Show 101-103: Buffalo Infringement Festival

The first theatre festival we performed where we didn't lose hundreds of dollars!!

After 3 weeks of touring to the west coast and back we dropped Peter off in Milwaukee (or he dropped us off at our car, actually) and headed to Buffalo for three days of DIY theatre goodness.

First, we stopped at my mom's house where I made the grave error of jumping in a nearby lake, invoking a terrible allergic reaction, which incapacitated me for most of the 10 hour drive to Buffalo, and made our first performance that evening a little more strange than usual. Performing actually very much improved my condition, though. Apparently rolling around in a hot little room and screaming with your head in a bag and a gag in your mouth cures congestion!

Second, we played three shows, and saw a bunch of others. The others were a pretty mixed bag, some well intentioned but failed efforts, the most proficient puppetry I've seen, and some Brecht done really Brechtian (which turned out quite disatisfying, actually).

Third, we got to hang out in Buffalo and discover more of the wonders this city has to offer. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: the rust belt is where the fucking rev will start. Or at least the total social collapse part of it.

Blow by blow, show by show:

I. Friday July 30th, Rust Belt Books

TURNOUT: 10

MONEYS: $30.50

INJURIES: Rust Belt's french press didn't make it. Sorry.

STORIES: We got to Buffalo in time to hang up a few flyers, watch a beautiful puppet show, and beg passersby to come watch our show. A few did, and it was good.

The performance was a little hectic and distracted, there were windchimes on the door, and we had a fairly tight performance time schedule, also, Kate bumped into a wall with a french press on a table on the other side, the bump was enough to cause it to leap onto the floor and smash itself. Hurns.

In a recurring problem that makes we wish we'd signed up for an hour-and-a-half time slot rather than an hour, we had to get packed up and out of there before we were able to have any kind of discussion with the audience. I'm beginning to think these discussions are a necessity for the kind of theatre we're doing. Otherwise it feels like presenting our honest, complex inability to live under empire or confidently attack empire might be kind of pointlessly bewildering.

II. Saturday July 31st, Sugar City

TURNOUT: 7

MONEYS: $27.71

INJURIES: Unscathed!

STORIES: We rolled into Sugar City as awards were being given out for some kind of social media scavenger hunt, which honestly looked far less fun than a traditional scavenger hunt. Sorry guys, social media is a fucking tragedy. (yes, i realize this is a blog, and i am thus a hypocrite, but I am part of this fucking tragedy.)

Anyway, we performed for a small, but i think, appreciative audience, including some middle aged, middle class, generally middle-oriented folks who voiced discomfort with our performance.

Then we stuck around to watch "You Know This Girl" which we've been curious about since seeing posters for it at the bunk house in Cincinnati. Another DIY theatre tour! Her one woman show about "the depths of shallowness" depressed the hell out of me and pissed Kate off. I suspect Fallon has good intentions, and is clearly committed to her role, but the piece misses the mark. Humiliating clueless women who live for the shallow approval of others is (as comedy) like shooting fish in a barrel or (as social commentary) like treating a rash with poison ivy.

III. Sunday August 1st, Broadway Market Rooftop.

TURNOUT: variable 4-10, including two cops.

MONEYS: $28

INJURIES: temporary staring-into-the-sun eye strain

STORIES: Now we can say we've performed on a roof-top on a cloudless summer day at high noon! I just need to figure out if being able to make that claim is worth the unpleasantness of actually doing the act.

Also, the place was crawling with cops, one of whom we notified of what we were doing before performing, which was fortunate, cuz he later told us his partner's first reaction upon witnessing our play was to reach for his gun.

Also, there was a drum circle and a rap group elsewhere on the roof during our performance. This rooftop happens to be in the middle of an african american neighborhood, and both these African-rooted music genres happened to be performed by white dudes. Assumptions of cultural appropriation aside, they were both pretty loud and I'm sure made it hard to hear us.

In spite of these things, a few people managed to stick around and seemed to get something out of the show.

