed it up. She was wearing sunglasses inside and we thought for a long time that she had stretched her thong over a part of the back of her shirt. As it turns out instead, she was wearing a funny shirt. The food was nice and we had plans to hit the Staten Island ferry and see the Statue of Liberty. But, we derailed and decided to go to Coney Island with Maris instead. The Subway system just eluded us. In the end Kevin ran up to check and make sure the R was running normal while me and Peter sat down and waited on the line. Kevin realized it was fine and as he ran down he saw an R. He hopped on to see us still standing on the line. He got off at the next stop and walked six sweaty blocks. He was pissed. The R finally came and we found Maris waiting for us over in Brooklyn. We got out to Coney Island and it was amazing. We walked around the beach and I couldn't get my head around having gotten to a beach on a Subway. The waves were beautiful and there was such a big ass diverse crowd of people enjoying the water. My feet got sandy and we walked towards the ferris wheel. We made the mistake of sitting on the "rocking" ferris wheel which really ought to be called the ferris wheel of fuck you death. It spins a lot, but now I can say I've been on the ferris wheel on coney island. Eat off your face Ben Gibbard. We stopped at the original Nathan's at Coney Island and got amazing hot dogs and clams. One of my fried clams had a bone in it, I don't think there are any bones in clams so that shit is foul. Gross. Gross. Gross. We grabbed the subway back to our car spot (car still there) and Kevin Hunt proceeded to drive through Manhattan and Brooklyn like a professional New York City fish delivery man. And, he is. It was unbelievable to see someone handle the roads with such authority in a city where every Minnesotan usually drives like a seventy-nine year old on Quaaludes. After we got to the gig things went pretty normal for awhile. We put our gear in and sat our ass around manhattan. Doing jack shit. I mainly just ran around trying to make our guest list shit work. Right before the show my dad and his girlfriend stopped by and we hung out for a bit, but I was a little too distracted with getting the show started.
Our show went really really well. The energy was amazing, people paid a lot of attention and the lighting guy just beat the shit out of our songs, doing all this different lighting with our dynamics. But it was tasteful. After the show I went and got food with Kevin and one of my best friends, Izzy. Izzy is an old college roommate of mine who I had lost a little bit of touch so to hang out with her was just great. We went to an overly fancy place for food right next to the Irving Plaza. It was Eastern European waitresses and they acted like I had spit dog shit out of my mouth when I asked for tartar sauce with my fish and chips. Turns out they don't have tartar sauce. In my opinion if you don't have tartar sauce then you don't have fish and chips. Jackasses. Two days after we ate here my friend Kevin found out that they had attempted to run a charge for 8 million dollars on his debit card. And I'm not exaggerating. He got a fraud call from the company just cause he had a heavy weekend of salads, beers, et cetera. But the woman mentioned that the Belmont had tried charge him literally 8 million, 415 and seventeen cents. I mean, how would they even find such a figure, it couldn't have been their whole receipts for the night. They just don't make that much money.
After I went back to the Irving and worked merch and got drunk for the simple price of $9 a whiskey/diet coke. Thank god that sexy fisherman Kevin Hunt was with me. Cause he bought a lot. I hung out with Bill's wife Abby and their friend Dru for awhile. I was able to drink freely even though I was responsible for moving the car because we didn't have to move the car. I love you Sundays when there aren't parking restrictions on Sundays. So, after a ton of drinks we went through the process of trying to pick a bar to go to in Manhattan. People are only able to say bad things about bars in NYC. They can never get passionately behind one bar because it might be read as "honest" or "passionate". It's such an embarrassment to be a New Yorker, it is constant large-scale defense of your city and minor-scale shitting on your city. Por ejemplo: "new york is the best city in the world." These statements are coupled with "I can't stand my apartment." "It's so hard to find cheap places to eat." "I can't stand all the bars in (insert any overly hip borough, manhattan or Brooklyn". The whole thing is just a supreme joke.
