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Published: August 19th 2005
Allow myself to introduce......myself
Hello again to all my faithful readers!! I am sorry time has not permitted me to update since Atlanta, but various events and cicrumstances have plotted against me, leaving me either netcafe-less or time-less, but, coming to you all the way from Brussels, Belgium, I'm here to make things right.....more or less. Anyway, last time you heard we had just finished up at the magic kingdom......(insert cliche movie flashback here)
The 30th dawned bright as we ponied-up once again and hit the road south towards Tony Montana's town, Miami. Having not called ahead, Tony's goons weren't all that pleased to see us, so we checked into a cheap hotel on South Beach. It was merely adequate, only 1 double bed, so Chris and Brad would be on the floor this night, w0000t! It being a saturday night, we agreed hitting the piss sounded a top idea. However, Miami had other ideas for us this evening, after an initial good start playing pool with $2 beers in some dive, we upped stumps to find somewhere a little classier and were met with only super-expensive cover charges or crappy dance-clubs. A little disappointed, we called it a night around 2am. Upon returning to the hotel room, we decided to play with my new BB gun, having a laugh shooting targets around the room, however it was turning our attention to passers-by nearly proved to be our undoing! Focussing mainly on convertibles, it proved quite a laugh to pepper the cars below with our plastic projectiles. Eventually, at the valet parking below us, up shows this coiffed tosser, preened like the cool cat he clearly thought he was. "I'm having this" says me, and so I fire one in his general direction......FUCK!!! Right in the chest!!!! Hahahahaha, it was great! We hid behind the shades and watched with much amusement as our friend looked wildly around for what had hit him. Thinking ourselves very clever, we had a few more shots, until there was a knock on the door.........!!!! Chris jumped in the shower, Brad hid the BBs and I threw the gun behind the fridge, then put my fine acting skills on display:
Employee: "Hey, did something fall out of your window??"
Tris: "What?? Nah man, we've all been asleep in here"
Emp " So, nothing came out of your window then? Only something hit a car downstairs"
Tris: "Nah mate, nothing at all, been asleep up in here"
And so on and so forth. Eventually convincing him we were legit, he left, and we shut down operation "shoot tossers." It was fun while it lasted though!
The 31st found us needing new digs, as the hotel from the night before was booked solid. Turning to our trusty friend the voucher book, we found a coolish place for heaps cheap further up the beach. It wasn't the central location the other place was, but for $50-odd for the night, it was solid value. This day turned out to be pretty quiet, the go-go-go pace of the previous week had left me in particular feeling a bit flat, so after a stroll around we settled in front of the TV with some pizza for a relaxing evening.
The 1st saw the dawn of a new month, and for us, as often the case, were faced with a fuck-off drive up to Atlanta. After deciding it wasn't going to drive itself, we set out. About 2 hours in (around 4pm) one of the famous florida storms flashed over us. These storms are crazy, for about 30 minutes visbility is reduced to virtually nothing, and while caution dictates you slow down to allow for this, some of these crazy american bastards actually sped UP so it seemed! Crazy! So while I'm tooling along in the right lane trying to see where the fuck I'm going, some madman in a semi goes flying by me at around 85. I'd have taken his number down and reported him for bad driving, but I couldn't see the damned thing!! We finally arrived in Atlanta around 2-ish, our arses numb after the 660 mile hike. We checked into the first cheap place we could find, the Claremont, and after passing up on the friendly hookers in the lobby, hit the hay.
The 2nd was a tourist-y day. We started things off with finding a new hotel room, apparently the roaches had the place booked for the evening. Once again finding a voucher book, we got a cool place about 10 miles out of town, the Microtel inn, right near the airport. Apparently we were very lucky, there was a fuck-off Southern Baptist Convention in town, Mega-fest, and the lady at the desk said this was their last room. It was a smoking room, clearly the god-botherers like the smell of cleanliness all around them. We, however, had no such problems, and took the room with glee. Heading back into Atlanta, our first stop was the Coca-Cola museum. It was pretty cool, crowded as you'd expect, but the upside was all the free soda you could drink. Chris and Brad were almost in tears due to the fact that in the "sodas of the world" room, there was no Lift! Both lads enjoy their Lemon Squash apparently! Next up on the agenda was CNN headquarters and the tour, which was really good. We saw live TV being shot, and were actually there for the breaking story of the Air France Jet crashing in Toronto. Pretty crazy stuff. That nite we again planned on taking it easy, we hit the netcafe, emailed home etc etc. Next door to the netcafe though, was this tiny hole in the wall rock-club, and after sweet talking a couple girls, we got in for free! This proved to be a mixed blessing, as the music was completely crap, some electronica band tonight. Behind calls of "fuck this" we headed back the motel for some much needed sleep ahead of Warped tour the following day.
