Making friends with my cousin’s cat in Marietta, GA. She’s old but sweet – Kristen and Joey have three cats and two dogs who all came to greet us at the door in a sweet but large display of mass affection! 
Well – I’m glad to have my computer back.
Almost.
I don’t know exactly what happened – I was having trouble getting a wireless connection in New Orleans, restarted my computer and had the whole thing die on me. Refused to restart. Then discovered it’s not that it was REFUSING, just operating very, very, very slowly. At our friend Missy’s house I started the machine as I went to bed. Got up to find it’d gotten to the login screen. Typed my password (but nothing came up on the screen) and took a shower… after the shower the words had finally shown up. Right clicked on the Windows button, went and had breakfast… got back to find the contextual menu had finally popped up… etc.
Anywho – on the drive from New Orleans to Houston I ran the Windows disc check utility and just shy of the Texas line restarted and seemed to have everything back up and running – but slowly came to realize that none of my … not-completely-legal … applications were running. I’m assuming that some of the registry “errors” discovered by Disk Check were actually registry hacks made to make some of my software work. I tried reinstalling, but not even that functionality would work. I tried uninstalling the existing applications and THAT didn’t work either…
Finally in Houston I spent time backing everything up and reinstalled Windows and spent any downtime over the next two days getting the machine back up and running. There are still a couple of oddities: drivers are an issue – though Windows eventually figured out my laptop was a LAPTOP, installing the networking drivers without being able to access any networks was a bit of a trick. The trackpad is DEFINITELY being wonky and I’m sure I’ll run across plenty of other issues as I go along.
Still – I’m finally back up and running. By now I’m even pseudo-caught up with the thousand photographs and 500 emails that I’d accrued during that time. I know I’ve got a fancy phone to keep me from having to be tethered to this machine, but running your business of your phone simply isn’t as easy as running everything off an actual computer.
Give me a keyboard or give me death. For reals.
In any case – by now we’re in Austin, TX. We’re staying with our old friend Jen Hitt and played a Lovely show with her last night at a little coffeeshop called Irie Coffeebar. Unfortunately it was JUST cold enough that we had to move inside (not something I’d foreseen), but we had a good little (warm) audience crammed in to see us. Though most nights I’ve been viscerally missing Heather’s voice and djembe – tonight we literally wouldn’t have had space and the outdoor stage though beautiful would’ve hit 40 degrees by the time we kicked off and Jen was pretty sure we’d have lost our audience pretty swiftly.
Today has been spent wandering around town and being tourists. Mostly shopping in the South Congress area (SoCo). Kristen’s looking for boots. I’m ALWAYS looking for boots. We ended up getting tired of boots and finding a couple of books and sparkly art instead. You know how it is.
Austin’s a vastly different experience during SXSW – and I’m kind of grateful we’re not dealing with that level of intensity – but also fear I’m letting Kristen down a little bit. My memories of non-stop music and constant aural stimulation are a far-cry from the sleepy, slightly touristy town we’ve been wandering today.
Doing a quick search of the Journal I turn up “playing with Austin (Stahl)” here and there, and plenty of references to things being “exhAUSTINg”. A couple of mentions of Austin Healeys, Boston artists Austin & Elliot…. Meeting PorterDavis who are FROM Austin… going to Austin… playing Austin Grill… running out of CDs in 2007 till we were able to meet up with a box of copies of Fifth Circle in Austin…. Watching Battlestar Galactica before heading to Austin…
And then I find the entries about SXSW – Heather bleeding on her drum and George and Del grabbing a last minute hotel and joining us. Camping in Roswell, NM a couple of nights later… I’m really glad to be out this way again, but am horribly aware that after tonight we turn north and eventually back east as opposed to west and further into the desert. It’s such beautiful country in that direction and we’re just hitting the very edge of the southwest before shying away.
Cactuses only became prevelant in this last push towards Austin and I’ve yet to even see a DEAD armadillo. I’m enjoying this trip immensely, but in my heart I know we’re about to head the wrong direction.
