During one of the recent shows, I Wikipedia’d Batavia, NY –our home town. I recommend to anyone who’s from a home town to Wikipedia it. You’ll learn more about where you live then you’d expect.
For example, I learned that there was a huge Masonic controversy in Batavia in the 1820’s. The jist: Someone talked shit publicly about the Masons and they killed him. The story the Masons told was ‘We didn’t kill him, we took him to a cabin and convinced him to leave town forever.” They were convicted of abduction, but not murder.
It’s true.
The source has already been sited.
See for your self.
I also read this:
The area was purchased in 1792 by the Holland Land Company, a consortium of Dutch bankers. The 3.5 million acre (14,000 km²) territory, purchased from Robert Morris, a prominent Revolutionary banker, was known as "The Holland Purchase."
Batavia, the name the Dutch gave the city is a poetic name for the Netherlands.
[this is the good part. Actually, it’s the worst part….fuck. fuckin’ crazy white Europeans from the 1700’s and their manipulation of the natives Americans. Fuck’em!]
One of the provisions of the sale was that Morris had to settle the Indian title to the land, so he arranged for his son Thomas Morris to negotiate with the Iroquois at Geneseo, New York in 1797. About 3,000 Iroquois, mostly Senecas, arrived for the negotiation. Seneca chief and orator Red Jacket was adamantly against the sale, but his influence was thwarted by freely distributed liquor and trinkets given to the women. In the end-
[anotherwords, once they were all drunk]
-he acquiesced and signed the Treaty of Big Tree, in which the tribe sold their rights to the land except for a small portion for $100,000. Mary Jemison, known as The White Woman of the Genesee, who had been captured in a raid and married her Seneca captor, proved to be an able negotiator for the tribe, and helped win more favorable terms for them.
[if you ever see me, ask me about Mary Jemison’s greatgreatgreatgrandkid]
alright. Enough with the cut and paste.
Currently: 12:24am april 29.
Driving: to Witchita, KS
ETA: 6am
Destination: Comfort Inn (with wireless for cripsakes)
Saves the Day Head West, Back East Tour, Part 1
Over. Done. Ciao bella!
Hmmm… old news, again. The West Coast is like a giant slip and slide. All the water is dumped on Seattle and it just runs screaming headfirst down the coast until it comes to a skidding stop in the sand. You and everything else around you –including time, haul wet ass down hill.
To recap: Since leaving the Jedi Training that was touring with Takumi in Seattle, things are so far, so… bipolar.
-and there’s that. The Bipolar Tour with Lorene Drive has begun. Both in terms of the shows ups and downs and the fact that it’s a co-headlining tour split smack down the middle.
We had a relaxing good ta meet ya first night in Roseville California on the 24th.
Before anything could begin any other way… we got to Bakersfield.
All I will say is that apparently water is very expensive in Bakersfield, CA.
Oh, and I almost got maced by the crazy shut in that lived right across the street from the venue. (by street I really mean a small dead end street that wrapped around the back of The Dome [actually a dome] the venue we were at in Bakersfield)
My guard went up early on that night when we parked in front of his house. He had posted two NO PARKING signs on his property. One on his gate to his front door, another at the end of his yard, the latter one had a huge two way arrow implying that this guy’s spot will most likely be guarded at all costs.
Picture now the van and trailer, taking up three car lengths in front of his completely fenced in house. The house is in a location where no matter what you do, the muffled audio muck that is the sound of live music through walls from across the street is inescapable. Hearing that night after night after night… it’s enough to drive crazy people insane.
It was towards the end of the night when all of this happened. I was taking my camera bag back to the van. Ryan was sitting on the curb a few feet away talking on the phone. Pete was inside the van, also on the phone. As I walked to the van, the guy’s dog was barking –nothing out of the ordinary about it.
Just a dog.
Barking.
I open up the van, throw my camera bag on the seat and say something quick to Pete. The guy’s dog has stopped barking. There’s a pause as everything beings to slow down. Pete laughs in reaction to whatever is being said on the phone and agrees with whomever he’s talking to. I hear “hey” gruffly from the yard behind me… everything continues to slow down… something’s about to happen. I stay slow and attentive, waiting. Pete’s on the phone so he’s only half there. He hasn’t heard anything. “Hey, you…” I hear the sishsishsish of feet walking through the lawn. “Hey man. Hey, where’s my dog at?” I turn. What? “My dog, where’s my dog man?” I have no idea where he is. “This your van? What are you doing over here –where’s my dog?” Again, comely I speak… I have no idea where he is. “You wanna fuck with me?” His right hand is in his pocket. “Where’s my dog man?” I don’t know man –I have no idea where he is. His right hand comes out of the pocket holding something. “You fuckin’ with me man?” I see something shine between his fingers. He steps closer to the chain-link fence separating us. His eyes flicker up to me and back down to his hand. I can tell he’s thinking over whether or not to follow his anger forward. I have since planned out my possible path of dodge/escape/attack, but I wouldn’t know this until afterwards. It’s not a knife in his hand, I know that much. He wouldn’t bring a knife to a fence and stand that far away from me. I stare at his hand. What ever is in his hand is small, a cylinder, and silver. From the possible weapon, my eyes flick to the edge of the reach of the streetlamp. His dog comes trotting out of the darkness. He’s right behind you! “Don’t fuck with me.” He doesn’t believe me. Look. He’s right there. The dog walks across the tops of the guy’s feet. “You fuckin-“ He looks down. Immediately he snaps out of it and beings to talk rapidly. “Oh my, oh man I’m sorry. Oh man, ya know I had to lock’em up. Oh man, I’m sorry.” He put the can of mace –or gun, back into his pocket and placed his hand on top of the fence. “He’s my guy ya know –I gotta lock him up, he must have hid on me.” To the dog; “where’d you go buddy?” Naw man, it’s cool. (Is it?) I understand. (Do I?) Why am I saying these things to him? He extends his hand out. We shake. “I’m really really sorry man.” He picks up his dog and walks out of my life.
That dog will never understand what he stopped. He doesn’t have to either. He was a little wiener dog. One like I’d get.
I told this story later on that night to the rest of the guys. “Wait, what? What guy?” Ryan asks, “That guy with the dog?” Yeah. “He came up to me and started talking to me –I had no idea what he was talking about. He asked me if I was with the guys in the van. I said no just cos I didn’t know what the fuck he was talking about. Well first he asked me for a cigarette but then he said ‘there was a guy over at that van –I thought he put my dog in there. Then I realized he was talking about our van and I said, ‘there’s no dog in that van that’s my van.’ ‘Oh,’ he says ‘well, that guy over there opened up the doors and then closed them slow like. I hope I didn’t freak him out’.”
Currently: 2:14am
Driving: Just over the Oklahoma border north of Texas.
I’m still working on getting Cellphone Chronicles Vol. 6 posted.
Plus there’s more video to be posted.
A lot more.
It is now the next night, Saturday the 29th. We’re at our hotel outside of Witchita, KS watching the South Park movie on the secret stash on Comedy Central. Cartman just finished “Kyle’s Mom’s a Big Fat Bitch”. I just finished a Guinness.
I plan on switching to Pete’s laptop soon so I can upload a few more videos tonight. Stay tuned, etc.