Then we went to see a story teller, the Conspiracy Tour, and Subversive Theatre's production of "The Mother". I really wish the producers of The Mother had gone to the Conspiracy Tour, cuz maybe then they woulda recognized how dated the play is and how badly Brecht himself would surely want it revised so that it's deconstruction of The Mother's naive assumptions wouldn't be overshadowed by obsolete ideas of mass workers movements and state communism. It's very strange hearing Brecht's celebration of communist leaflets being recited by folks who don't seem to have read any leaflets written in the last 5-10 years.

Did you see this show? If you did, write a review, ask us some questions or comment on it. We'd love to hear it becuase we believe in artistic transparency.

Show 73: NYC @ ABC No Rio

Turnout: 20

Monetary Votes of Support: 69.92

Personal Injury Report: none mentionable

Show Descriptions: So we drove 10 hours there, played the show and then drove 10 hours back. It is confirmed: We prefer to present ourselves straightforwardly and say what we mean bluntly, and it works, well.

Did you see this show? If you did, write a review, ask us some questions or comment. We'd love to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.

Show 72: Philadelphia, The Rotunda

We continually fail at getting people to come out to shows in Philly. Hurns.

This is a pic of a burnt and abandoned house's stairway in Youngstown PA. A house that ours in Philly is now aspiring to.

Turnout: 7

Monetary Votes of Support: 48

Personal Injury Report: If you count hopes as personal...

Show Description: The Rotunda was a big old space to perform in. Nice lighting and high, high ceilings. Unfortunately, when we got to Philly a day earlier, we'd seen that pretty much all of the posters we'd put up 2 weeks earlier were down and therefore, along with other things, like us being strange, not music, political, and not local, not many people came out. Disappointment. Oh well. The show went well nonetheless and it was good to have done. I don't really have anything else to say besides breathing a sigh of reality.

Off to Columbus!!

Did you see this show? If you did, write a review, ask us some questions or comment on it. We'd love to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.

show 66: Buffalo, NY Rust Belt Books

Turnout: 11

Money: $24 (our cut)

Personal Injury Report: Reverse! My back was really sore before the show, and felt great afterward. Maybe I'll create a new form of tie-yourself-to-a-chair yoga!

Show Report: Rust Belt Books is an awesome huge bookstore, full of old rare and radical stuff. They've got a beautiful little intimate space in the back for performances. It's really nice playing the show in small spaces with focused lights (and focused audience) every once in a while (most actors don't know how spoiled they are).

I think the performance went really well. I messed up the communication with Rust Belt, and let them think we were coming Friday, when we were actually there Saturday. Fortunately, they let us perform anyway, and the turnout somehow didn't totally suck in spite of the confusion. A decent discussion with enthusiastic young people (one of whom was doing a report for his theatre class).

We went to Nobody's for a concert afterward, but didn't feel much like shaking our booties. Ended up sucking the mop late into the night. Which I guess is unavoidable every once in a while in this line of work.

Did you see this show? If you did write a review, ask us some questions or comment on it. We'd love to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.

Show 65: Jamestown, Labyrinth Press Company

Turnout: A whole bunch, 35 ish

Monetary Votes of Support: 68 (40 hat, 28 merch)

Personal Injury Report: Unscathed!

Show Description: Labrynth Press is a kick-ass locally owned coffee shop and show space. Playing there was a great time, lots of people turned out, young and old, which was a very welcome sight. The whole space seemed to bustle during the show, people were pretty lively. It kind of almost threw me off a little--in a good way.

I believe we freaked out some people who saw us as they were walking by; that's always awkward. Also, my apologies to the guy who's coffee Ben jostled upon his entrance.

Did you see this show? If you did, write a review, ask us some questions or comment. We'd love to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.

Show 63: Philadelphia, Wooden Shoe

Turnout: 7

Monetary Votes of Support: 42 (32 door, 10 merch)

Personal Injury Report: Unscathed!

Show Description: Snowstorm everywhere! This made for exciting driving and a very intimate show for those who came out to the Wooden Shoe. The discussion afterward was lively and, much like the experience of driving in the city, it swerved about often. I really liked this performance, one of the better on my list of already solidly performed shows.