Mission accomplished! Gator achieved! And then swiftly consumed! Oh so delicious – but Heather knew the RIGHT places and I’m sorry she’s not with us right now. The favourite restaurant of Missy’s roommate is more sportsbar than cool New Orleanian hang out – couple this with the fact that the local football team is on television being trounced by some team in Seattle AND Mardi Gras is getting into gear outside and our dinner WAS somewhat lacking in ambience.
Yeah, I guess the last time we were out here was 2008! That’s just painful! It’s very, very, very good to be back.
Gah. Just got caught up in staring back in time at my Journal. It’s easy to do I guess – even when you’re just looking at the pictures.
I’m stunned by how grey I am now. Getting older has not been kind to the colour of my hair and I’m beginning to understand why so many people comment on it when they’ve not seen me in a while. No matter – it happens. Going back through the pictures of the last time we were here or there or anywhere – it’s amazing to think about the miles we’ve covered – and it’s amazing to think of what a wonderful thing it is that we do.
On a night like tonight, sitting on a couch in Austin, TX it’s easy to think that my adventuring days are over… and then I remember I’m in Austin, TX.
On Jackson Square we quickly got shooed out of the way as a wedding party was released from the church accompanied by beautiful dresses and fiercely cheerful brass band music! At the far corner of Jackson Square, after we’d avoided getting run down by the wedding party, we encountered another big swarm of humanity.
Tonight we played an open mic at Flipnotics. It was suggested from a couple of different fronts and indeed, it definitely WAS the PLACE TO BE – in that it was the place that everyone was! Signup was awful – a literal scrum and shove of people pushing pens to paper. I ended up signing right-handed while keeping myself stable with my left hand, pen caught in a girl’s hair while someone else was trying to push my arm out of the way.
For a town that has often impressed me with its gentle nature, full of “howdies” and “y’alls” this was pretty unpleasant. I’m glad I happened to be in the right place at the right time. The host had wandered up outside while I’d stood up to stretch and slapped the list down while I happened to be standing there. I’m also glad I happened to have a pen in my pocket. The ingenious gentleman who had his name on a stamp who was able to just WHACK his signature down on the list caught my admiration right from the get-go (and turned out to have a pretty amazing voice to boot).
Sitting through the performers, a lot of good voices, a lot of covers – but a lot of good performers –and some good comedians too! And the host was fun, Muppety, good energy. I didn’t like the non-use of mics or the PA very much, I became hyper-aware of the fact that the cello would be the first instrument to be plugged in the whole night. For better or for worse, when it was our turn to play, I forgoed (forwent? Didn’t use) the PA myself and just played acoustic. I heard later that the balance wasn’t so hot and most of what the room heard was cello – but such is Life. The host walked out the moment we started playing which bruised my ego a bit, but the rest of the room was pretty enthusiastic.
Meh. Unfortunately my stomach started acting up pretty ferociously almost immediately after we’d played and we ended up leaving only a couple of slots after we’d played. (about two hours into the night) I felt rude, but was really, really glad to have a bathro… wait. What am I saying?!!? I don’t have stomach issues! I don’t even HAVE a stomach! Or an ANUS! At all times my body is a happy place for my soul and mind to inhabit! Never you MIND where I’m typing from right now!
Gosh I Love laptops.
On the drive through western Louisiana I practiced photographing circling birds with my 300mm lens. After doing this for a while out of a moving vehicle, I’m much LESS impressed with first person shooters. I bet I-10 West of New Orleans pre-Texas we drive through bayou all the way with the highway resting on pylons poking up out of the Louisiana swamps. The whole drive I spent checking in on my laptop watching the numbers of Diskcheck chewing through my hard drive. I kicked it off just as we were leaving New Orleans. It wrapped up and got the machine back up and running by the Texas line four + hours later – little did I know that that was just the BEGINNING of my problems! Still have NO idea what caused the initial crash. Eventually we FINALLY found ourselves over solid land again. Must mean Houston’s getting close!