So we ended up going to the non-choice of going to the nearest bar to the Irving. We got a ton of drinks and a ton of food. My friend Afi showed up, John Kingman and a bunch of Minnesotans and friends of Minnesotans are getting nice and drunk. Peter and I were staying with Kevin so we grabbed a cab uptown. I chatted a bunch with the driver which Kevin found funny and he camera'd it. We got out of the cab, dropped our shit at Kevin's and walked over to catch a bar for last call. None of us needed another drink, some of were too drunk to need one more, and some of us were too sober to want a drink at 4 in the morning. But we went to a bi-lingual bar in Spanish Harlem for some drinks. There was a guy our age ranting and raving about New York in a way I've heard before; "anything Harlem does, new york does. . .anything new york does, the u.s. does. . .anything the u.s. do, the world is for sure gonna do that!" And et cetera. I want to say he's full of shit but I look at the name brand clothes I have, the shoes, the styles. . .he makes a fair point. New York still does really move the world around. But, it still sounds funny when a drunk dude is saying it very slowly. We went to bed in a crowded room in Kevin's apartment with Kevin me and Peter.

Oct 7
We woke up in shifts of sleepiness and hungoveredness. I took a long hot shower and brushed my teeth and laid down and slept some more. After awhile we got around to calling my dad to make brunch plans with him and his girlfriend, Sandy. We hit the subway and went to visit them at the apartment they were staying at at 61st and 1st. The apartment was a very Hollywood apartment owned by a colleague of my dad's. It had a pretty unbelievable view of the whatever water you should be able to see from the East side of Manhattan. We went to a place with a jazz brunch and got bloody mary's and different dishes, I got the cobb salad, which I guess is my New York mainstay to some extent. Things were good and the conversation was relaxed. After the brunch me and Peter made our way back to the van. But not before we stopped to buy tough actin tinactin for my "friend's" athlete's foot which I handily lost eleven seconds after buying it.
We then spent the next six hours escaping from New York Kurt Russell style. Spurned, intimidated, and emasculated by Kevin's powning of New York City inspired me to drive like a measured confident mad man. Bill needed to pick up some things from the hotel he stayed at with his wife in New York. It was only a couple of blocks away but all the streets were closed and we just got slapped in the face by one ways and a lack of map information. The fuck you in the situation was having to drive around a New York construction disaster. The two real fuck you's was 1) waiting in front of a cute boutique hotel while Bill picked up his gear and everyone else in Ela took diggers or mad pissers and 2) when we left we only got to drive to NJ. Leaving New York for New Jersey is kind of like leaving Roseville for Elk River. Granted, I like Roseville better, but it's the same pile of bullshit. But I drove away with the confidence and pride of having sweet talked a cabbie into letting me merge in front of him to take a fat left on West Broadway with a fucking minivan and trailer. That shit was unbelievable. I can't really be in a bad mood after being with Kevin, he's my hero and best friend.
The drive to New Jersey was predictable and foolish. We got lost because I think New Jersey forgot to call NAVTEQ and tell them what the fuck is up with their state. Even though they invented highways as lifestyles they certainly haven't been any help in map land. I mean shit. Every band has a story about getting lost in NJ. Now I got three. We got to the Starland Ballroom which looks like one of those 80s venue that Jon Bon Jovi probably got head in every room of. And you know what, he probably did. We got loaded in and were all glowing in the ease of parking and space and open sky that is the absence of New York City. I realized I left a bunch of essential gig crap at the last gig which was a little stressful. But I could borrow stuff. I also realized that this club really knows how to bend you over about merch. We had two merch assistants who were unwilling to help sell merch but would count your merch in and out like Nazis and required 20% of the money. Thanks. These dudes were real cool personally and real dirty jersey in the best way. The short guy in charge was named Bobby and he used the term boytender. Like, "yo dave, go ask that one boytender if he's got change for the minus the bear". It was just classic. The other dude looked like the gravedigger from Garden State. They were all geared up to get sandwiches from WaWa after doors opened while we worked the shit to pay their salary. But, they still couldn't slip half a dick in Ela's merch hustle. I faked some promo to teeny up our take and waited patient while they counted Minus the Bear and then speed guilted them into letting us slip out with half of what they deserved. But lot's of other shit happened before that.