Did you see this show? If you did, write a review, ask us some questions or comment on it. We'd love to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.

Here are two small pictures...

Show 42 & 43: Chapel Hill, NC @ Nightlight

Turnout: 12 for the first show, 18 for the second.

Monetary Votes of Support: 51 and $40.16

Personal Injury Report: No injuries first night. Ben got shot dead with a banana on the second night.

Show Description: Most challenging discussions ever! Between the post show discussions and the Internationalist Books meeting, I can't really think of much to say much about our actual performances. People here are have been super critical and yet openly talkative, a really exciting combination. It's fucking GREAT! I hope we didn't fumble or put our foot in our mouths too often, cuz people definitely objected to what we're trying to do in some interesting and unanticipated ways, and I'm not sure we were always as articulate or clear as we'd like to be.

We were a little concerned coming into this weekend. Performing in a bar, twice in a city we've never played before is a risky endeavor, but thanks to the folks at Internationalist Books, Dan Mac (whose songs are awesome, rowdy and hilarious), Alexis at Nightlight, and Ickibod from The Mysterious Rabbit Puppet Army, the risks paid off and we had a two great shows. We also got to volunteer for a little while with Prison Books.

Also of note! Three masked vigilantes armed with a banana interrupted the end of the second show. I improvised playing dead (poorly, while laughing) and they left this message: "We killed capitalism. What?! That shit was tied up and ready to go. The 'global economy' is not 'all the oppressors and their victims' it's the flows of capital around the globe, the conversion of living into dead; it is not the workers, but the coercion of work. So now it's dead. Good fucking riddance. For once, violence went up the hierarchy, and it felt good. Can we really kill capitalism with one blow? No. Could theatre serve to inspire social conflict and courage? We hope so. [heart] the bonobo gang

We hope so too. In fact, we hope it can inspire a useful and successful social conflict.

Did you see this show? If you did, write a review, comment on it or ask some questions. We'd love to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.

Show 40: Charlottesville, VA, This Little Bird Studio

Turnout: 10/20
Monetary Votes of Support: $21 Merch: $2
Personal Injury Report: Nothing!

Show Description: Play play play. Part of what we're pursuing on our adventures is experiments in alternative, non-capitalist forms of life. Sometimes such experiments can take the shape of emphatically non-productive activities, also known as playing. Our show in Charlottesville, coincidentally near our always enthusiastic and gracious host Cindy Leal's birthday, allowed us to position our production of Ulysses' Crewmen in the middle of a wonderful playtime session. The first hour of the show was audience participation, improvised music, experimental video, contact dancing and various hoops, tubes, noodles, and other soft objects to play with. Then we
performed. Then people played some more.

It wasn't for everyone (some people who, I imagine planned on being only spectators left during playtime) but the openness and joyful energies of playing definitely informed and contrasted with our nasty oppressive play about the strife of living in capitalist society very well, making this a unique and exciting experience for us, and hopefully everyone else there.

We hope to have more pictures and maybe video from this show soon.

Did you see this show? If you did, ask us some questions, write a review or comment. We'd love to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.

Nature Day!

Well, last nature day was eclipsed by Philadelphia. We spent it making copies of our merch, flyering and getting a parking ticket. 36 Bucks. Hurns. This Nature Day was better. We got to tour Twin Oaks, an Intentional Community in Virginia near Charlottesville.

They've been around since the 70's. 85 adults and 15 kids live there. The tour was quite informative and I have a lot to say about it but don't really know where to start. So, right now, I won't. That's all for now.

Show 39: Baltimore, MD at 2640 The Church

Turnout: 18

Our Cut (3/4) Door: 71

Personal Injury Report: Hmm, Kate rescued herself from having to act the whole show with her contact slowly and sneakily making its way into the depths of her eye. Also, she made sure the second gun hit looked and sounded really good by really doing it.

Show Description: This show went very, very well. The best part though, was the discussion afterwards. People talking about what brought them out that night and what they took away from the play led to some great discussion covering points on violence and non-violence, what violence itself entails, and the scope and consequences of our, here in america, ideas and recommendations regarding the sort of society we'd like to live in.

