Bas Rutten Self-Defense and Meeting

This is Bas Rutten's self defense video. He is a very decorated mixed martial artist and now a respected commentator. He has some good points here. He is also a psychopath.
On another note, I talked to Britt Daniel from Spoon at Club DeVille. Now, I'm not talking a soul bonding, but we chatted for a second. He seems like a decent guy. I was wearing a blue suit, though. Who wouldn't want to talk to someone with enough balls to through on one of those in January. Thank God this is not New York, I would have been egged to death, right there. Enjoy, friends.

Some of my favorite quotes:

"I slit your throat"
"Everybody underestimates the kick in the groin"
"Right away you say I'm sorry....No I'm not."

Really kids, this is kind of joke, but there are some great tips here. Mainly the head butt and groin strike. Those two.

Reach Music Festival

We played the Reach Music festival last Saturday. It was the first show we'd played in a long time. Probably two or three weeks, at least. As usual, it was balls cold and windy and no alcohol was provided on location. They did have some great looking funnel cakes but I only had three tickets so I decided to use those on a chicken sandwich.
Brett and I decided to make a trip to the local liquor store. I initially proposed we get tequila, which was debated back and forth. I even doubted myself. In the end, that was the choice. Tequila and lime juice. We took drags of that in the car before the show.

When I stepped out of the vehicle, it was not so cold anymore. My throat felt like the chimney of a low, glowing fire down in the pit of my stomach, gently warming everything. I had to change into my suit, we were in a hurry. Even as I undressed down to the whities in the howling wind I was not chilled.

On stage, my fingers were cold. The guitar was thrown horribly out of tune. So were Travis's drum heads. When we started, no one was there. Then I realized a lot of people had arrived. Probably 30 or 40. I mean, it was fucking cold for them. They hadn't exercised the foresight; they hadn't consumed any blue agave that night.

After the show, they listened to me attentively and were much nicer than normal people. These kids displayed neither visible pretension nor any unreasonable preoccupation with the ironic. It wasn't all about doing what was ironic with these kids. They just listened to what they wanted to and enjoyed what made them and dance and endured a lot of cold weather to do it. Good people. I'd really like to seal off and exterminate Beauty Bar on a Sat. night, then airlift the reach kids over there. That would give that place some courage, some guts!

Thursday, 15th

This morning I awoke at 8:10. Outside my window there was a little bird. It's sounds woke me up. I then went back to sleep.

For breakfast I had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, two slices of pineapple, and Yoplait yogurt, harvest peach flavor. I watched the first two rounds of the Georges St. Pierre vs. Jon Fitch title fight of 2008. Interesting.

I've put the monkey story on the back burner and am now trying to finish something I started in freshman year. It's something I wrote with the passion of an admirer from afar. A little overdone then. Now I'm reeling it back in, it should be good.

Day to Day Things

I was just about to say the same thing. I am saying the same thing. Nothing beats Brett and I screwing around after practice, inadvertently tapping into the divine, coming up with the money chorus. I was getting really worried. We had no chorus. Now we do. We have one, big time. A great weight is lifted from my shoulders. 

But still I wonder. How are we going to top this song? We always do. And I know I'll always pull my hair out over it. I actually have that disorder. I think it's fun.

Jesus "El Matador" Chavez was sparring today. I go to a boxing gym. Trav and I both do. We feel pretty fat and white most of the time, but we're getting better. And we're not like the other fat whites because we have athletic backgrounds - both AMAZING wrestlers. Haha. No, actually we were both pretty good. 

I've been coquettishly avoiding verbal and visual contact with the former world champ. I am not worthy. But he was sparring today with some other pros. I was hitting the focus bag (little inflated ball attached to floor and ceiling with elastic bands) and I felt something strike my back. I turned around. Nothing was there. Something struck my left shoulder. I whirled, again finding empty space. Finally, I received a knock to the head. I decided to turn and walk five feet away at the same time, to get a wider perspective. It was Jesus. I felt about the same as when my high school crush finally talked to me. 

He said I was treating the bag like my girlfriend and that I should not give it such an easy time. He demonstrated accordingly. I tried again and noticed the lesson had improved my abilities. I thanked the Matador. 

I'm still sweating out a year of hard drinking and burritos. 

The old routine still tries to lull me back. I will walk right back in again, someday - and gladly. I'll need to rest. Right now I'm resting from that. 

The legend of the new songs.

Proud to report that major progress was made on both new songs today. I'd say they are 70-80% done- with most of the remaining work stylistic rather than structural. Galactic has some amazing ideas for the words and I had a major breakthrough with the progression on a song that Galactic is calling, "Bu****g Pa***s (top secret). I'm sure we'll be playing both at our upcoming Austin super-show.

More as it develops.

- b