Our show was fine but very Sunday nightish. But we couldn't find the key to our trailer lock. So we got to get all Triple AAA (redundant?) and Internet and try to call around for someone who can work us out tonight. We should have taken into account the dirty jersey element. A dude from the club just clipped the shit out of our lock no worries. Wow, thank you jersey. We were all in that naked tour joy of not spending money to solve a problem. We drove to Philadelphia with the solidarity that only comes with struggle. It disappeared with the sleep that only comes with the financial guilt and physical tiredness and emotional stretching of two days of heavy drinking in New York with friends from your whole life and a long night drive and a weird record of pseudo eastern music from the Secret Chiefs three complements of Peter.

Oct 8
We stayed at Bill's friends house in Philadelphia. The girl's name is Melissa and Askeleton, Heiruspecs and Ela have all stayed with her in different cities multiple times. Melissa is great and she has a boyfriend named Corey who is great too. We woke up in the morning and got involved with laundry and the internet and relaxing. I tried to make a dent in the earlier part of this tour blog and I tried to get back into my regular life of booking gigs, work schedules, myspace crap, chatting online, planning shit. It was a productive morning but I simply could not find a legit Indian buffet in Mt. Airy. This was still my struggle, I'd been jonesin' for so long. We ended up going to a cool breakfast/deli place and having totally fine food. But I was getting in kind of a sour mood and the tour was lying all over me after all the stresses of New York had washed away I was still left with the residue of traveling, arguing, stressing, playing, tuning, losing money, losing keys, driving tired, tired of driving, talking too much online, not talking enough in person, cleaning the wrong clothes, dialing the wrong numbers, forgetting the wrong names, and generally losing step.
But I was with purpose at the gig. I had to help Minus the Bear do merch cause they lost a key to their truck as well. So I got that shit handled and felt good. I ate a cheesesteak and confirmed that my friend Katia was coming to the show with a bunch of her girls. I've known Katia forever and just love her. I ate a cheesesteak at Jim's. I took the recommendation from Dose-One who had some early years in the Philly metro: cheesesteak with cheese whiz and onions. (I added peppers cause why the fuck not Dose?). After our set I started drinking with Katia and company of tons of cute teacher girls. One of them ended up going out with this drunk dude who was a diver for the navy and had Oakley sunglasses sitting on the back of baseball cap turned backwards. It truly looked like a Halloween costume. But that dude got laid. I ended up just getting drunk, seeing James Lynch ( p.o.s.'s tour manager) and Charissa from the God Damn Doo Wop Band and watching Minus the Bear. After the show me and Knol had a talk that had to happen for both of us with whiskey that didn't need to happen for either of us. (although I certainly supported the whiskey and had a lot more than knol). We sat down on the steps of Melissa's house til 4:30, save an outdoor piss and ironed out being two different aged people from two different musical, personal and social worlds. Two people with brothers for musicians, two people with different dreams that venn diagram together on a lot of things but with very different ways of handling our lives, our careers, our emotions. The conversation really started tough but understandable and ended well and beautifully, and where we went in between healed a lot of things for both of us. I woke up ten pounds lighter and eight elevenths hung over.