Ryan Harvey also played music before and after the show. I actually still have one of the songs stuck in my head as I write this. Man, it's great playing with him, besides similar political themes he also just has the same sort of relationship with the audience that we try to have-- close, honest and straightforward. It's really refreshing to play with music like that.

Did you see this show? If you did, write a review, ask us some questions or comment on it. We'd love to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.

Show Report 38: Brooklyn, 13 Thames

Turnout: about 20 watched the whole thing.

Money: $30 door, $3.10 donations.

Personal Injury Report: We sat directly in front of SETH's fog machine, which was used somewhat excessively given the small space, our eyes were still itchy the next morning.

Show Description: Our first multi-media performance of the play! One of the 13 Thames guys hooked up a camera and video projection of us on the wall and ceiling. I guess the show was also being live-streamed online somewhere.

13 Thames is a great warehouse space in Bushwick, dingy punk squat atmosphere, radical slogans and vulgar graffitti all over the walls, bands in back and in the kitchen, a black dog named Blue and an orange cat that seems to like noise music. In addition to the projector the only other light was a weird blue cliplight that gave the show a nice subterranian feel. This was especially nice after performing in flat even bookstore lights the night before. I remain committed to performing under available lighting, but when the available lighting is cool it makes me waver in this commitment and think about bringing along a gelled cliplight or two.

Our performance felt so much better than the first night. Nearly flawless, which is pretty astonishing on Kate's part, given the circumstances. This was a noise show and we played first. Our expectations for audience committment at noise shows have been set pretty low. I'm not complaining, just stating a fact. People come out to these shows expecting a party with occasional bouts of blasting feedback, not an hour long, unamplified theatre performance. If our presentation of the totally unexpected can capture the full attention of half the people there for the duration of the show, we consider it successful, and this one definitely was. The astonishing part is we set up in the middle of the space, which meant people coming and going would need to walk across our tiny "stage" to go in and out, which they did, frequently. Again, I'm not complaining, just pointing out that Kate performed without missing a beat as people brushed past her to go chat in the kitchen. This is, in itself pretty impressive.

The 20 or so people who stuck around for the duration seemed to really enjoy it, and we had a couple great informed conversations with people afterwards*. One advantage of playing noise shows is seeing the bands, which were excellent last night. Opponents and Towering Heroic Dudes were personal favorites, but Kate and I enjoyed at least parts of everyone's sets. Coulda done with less fog machine though.

Did you see this show? If you did, please comment here. Write a review, share your thoughts, ask questions, we'd love to hear from you because we believe in artistic transparency.

*One of these conversations, about school occupations and thirdworldism was with someone we failed to get contact info from, and wish we had, so please, drop us a line here or at insurgent.ben@gmail.com or 414 305 9832. Keep in touch. (This invitation of course also applies to anyone who wants to contact us for any reason)

Show Report 37: Bluestockings, New York

Turnout: 35

Monetary Votes of Support: $43.45 (Bluestockings passed a hat for themselves as well)

Personal Injury Report: None for us. There was a very attentive and excited 7 year old who might have gotten nightmares.

Show Description: Great turnout at the wonderful Bluestockings bookstore. Excellent people, great selection of books, very friendly atmosphere, attentive audience, some of whom just happened in off the street.

We're really relieved to have the first show of tour out of the way, especially considering the number of stupid technical problems we had. No dropped lines or anything that ruined stuff, but we forgot the hood in our dryer back in Philly (had to use a lucky back-up, which was too loose and fell off easily) we lost one of the ropes mid-performance and forgot to hand out the programs (which probably makes the land of the dead part even more confusing).

Funny story: so Bluestockings is in the middle of Manhattan, and Kate used the front door as the exit. Which means twice she walked out onto Allen St with a realistic looking holstered handgun, startling passersby, who she just smiled at until they either felt comfortable, or walked the other way, wide eyed.

