This Is Our Legacy

After our sort-of-celebrity sighting in L.A., it was time to hit the road to San Fransisco. We stopped at an In-N-Out Burger at a place outside of the city. The place was packed; it was the only restaurant at this stop. In-N-Out Burger was so hyped I felt a little jealous that California had these by fistful and Washington did not have a single one. After eating their fries, any desire to have one of these restaurants near me vaporized. If I want a mediocre tasting cheap burger, I'll just eat at Dick's, thank you very much.

We arrived in San Fransisco to find House of Shields packed. This is something that we were not accustomed to, but was a nice end-of-tour surprise. House of Shields is in the downtown business district and it was filled with business casual types enjoying a Friday happy hour. As we pulled equipment through the crowd, one person commented on how brightly colored our shirts were. This comment made me notice how dull the other clothing in this place was. While lifting a bass drum above my head and walking through the crowd, it occurred to me that forgetting to apply deodorant and going without a shower was not doing me any favors.

The stage was upstairs in a loft area that overlooked the main bar. The band faced away from the balcony towards a video camera that projected a black and white image on the wall above the main bar area. The upstairs area was big enough to pack 30 or so people; the first band brought it to capacity. They used our drum kit, and after an amp mishap, one of our amps. I talked with all of the guys in this band that night and they were all very nice down to Earth guys.

Just before we went on, one of our Bay Area friends handed us a large bra with SWFOT written on it. No one ever gave us underwear before; it felt so rock-star to be thanked in this way. I hung it from the headstock of my guitar and we gave San Fransisco a thorough rocking. Stencil sang backups on Animals and Factory Song making them fuller and rowdier sounding than they had been before.

When Stencil went on, we returned this favor by playing tambourine on Stars and singing on Singer's Young Friends. Stencil was on fire that night -- Jared was letting his pre-calculated composure give way to something more spontaneous and exciting. It was great.

After some chit chat with the door man and our friends, we packed up our stuff, pointed the front of the vehicles Northward, and pushed the gas pedal down. I was the first to take a shift in Lucas's truck and was feeling pretty charged up about increasing our distance from the equator. Brad stayed awake and sat shotgun, keeping my brain going with the movie game. About 6 hours, I was getting tired. Brad could not guess the movie "Pirates of the Caribbean" after the following clues: recent movie, trilogy, has a sword fight, has a boat. We pulled over, ate some breakfast at a little diner and switched drivers. I played the movie game with Joe as we pulled into Seattle. I had a really good one, then Joe said he was done playing for a while. Too bad. The character was the midget in Trapped in the Closet.

When we got to Seattle, I was tired. All I wanted to do was sleep. I dropped off several members of Stencil at their houses, went back to Devon's and took a two hour nap. Lucas woke me up with a phone call that I was a bit too tired to completely digest. He said that my Jaguar had fallen out of the back of his truck along with his bass somewhere between his house and Leary. He retraced his steps, but neither instrument could be found. His voice sounded weary and sad. I told Lucas not to worry about my guitar, I would play the show that night with a different guitar.

When we got to the High Dive, I was pleased to discover that it was my Epiphone SG that had fallen out, not my Jaguar. This instrument was far less valuable, had intonation problems, and a warped pickguard. It was easily my least favorite guitar. Despite this setback, we were able to rock the High Dive.

After we played, I found Brian taking a cell phone picture near the rear door. As I rounded the corner, I could see that he was taking a picture of a drawing of a 2 foot penis with the word "ELBA" next to it. "This is our legacy" he laughed.

Elba was really tight that night; it was nice to play a show with them again.

I said goodbye to Stencil, and with that, our week long adventure was done. I was glad to have a place to get a good night of sleep and a shower. I was glad to see Rachel again. I could tell I was going to miss those guys though.

Do we have time four a round of movie game? OK. I am thinking of a human, male, protagonist, in a series, made in the 80s...