Jul 21, 2008

I got up early and packed all the bags, tents and other items into the trunk, then put the rest in the back seat.

Then it was a short four and half hour drive to Virginia. Of course, after we got there we realized the campground I checked out kinda misrepresented their setup.. that explains the cheap rates. Anyway, we had to go find a new place to camp, leading us to the visitor center in Luray.

We found a good looking place on Skyline Drive and got a lunch recommendation as well. The staff at this restaurant is not well informed on their food, since they served Katie something with mayo in it even after she specified nothing with animal products. In any case, the veggie steak was awesome and Katie's food was free.

We drove up the mountain into the Shenandoah National Park and onto Skyline Drive.

The views were amazing. You could see mountains for miles.

We stopped a good number of the overlooks on the way to our camp.

We found a site that looked nice and posted our camping pass (with my named misspelled.)

We put up the tent and got our stuff inside and then set out to explore.

We went up to Black Rock to check out the sunset and were not let down.

The view was great and the sunset was really nice over the mountainous landscape.

We climbed back down after we got some pictures and started a fire so we could cook dinner. We made spicy eggplant and veggie burgers. After we ate, we sat around the fire until it went out, then went to get showers and came back to sleep.

Jul 20, 2008

After having such a good day yesterday on the course, I decided to go out again. Ryan came over to meet me. I didn't do as well as last time, but not bad.

The rest of the day consisted of me packing things up for departure tomorrow and then going to play poker at Jimmy's. I quickly doubled up on the second hand with a full house over Dave's trips and ended up cashing out later on up six bucks. Better than usual.

Jul 19, 2008

I spent the early time today looking up campsites for the week I have off.. even though I had last week off too. I called Ryan to see if he'd like to do something this weekend and we went swimming at his aunt's.

We played a few games of darts after swimming, then sat around and talked for a while.

I went to the disc golf course and played a round by myself trying to improve my game. I did well on most of the holes.

There wasn't much going on after this. I hung out at home and read for a while, then got together with Katie to talk about camping. I came home, wrote a little, read a little, then watched The Office and went to sleep.

Jul 18, 2008

It was set to be a big day and it started with a big movie. I picked up Chuck and met Steve and Katie at the movie theater to watch The Dark Knight. It didn't let me down at all! I thought it was a great, dark movie. There were few things I would have changed, but overall everything was amazing.

After the movie, the band retreated to Jeff's to practice a bit. We only practiced two songs and then had to get going. Once everyone found their way to the place, we came in and set up. Even though we were a little late, the PA wouldn't work and we had to wait another half hour for the sound guy.

We went out for a drink once we were set up. Cheers to not fucking up too bad!

After a couple shots of liquid courage we went back inside to wait.

The PA started working and we got into our set.

The crowd was typically still during our set of songs they didn't know.

I had a good time.

We talked Jeff into playing the cover of Don't Stop Believin' while we were on stage.

Chuck posed for all of his pictures while playing.

And Steve changed the ending of our last song on the spot. But we caught on and it went well. We got compliments from the crowd and other bands even though we didn't feel that we did our best.

We got through the show, so cue the victory shots.

..and then the rest of the bottle.

We had a little photo shoot in the parking lot after we played.

We got some good shots between the wrestling.

We went back in to view the rest of the bands, including: Streetcar, Where the Ocean Meets the Sky, Fire in the Eyes of the City, The Filthy 42s, The New Sabrosa and Wellsping and Honor. All the other bands were really good and I hope to see them/play with them again.
After the show ended I went to Katie's for a short time and had something to eat before going home to sleep.

Jul 17, 2008

I met up with Ryan this morning and we headed over to the course to fix the baskets. We had to dig out the holes again that had been filled in.

The one basket was already near the area but we had to drag the other one out of the ditch and up to where it belonged.

When we were done, the baskets were standing pretty sturdy and definitely playable. It wasn't too difficult, but it was nice to have the course fixed.

Ryan liked my idea of diving for discs and suggested we try again. I agreed and we ended up hitting it rich in discs! We found these eight near the first hole and two more by the last hole. We tried them out and split them evenly. Now we have way too many discs!

We've been wanting to try the game from the harder gold tees, so we played half the course from them. We actually did as well or better on some holes! We called up Chuck and Jeff to play a real game and made strawberry banana smoothies while we waited for them. They were really good after spending a long time out in the sun.

We had band practice fora few hours to get ready for our show tomorrow. I feel pretty good about it. Katie and I watched Batman Begins since we're going to see the new one tomorrow.

Tomorrow is going to be a busy day, sort of. So I'm going to get some sleep.

Jul 16, 2008

When I got up, I felt like running so I went over to Parvin's and took a lap around the lake.

Later, I picked up Nathan and Ryan to go play disc golf. There was another group ahead of us that brought their own portable baskets to replace the missing two. One of the old baskets was laying on the ground at hole fifteen. They told us someone threw them down the hill.

The moon looked really awesome coming up over the lake. This doesn't show it at all.

Poker happened later. Luke, Jimmy, Chuck, Jeff and I played for a few hours until it was down to three of us. I left with my money and Luke and Jimmy split the rest.

I am very tired now, but I'll watch Curb Your Enthusiasm before sleeping.

Jul 15, 2008

So, most of my day was spent in my house waiting to be e-mailed tickets for the show tonight and watching old episodes of The Office. I finally got the tickets and printed them out, which turned out to be a chore in itself. Then I tackled the problem of finding someone to go with. Luckily, Jordan was more than happy to come with me. When we got to Philly, I took her to get bubble tea and Katie was already there with her friend Kate! Interesting. We got our tea, then we met up on South Street and had dinner at Whole Foods.

Alkaline Trio started playing very early in the night, close to nine. They played a good, long set full of old and new tunes. It wasn't the best setlist, but they put on a fun show.

We got home before midnight. Katie and I took a walk on High Street and I got a cool shot from the riverfront walk.

We went to Jimmy's for a short time to talk about camping plans and played some Grand Theft Auto, then I came home.