We were really nervous and uncomfortable and kind of botched the transition from play to discussion, which is really too bad. We had a couple good individual conversations, but I look forward to infoshop and bookstore shows as opportunities to have real group discussions. Plus, I guess Trey recognized Howard Zinn in the audience.

Did you see this show? If you did, please comment here. Write a review, share your thoughts, ask questions, we'd love to hear from you because we beleive in artistic transparency.

Show 30: Charlottesville

We forgot the camera again. Here's a picture i found of Cindy (our host) online. At least I think that's her.

Turnout: 60

Door: 158 Hat: 34 our take: 122

Personal Injury Report: Ben strained his lower lip. The gag slipped out at the beginning of the show and he spent a good long time trying to half-swallow the dirty sock and repress the gag-impulse in order to get his tongue and teeth around the strap and get things back in place hands-free. This resulted in a very unusual work-out for the lower lip, thus the strain. Yes, it's a whole different, very strange world under that hood folks.

Show Description: Fucking amazing way to start off the second tour! Great turn out, really wonderful local performers, a good show on our part. I am in awe. The run down:

Great Dads is the noise side project of a guy named Adam Smith, who is also the front man of local band called "The Invisible Hand" (i love this!). Great Dads kicks ass. Super interesting looped keyboard drone action, very unique vocals, expert echo-machine manipulation, and beats that don't compromise the noise. Really really really good shit.

Cindy and some other dancers did a series of great improvised, contact-based dance pieces. Seriously talented and intense performances. Makes me want to spend 20 hours a week just practicing in order to have some fraction of the body and spacial awareness these people displayed.

Another great short dance piece from a guy whose name i didn't get, and Ali Cheff's intense and beautiful butoh-esque piece finished the first half of the show. I'm glad there was a break because I'd be nervous following directly after these great performances.

Then we set up and went through what felt like a great performance of the play. In spite of not having done the show for two weeks and only doing one short pick up rehearsal, i feel like we were totally on. Kate skipped one small chunk (the second examination) but that only cuts out a little bit of absurdist mood setting, doesn't miss anything major. The audience seems to have LOVED it, some good conversations with people afterward.

Great happy feelings all night. Looking forward to the rest of this week. Almost a little uncomfortable with feeling this happy about good performances of such a depressing, desperate and sober play. Fuck it, there's got to be some room for celebrating our alternative.

Did you see this show? If you did, write a review, comment, or ask us some questions. We'd like to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.

Show 17: Buffalo, NY

Turnout: 27 ish

Our Cut of Door Donation: 40.60, Merch: 20

Personal Injury Report: Our bodies and minds remained intact.

Show Description: Nobody's turned out to be a great show despite various, what should we call them... screwinesses?

Everybody seemed to be in a great mood, we definitely were; things were giddy and Buffalo is a surprisingly enjoyable city. It seems oldish, or maybe just small in that there are two main streets populated by a surprising mix of businesses one wouldn't expect to see next to each other.

For example, Nobody's, an anarchist punk space, is in a house on the corner of one of the main streets that also sports an "I have muscles and wish I had the nerve to pop my collar like those guys I see in GQ do; oh well, that new hair gel I got does pop me up a notch style-wise, I suppose that makes up for it," kind of restaurant.

It's like a family reunion where you can find your biker aunt sitting next to your business school cousin who's explaining collateralized debt obligations to your punk nephew's harmonica playing girlfriend.

On that same street there is also a great European Cafe, a convenience store largely labeled "WE NEVER CLOSE" along with various boutiques, overnight printing shops and tattoo parlors all located inside old Victorian houses. Not to mention, on the other main street, there are goth bars merging with well lit modern minimalist cocktail places that always freak me out, next to worn wood New Orleans style whiskey parlors.

Nice.

Anyway, the screwiness mentioned earlier can be divided into two categories, one being, good screwinesses and two, bad screwinesses. The bad of the two was that the radio decided to sound like a recording of an already talkative hamster now on coke. This threw things off a bit as one might expect. This is a good reason not to own a hamster, always brining things closer to disaster, bastards.