Oct 9
After my hot shower oddysey and some turkey bacon we tooled around Melissa's house and watched Red Dawn. It's a Ronald Reagan promo flick basically. Patrick Swayze is in it. Young Swayze would be a good name for a super cute white rapper. "Young sway, we bought that money baby!". We were headed towards a free hotel room in the D.C. area complements of Minus the Bear. Good looking Bear. I stopped and ate an amazing salad a restaurant that I recommend, it's called SaladWorks. I might open one up in West St. Paul if I ever get real boring. We got to the hotel at around six and I've never been more excited for a day off on tour. Maybe it's because the plan was to play Edward 40 hands. This is a game that involves duct taping two 40 ouncers of your choice to your hands and drink all of them. If you have to piss, piss your pants. That's why I wore mesh shorts with no underwear, I ain't no Edward pissy jeans. I had to go with St. Ides because there was no Olde English. I've learned such important things from rap records. I also recognize that at times this tour blog looks like this was a big drinking party with the occasional interruption of shows and drives. And to some extent, that shit is true. I'm on vacation man, I don't tour for a job, I work with autistic kids and I do it well. Pass the duct tape. Duct tape on, crooked eye sippers on both sides. I drank em slowly and smartly and handled that shit. The other players were Steve the merch guy for minus, alex the guitar tech for minus and erin, the drummer for minus. Everyone handled it. In a sense it is an amateur's challenge. Although it is precarious to have bottles duct taped to your hand, ultimately it is not the largest amounts of alcohol for band dudes to drink. So what not and what not. I crash out and snooze.

Oct 10
We woke up leisurely in Largo, Maryland because we didn't have to leave in time for check out. The Minus the Bear boys were keeping the room open to give Subtle a room for free on their last night on the tour. Again, a class act all around. I woke up early and made a birthday sign for Knol on the back of the "we have wireless internet" card. It was Knol's birthday today and it simple read "33 and I Vote". I put it on top of his sleeping body and videotaped it for him. Happy birthday. We thought we would grab some food in the local super mall area but we actually couldn't find anything we wanted to eat in the area so we thought we would roll on into the next suburban Borders/Barnes/Noble Applebee's/Ruby Tuesdays/Chinese Buffet/Local Mexican Place area. But we fell right into D.C. all knowing that this was too long to kill for Ela in a city with parking meters, expensive restaurants, george w. bush and confusing streets. My dad says that the streets in D.C. are easy to understand. He also has a B.A. in Mathematics. Well fuck, the shit makes sense to the math major. Point: "It's all a grid Sean, super easy, super organized!" Counterpoint: "Florida Ave, Massachusetts Ave and all these streets are curved like motherfuckers and every street they hit is part of a separate system of names, Mike.". We ended up going to Ben's Chili Bowl right near Howard University. I've eaten here before on a far earlier Ela tour. The area is either known as "Black Broadway" or "Black Hollywood". Not positive which. But it has the Ellington theater and is the childhood (and adulthood?) home to the great composer. We've been killing so much time in suburban areas where music is quiet and the food is predictable (and fucking delicious often, don't get jealous ruby Tuesday, you've still got my heart), but dropping into this mecca for the Black community of D.C. and hearing loud ass r&b and go-go feels just right. Also, contrary to the title, there is a lot of vegetarian stuff going on. The restaurant's variety of dietetic options may partially being thanks to it being a hub for the Nation of Islam for many years. I only heard this from one local so I might be wrong. But either way, my turkey dog was the shit and the vegetarian burger birthday boy Knol got was good. We hung at the restaurant for awhile and heard this great song, which I think may have been a cover of a Parliament song, I'm not positive but it didn't sound like the original. Through the big speakers, the drum groove sounded unbelievable. Afterwards we killed sometime at a coffeeshop where I bought one large coffee and we pulled out three laptops and took two dumps between the three of us. Just typical tour time killing bullshit. But, it was nice.
In advance of load in we jumped into the van and headed down towards the Black Cat. Heiruspecs has played at the Black Cat before but in the little ass room. I've actually never been upstairs before. We got loaded in after a tough trailer fiasco I engineered by being a lazy jackass. After load-in we sat our asses around and bullshitted with Subtle. This is Subtle's last day on the tour and we've bonded over so many things: rap, stealing Minus the Bear's backstage food, stealing Minus the Bear's backstage alcohol, food, free jazz, funk, movies, tour food et cetera. After everybody else soundchecks we load our stuff on stage and catch a quick soundcheck. The dudes are staying with Bill's cousin Richard today but I think I'm staying with my friend Laura tonight. We've stayed with Laura before and I met her the first time Heiruspecs played in D.C. years ago.
