March 23rd, 2007.

Heather and Kree.
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Our new friend Laura introduces Heather and I to Kree, a beautiful female Swanson’s Hawk. Laura’s been working with Kree for several years, ever since she was electrocuted by a power line. The damage wasn’t enough to keep her from flying, or even from flying accurately, but apparently it’s enough to lend a slight curve to her flight. Over a thousand mile plus migration she would’ve been thrown dramatically off course, and so she’s deemed “unreleasable” and is used by Hawk Watch for educational purposes. (mostly for children and rockstars)

Oh my God we’re watching guys playing Trogdor on Guitar Hero 2. And singing along. I’m not sure if I want to die or not. But it’s pretty damned funny.

Burninate the countryside, bitch.

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Jenny leaves us to our fate temporarily. She’s cool.

Last night Heather and I just barely rolled in in time to the open mic at the Fiddler’s Dream Coffeehouse in Phoenix, Arizona. It’s one of the only completely acoustic venues we’ve ever played, and possibly the only completely acoustic open mic I’ve ever played. It’s very, very intimidating to play without amplification of any sort and there’s some songs we simply can’t play. We’re going to have to adjust our Saturday-night setlist accordingly in order to get by. Tonight we only had time for two songs and we played Illinois is Overflowing and Crazy As A Good Thing. After we played we got a LOT of warmth from the people running things and a lot of the audience members. Unfortunately we’re here on the same weekend as a local folk festival (which we didn’t know about) and we’ll just have to see how that effects turnout.

You’ve got to respect anyone who makes quilts out of their own jeans. I kept sleeping with my hands in a woman’s pockets, which is kind of hot. I’ve wanted to make a quilt out of all my old clothes for a while – the old t-shirts which are becoming more windows to my skin than coverings of my body, the boxers that are a little TOO freeing, the jeans that are more patches than patched… I thinmk this might be the inspiration I need to go ahead and learn how to make what is probably destined to be a very lumpy Frankentienian creation.

We tend to be particularly unlucky with such events… folk festivals in Phoenix, AZ – spring break in Albuquerque, NM, invariably some sporting event or another in New England… I’m hoping we don’t interrupt anything “important” in California like a televised celebrity wedding or Anna Nicole Smith’s funeral or anything…

When doing our usual diatribe on the non-existance of armadillos at the open mic at teh Blue Dragon in Albuquerque, NM – one of the other artists ran up and placed this bobble-headed beast before us. She screamed something about “Texas born and bred” before fading back into the darkness.

Tonight we played at Java Mama’s to a tiny but enthusiastic crowd. A number of people that I was hoping would show totally failed to, but we had Phil along which was a lot of fun. Phil was frequently our third drummer back in Maryland, and it’s been awesome to stay with him out here… and having the added percussion is a weird mix of growly-rock-joy and wistful home-sickness. i was suprised to learn that he hasn’t been playing out much recently, so I’m really happy we got a chance to get him out to stretch his arms a bit.

Good sound system, good stage – but I miss the Blue Dragon, and I miss the College Perk, and I just have really, really high standards for coffeehouses nowadays.

Back to Guitar Hero II. I used it to learn how to actually play Message in a Bottle, but other than that I’ve got to sit back and appreciate mad skillz being represented.

Justin, brush up on your riffs, cause I think Phil could kick your ass.

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Exiting Albuquerque, the scenery is beyond fantastic. This is the view from a gas station on the edge of town – snow caps in the distance and clouds struggling over the mountains.

upComing & inComing

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