So, in lieu of not having a working recording on the radio, I attempted to tune in actual static instead. And as the part about the character's Mother in the Land of the Dead begins, Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody picks up on the radio, perfect timing, singing in exact harmony with where the play is going, "Mamma, I've just killed a man..."

This was amazing. And awkward. It kind of made us look like haphazardly bad magicians, and threw me off performance-wise.

The good screwinesses were that people were much more enthusiastic than usual. Everyone hated Ben, quite a bit, and did so obviously. They actually rooted, loudly, for his demise. Also, people participated eagerly in the parts where there were suggestions to. Ah, goodness.

There was some great discussion afterwards too with everyone.

Did you see this show? If you did, comment on it, write a review, or ask us some questions. We'd like to hear it because we believe in artistic artistic transparency.

Show 16: Providence, RI

Turnout: 10

Monetary Votes of Support: 35, Merch: 6

Personal Injury Report: Unscathed.

Show Description: Providence!

We got a lesser dose of what we were dealt last time in this artsy city. Although there were no coon skin caps or tin foil patched clothing, the ironic art school style and attitude prevailed.

People sat in the bar. The guy we were kindly offered to stay with didn't see the play.

There was a man there filming it for, at first what was described as an Anti-war documentary, but then, after a bit more detail was an anti-war documentary, with zombies.

There were two great guys from Salt Lake City who saw the play and found it interesting. I liked talking to them.

There was also one woman who got in a sort of mild humorous argument with Kate that started out with her talking about her MFA and deconstructionism lectures and then evolved into her telling another MFA (who was running the door) to "suck it" when she mentioned another perspective on deconstructionism.

Suck it indeed.

Did you see this show? If you did, comment on it, write a review, or ask us some questions. We'd like to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency. And sucking it.

Show 15: Storrs, MA

Turnout: 80

Door Donation: 61, Merch: 55

Personal Injury Report: Ben's jacket split right up the middle.

Show Description: Tom from Blunt Objects did a great job of promoting this show.

Before we started there was a puppetry version of Antonin Artaud's Spurt of Blood, a poetry reading, folk punk, and a puppet piece from Tom himself.

We were pretty excited about this show and it turned out very well. Just having that number of people in the room gives more energy to the performance. Though, there were a couple noteworthy things we learned set-up wise. One, being that with that number of people, it matters even more where you're sitting. The farther back the worse for sight and audibility. Next time we'll have people scoot in closer.

That night there was conversation over clay work and Food Network, and the next day Mandy interviewed both of us for the college radio station, which was enjoyable.

Did you see this show? Comment on it, write a review, or ask us some questions. We'd like to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.

Show 14: Boston MA

Whoo Hoo!

We don't have a picture of this show. But, we do have this, a record of last year.

The red paint from Paint the Town is still on the floor in Egan's basement, turning a bit pink.

I wish we had taken a picture of the show, cuz it kicked ass! Here's Egans design:

Turnout: 30

Donation at Door: 108, Our cut: 68

Personal Injury Report: The REVERSAL of injury. This show was injuryless in all facets! Opposite! Opposite! Opposite!

Show Description: We played at the Zeitgeist Outpost, a gallery space that Egan rented for the show. Best show yet.

Diagram A, Xiphoid Dementia, Zerfallt, and Bitchneck played some great fucking noise sets. Man! I miss this stuff. We haven't been playing with too many bands so far this tour, and no noise acts up until this point. And ah! I can't say how much I like performing with these people.

The show went great, it felt fresh like the first times we did it, and the audience was marvelous.

What more can you ask for.

Rick from Nonsense Co. also came out to see the show, which added another layer of surprised excellence to an already excellent night.

This show made up for all the earlier hellishness of driving around Boston for three hours trying to find free internet. Ben mentioned this in the Vehicle Report and so anyone who read that can now consider at least that point moot.

Did you see this show? If you did, comment on it, write a review, or ask us some questions here. We'd like to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.

Show 13: New Paltz NY

We did not play at the Gilded Otter.

We did play at 60 Main.