Our set happens only 30 minutes after doors but it still feels good. We are definitely far enough along on tour that we are bringing along our own party on stage, which we weren't doing at the beginning of tour. Although people were just filing in and we weren't holding a big audience we had the energy together between the four of us. It's the best feeling when you feel some of that bulletproof coming to your group on tour. It's so strong. After our show I ate some food and finally my friend Laura showed up. She had been running late. I smoked a little with Subtle and told them how nice it was to work with them. Laura and I went up and listened to Minus the Bear. It's like they got the memo that I was going to be high because they made their Pink Floydy improvisey part about three times as long and it was blowing my mind. I was in a great place. After the gig got all set and everything was loaded out I grabbed a cab to meet Laura up at a spot called Napoleon in Adams-Morgan. It was absolutely amazing, especially for only ten people being in there. It was a basement bar with a young cute girl working the bar serving big ass drinks with fancy liquor in them for 8 dollars. That's straight with me if you only want to make nice big drinks and charge a lot, I just don't want a bullshit drink for that much, listen up Irving Plaza. There were two djs up there working a set of laptops and bringing in great music. Some house, some r&b, some rap. It was loosely 80s, but you know, lots of stuff. I was dancing, drinking and feeling more alive than I had in awhile. Laura's friends were really nice and I was also able to keep my space and enjoy my world. And it's a world I'm so rarely in. I like to dance, I like certain worlds of large drinks and girls who take breaks from their bartending shift to grind with the best dancer on the dance floor and if you want a drink than go fuck yourself.org. And I like dancing and moving with people I don't know or barely know or whatever. But the night is raw and feels wonderful. The guy that is giving me and Laura a ride home wants to stop at a Diner. I think we're both reluctant, but ultimately most of the crowd ends up going to this Diner.
The Diner ended up being the perfect end to the night. First off, Ela had been to the Diner before with Ela and her boyfriend had bought us all breakfast. And it was the shit then and the shit now. We actually wondered where the restaurant was on this tour cause it was so good. Also, the host was Jeremy Weiner, a middle school friend from Massachusetts who has been down in D.C. for a couple of years. He and I were very into punk music together and I wouldn't put it past him to be living in D.C. thanks to their amazing history in that scene. Catching up with him was great and he seems really happy and I was thankful to see him. I was so peaceful about everything that I ordered a cobb salad as an after-thought and only slowly made dents in it. I was having a great time talking with Laura and her people. D.C. is also such a soulful town. This was a big group of age mates talking about dropping maybe eighty a ticket to see Stevie Wonder. I don't think my crew in Minneapolis would have such reverence for a musical great. I soon also discovered that one of the DJs, who I was now sitting next to you was Chris, the singer and guitarist for Q and not U, a D.C. band I am vaguely aware of but Knol and Bill are big fans of. It's 2007 so I sent the text to Bill but didn't hear back. I was very excited but that didn't prevent from opening my ass mouth a little too long. One of the other folks at the table mused that Q and not U might be the biggest band from the D.C. underground scene besides for Fugazi. Chris quickly demurred and mentioned Nation of Ulysses and a couple others, but I felt compelled for some half reason to bring out my mini knowledge of big D.C. bands and just bring this: "well, Bad Brains, Trans-Am, Minor Threat, Dismemberment Plan, blah blah". But truth be told, I mainly gave the guy his props and we connected in some musiciany ways. The bill was super cheap cause Jeremy was looking out for us. I tried to be a baller (Microsoft word just tried to change that to baler, what dickheads) and drop some serious cash towards the fund after a guy was happy to pay the whole bill on his card. But I ended up dropping really cheap with like seventeen for me and Laura's food cause I was out of cash. But, I told the motherfuckers and made it clear and insured that things still got covered. And offered to switch to my card. Whatever people do at the end of the meal, the worst thing is when the outsider doesn't announce his deal and just lets it fall on the shoulders of others. But I felt good and the dude who really paid had my back. He also gave me and Laura a ride home to her nice ass apartment where I caught some good sleep and watched the majority of Better Off Dead with John Cusack.