The 3rd looked like a great day waking up, and the omens were good for a repeat of the Sacramento Warped, a great day to be enjoyed by all. Note to Warped organisers: PUT THE FUCKING VENUE IN A PLACE THAT'S EASY TO FIND!!! God, both Sacto and Atlanta were in the middle of fucking nowhere. Right, enough ranting. We found the place eventually, and arsily skipped the line to be within the first 100 through the door. I don't remember the exact lineup, but this warped, for me, shat all over Sacramento. First: it was cooler. In Sacto i thought I was going to pass out with heat-stroke, here it was a little cooler. Second, and more importantly, MILLENCOLIN WERE PLAYING!!!! One of my favourite bands, and they certainly didn't disappoint. Nikolai and the boys rocked the stage once again, that makes them 3 for 3 in times I've seen them. Other points of interest: The Offspring are past it; these new punk bands all sound pretty much alike, I can't really tell the difference between a My Chemical Romance or an Opiate for the Masses. Of course, that could be just me; Relient K were good; MxPx were good; Dropkicks were great! Some bloke got absolutely poleaxed in the circle mosh when someone threw a trash-barrel into it, it was great. All in All, a top day. Oh yeah, we met MxPx too, they were kinda wankers, but they prolly couldn't hear us over the band on stage......whos name escapes me. Opiate for the Chemical Romance or something.
The 4th arrived, and with it, another long arse drive, this time to Washington DC, site of many hijinks for me back in 2002. The drive passed uneventfully, and it was with much thanks that we checked into our hostel and headed out for a couple of drinks. That pretty much concludes the day really, we drove, we had some beers, and went to bed. Pretty boring really!
The 5th saw us doing all the touristy shite one must do whilst in Washington DC. As a DC veteran, I was kinda bored by it all, 3 years isn't quite enough time to reinstate a sense of awe about the whole place. But yeah, the Lincoln, Washington, Jefferson, FDR memorials still look the same. The new WW2 memorial is really nice, that was a personal highlight. There was a bomb-scare at the Capitol building while we were there, apparently someone had left a bag unattended and so of course the police went apeshit, all of a sudden there were cops with massive guns everywhere. Pretty crazy stuff. After this tiring day, we checked into our new motel, the President's Inn, shook off the hookers in the lobby, and hit the sack.
Had we known on the morning of the 6th what heinous act would occur this day, we all would have rolled over and gone back to sleep. But of course, foresight is never as accurate as hindsight, and so it was with much anticipation that we faced up to another day of touristy delights in the nation's capital. We caught the white house, Museum of American History among other things, and after 8 hours sightseeing, headed back to the car. I jumped into my usual drivers seat, Chris was shotgun and Brad was in the back. Suspicions were first aroused when Chris said "what the fuck is the bread doing on the front seat?" Further curiosity was raised when Brad asked "And who the fuck put the bags in the backseat?" I think it all dawned on us pretty much at the same time "Some bastard has broken in." And so they had, by slim-jimming the front passenger door. And so we took stock: Chris lost his camera and some iPod accessories. I lost my camera, my bag of chargers, a few items of clothing, my new Zippo from San Fran, and some other odds and sods. Poor Bradley had his entire pack fucking ganked, so all his clothes, iPod, watch, zippo, birthday presents, whatever, was taken. We called the cops, they took their report (took like 5 hours for this to take place) and we went to the Australian embassy, where the night watchman let us in to check what we did and didn't have. After taking stock, and not having much love for DC at this point, we decided to get the fuck out of dodge and head to Toronto.
Driving overnight, we arrived in Niagra falls around 11am. Saw them. Impressive. Kept on towards Toronto, getting a private room for the 3 of us at this cool hostel on Spadina street. We went shopping to get Brad some emergency supplies of undies and shirts, and were left witht he impression that Toronto is a heaps cool town. Very similar to Australia in how chilled it is. Anyway, we explored Chinatown a bit, and that night, instead of going to sleep, decided to hit the hostel pub. The Aussie barman had the cool tunes cranked, and despite the company of a weird middle-aged-american dude that wouldn't piss off, it was a top night. Heaps of aussies, poms and kiwis, not to mention resident canadians made the time pass quickly, and it was with much aplomb that Chris and I disposed of many challengers to the Pool Table Crown. Great night over all.
The 8th dawned way too brightly for we hungover-ed souls, the first order of business was to drink as much water as I could lay my hands on. Next up came trying to sort out some insurance stuff for Brad. Soon after we went on a free "Magic Bus" tour of Toronto. I really wish we could have had more time in this top city, lots of cool stuff going on, pretty cheap as far as sleeping, food and drink are concerned, and best of all: chilled the fuck out, a big change from some American metropolises. Of course, good times don't last forever and it was with much regret that we packed our shit (Brad was quickest) and headed towards the Big Apple.....New York.
Stay Tuned for the next episode of Tris's Blog! See the lads take on NY their way, and see why riding the subway will never be the same!!
Pictures to come soon people I promise!!!
Love to all,
-Tris
PS: Props to Raj for HER props to me!! Thanks Raj!!
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Kate
non-member comment
You never know!
Hey Tris Trying to cause in miami ...and south beach at that. Sorry about all ur stuff in DC ...and I thought all the criminals were in Africa! Keep us informed. Kate