Turnout: 20ish

Cut of the Door: $42, Merch: 20

Personal Injury Report: Ben's immune system

Show Description: Played at a coffee shop on the main drag of New Paltz. It was kind of strange to begin with, but then got better.

We'd expected or hoped that New Paltz would be kind of like Bisbee AZ, an out of the way small hippieish town, but, not so. The ratio of locals to tourists weighed even more heavily than Bisbee's on the cuff of the slick-back-haired vacationing businessman's sleeve.

The people who saw the show though were great and we had some good conversations afterward.

Again, for the second time! no one noticed the gun when Kate left through the front door and walked straight out into the street. One of these times she's gonna get tackled.

On the other hand, people did notice when we brought the merch box outside to load back into the car. One guy who'd missed the gun spotted it immediately and excitedly informed us that we could grow pot in it if we drilled some holes in the bottom, and (after some wittiness) that if we didn't want to grow pot in it, then we didn't want to make money. So be it. Our fate is sealed. Fuck.

Anyway, with some time to kill, and New Paltz offering so many opportunities to victorize things, we did just that. Here are some of the results:

We have a towering grandiose waterfall, large french fries along with proof that we were competing with Green Day, (they're listed on the white board), and Express Yourself Tattoo, (my favorite), all victorized, all much better for it.

Did you see this show? If you did, comment, write a review, or ask us some questions. We'd like to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.

Vehicle Report #2

You know how racehorses are named with phrases, things like "Hot Little Number" or "Sail on Sunshine"? I've decided to name the Volvo the same way, it's name is now "My Life Savings". We'll call it "Mary" for short.

Mary is getting around 25 mpg. Her odometer read 111633 Saturday morning. Her check engine light came back on shortly after the last repairs, but has mysteriously turned off. The funny melted plastic smell at start up, the loud exhaust and the strange whining sound when we accelerate are still with us.

The AC/DC adapter we bought for $55 at a RadioShack south of Chicago fell apart and then melted when I put it back together (apparently incorectly). So we are now without means to charge laptops on the road, which means we're singing the choruses of songs and mumbling the verses to pass the time on the road. We looked into a replacement radio, but the slot isn't compatible with most car stereos and all car stereos are over $100 because they play CDs, even though what we (and anyone with an Ipod) needs is just a radio receiver, ideally with a headphone jack input. These would likely sell well, but you can't justify charging more than $25 for them, so nobody is manufacturing them. Our goal is to find a thrift store and buy an ill-fitting cheap stereo and get the adapter/connectors for it from radio shack.

We've slept in Mary 3 times, including last night. Sandwich tally: Kate 4, Ben 3. Jars of salsa consumed: 4. The windsheild wipers stick, the TRACS light comes on and off intermittedly, the AC came on and wouldn't turn off once. We spent hours getting lost in Boston/Cambridge this afternoon. Somehow this city (unlike every other city in the nation) does not have a wealth of cafes with free internet, and when you do find one, there is no parking near it, and then when you drive out of the city a little way you get to these weird roundabouts and crooked-ass streets, and boutiques and fancy cafes with no internet at all. Today has been a pretty hurnsy fucking day. But the show tonight looks like it's going to be GREAT!

Show 12: West Chester PA

This is how we play a 375 seat theatre:

Turnout: 20

Monetary Votes of Support: 77

Personal Injury Report: Ben bumped his head.

Show Description: We got there late and left early.

It was raining. We drove in the rain. The rain kept raining. It rained all over us multiple times.

As the picture shows, we played at the back of the theatre. It worked out well. A bunch of people sitting on the floor.

Oddly, when Kate left the theatre at the end of the play and walked into the student union area with the gun still strapped on, no one seemed to notice. Not even the twenty or so sorority girls standing right there like upright stalks of licorice, red dressed and twisty haired. I have nothing more to say about this. I will simply wonder about the number of curling irons employed to create such grandiose wavery.

All in all, the show went well. Ben was sick, so that dampened things a bit, but nonetheless a good time.

Did you see this show? Comment, write a review or ask us some questions. We'd like to hear it because we believe in artistic transparency.