Oct 11
I wake up in D.C. and in my mind I never leave. I think that at some point towards the end of a tour one is just able to exist in the space they want regardless of where they are. And until I decide to exist in the shower at the venue in Norfolk I am lying in Laura's apartment waking up slowly. Really slowly. Peter figured out that I was actually in walking distance from where the rest of the Ela guys are. So at around 10:45 I shipped out and walked down Ogden to 14th and walked across to Sheperd. I felt great walking around in D.C. I've always shit on D.C. before but I can't now, I had a great time and that club was a big part of it. The Twin Cities are a very rock place and I make it even more rock when I drink at Turf Club/331 and rarely make it out to the hip hop stuff I came up going to. Martin Devaney, take me to the Dinkytowner. And let's wear some adidas shit. The walk feels amazing and I'm not aware quite how tired I am yet. I meet up with the rest of Ela and we very quickly pour into the van and drive towards Norfolk, VA. I make a couple phone calls and drop into a sleep aided by the huge collection of pre '98 hip hop that Dose-One gave me. For one of the first times in my career I sleep all the way to the venue waking up in a haze as we start loading our shit out.
I feel completely done with the tour without being remotely pissed or attitudinal about being here. But everything feels distant and untouchable. A new band is joining the tour today, Helio Sequence. I cordially say helio but I can't open up the space to talk. My mind is just locked off. Drowsy I fall asleep on a leather couch in the Hollywood ass backstage. The sleep never really stays and I run down and count all the merch so it is out of the way. Helio Sequence soundcheck and then we do. I take a shower upstairs in the venue. I have done that so rarely but it is so essential right now. My head reopens and I'm back. We are staying with Bill's family again. He's got so much family. Our set goes well and I realize that I have really grown into being a performer member of Ela again. I don't feel out of place, I feel strong and comfortable in a way I often only feel in recording and rehearsing with Ela. At the end of the set Minus the Bear brings us up shots of whiskey and I drink mine with happiness. I feel really happy about having done this tour and I'm also really happy to head home. After the set I get down and work merch and relax upstairs and on the computer. I am fully back into life/work mode and trying to get things going for me and mine back home gig/recording wise. The other guys get a little drinky in Ela, especially Bill who had a bad run in a game of West Coast style beer pong and he's definitely catching up for all the nights on this tour where we got wasted and he manned the driving.
I drive the car back to Bill's sister and we get lost but it's manageable. We decide to wake up really early and get real close to the Twin Cities. We go to sleep together in one attic room that we all slept in together a couple months ago on another tour. I check my email, myspace, type on this long ass blog and finally get to sleep.

Oct 12/13
What is there to tell you? We all drove a lot. We ate a great vegan restaurant off the highway in the Highlands of Pennsylvania. We drove from Norfolk, VA to Rockford, IL and we slept in a little room. I watched Sex in the City and typed on this blog. We woke up and I started to count our money and versus it against our gas expenses and see how we did. We went through tons of emotions as our little trip as the little band that has and will and could and might came to a close. But for a couple weeks just now we've glowed with strength and hung together and gotten tighter and learned. I'll return to my life with the strength and vitality to make my normal situation more creative and more musical. Tonight we will play at the Turf after we stop in Wisconsin for me to play with Joanna James. We will return to our jobs, our lives, our trivia nights, our drum lessons, our other bands, our wives, our girls, our friends, our great fucking state. Sorry for cussin'.