MEXICO PLUS ONE TOUR

March 21- Tijuana- Kimbara
March 22- Hermosillo- Bar La Negra
March 25- San Luis Potosi- Sky Bar
March 26- Guadalajara- Punto Live
March 27- Mexico City- El Clandestino
March 28- Monterry- Bar La Tumba
March 29- San Antonio, Texas- White Rabbit

fucked the dog - finale....uuuuuh finale

the only reason why i made this in 2 parts is because its so fucking long.
so, where was i? oh yeah....

so we thought, lets make some calls and see if we can find someone to fill in for us until we get to southern california, where our drummer lives. we had 3 shows we needed a fill in for. monday - reno. tuesday - sacramento. wednesday - fresno. by the time i got cell phone service, it was 3pm on sunday. i called phil (among lots of other people) from the band 5 victims 4 graves. they are from sacramento. i told him the situation and i asked him "do you think your drummer would be down to help us out?" he was like, "nah, probably not man, but give it a shot anyways." he gae me his phone number. i have never talked to this guy before in my life, i had no idea if he even knew who our band was. i called the number that phil gave me and to my suprise, jake answered right away. i told him what was up and asked him if he would be down to fill in. he basically responded with "wait, how did you get my number?" we talked a little bit more and he said, "yeah dude, ill take some time off work and help you guys out, a friend of mine has your cd and i will learn about 4 songs by the time you get here." STOKED!!! so we drove to sacramento, dropped off shit for brains at the airport (good fucking riddance) got directions to jakes house, picked him up, booked time a a rehearsal studio, and had practice from 10 pm to 1 am. let me tell you....Jake FUCKING RULES at drums. he had 4 songs down perfect. i couldnt believe it. such a rad dude as well. we dropped him off, then went to hang out with our friend Jim rice and his girlfriend amy. they made us some awesome vegan blueberry muffins. so so so good. the next day, we went to del taco, ate some food, bought some drumsticks for jake at guitar center, picked jake up, practiced for another 2 hours, then headed over to reno. we were really lucky to be on this show. we had a hard time getting a show this day and i called my friend brandon from the band, 1618, and he got us hooked up with this show. ceremony played, as well as All Teeth (these guys RULE) and a really good locl band called, Land Locked. the show went REALLY well. although we only played 4 songs, we sounded SO GOOD. Jake really helped us out a ton. it was a great show for us.

we stayed the night at my parents house, and my mom made a rediculous amount of food for us for breakfast. after we ate, we headed down to sacramento to play at the R5 record store with Pressure point. i fucking love that band. they are so good and such awesome guys. again, our set went over very well, short and sweet, but really good. everyone had a great time. we went back to Jims house to hang out. then walked to the store to buy tortillas and beans. on the way back to his house, jim pointed out to me that peets coffee leaves unsold baked goods outside their door when they closed. i didnt believe him and he said "whatever, go see for yourself" so i did, and he was right. so fucking awesome. there was so much good shit in there. scones, tiger tails, cookies. amazing. the next day we at at a really good vegan thai place. then picked up jake one last time and headed to fresno. we got to Kats house really early, so we decided to roam around through the set of Road warrior. we were throwing rocks through windows in this OBVIOUSLY abandoned building. and these 2 dudes in a plumbing truck pull up looking like they are ready to either rape or murder us and say " you cant be throwin rocks and breakin stuff here. this is private property" weird, but whatever, we left, and went back to kats house. jeremy, the guy who hooked us up with the show came to meet us there. he informed us that it would be a very small turn out, so rather than playing outside lke last time, we will play inside this old fucking shack in the backyard that is lit by christmas lights and looks like tons of people have been murdered there....awesome. it was SUCH a fun show. kids were actually circle pitting and moshing for us in this tiny ass room. so cool. we sold a shirt to literally everyone who showed up, and got a few donations. i love those kids out there. always show us a good time.

rather than driving back to SAC to bring jake home, he suggested that we just buy him a train ticket. that was really cool. it saved us tons of time and money. so, the next day, we are hanging out with jake, waiting for his train to come (by the way, we stayed on a fuckin grape farm that night, and the house we stayed in had about 20 cats....moving on) and i get a text message from verizon wireless, saying that my last payment was made with an electronic check, that bounced.......AWESOME. so i called sergio and told him "dude, the payment you made on my cell phone didnt go through...you bailing on us cost us 300 dollars, so the way i see it is, you owe me 600 dollars" he replies with, "i dont have any money...you can sell my drums if you want." (later on, once the tour was over, i found out that they werent even his drums. he was borrowng them from a friend. what a fuckling pile of dog shit) i was able to borrow some money to make my payment and not have to pawn the drums right away. we took jake to the train station and sent him back home....we would have been SO FUCKED with out jake....that guys rules so hard...

our next show was in cathedral city in southern california. it was in a tile shop of all places. it was really cool being so close to home...but lets cut to the chase....the show SUCKED. I had huge expectations for this show....there were lots of kids, and it was a great night...for whatever reason, they just didnt like us. whatever....it happens.

the last show of the tour was at my favorite place...the che cafe in san diego. such a good night......all of my friends from home were at the show, it was a beautiful night, and it was with great bands. Verse, Killing The Dream, Rotting Out and at the last minute, our good friends Masterpiece got added to the show. we opened the show, had a great set and then i got to see some of my favorite bands...it was a perfect ending to a great tour. Thanks so much to Grave Maker and everyone else that helped us out or hung out with us....It was truly an amazing 5 weeks.

fucked the dog - finale part 1

we got to the venue in witchita at 7pm. there was nobody there. no promoter, no kids, nothing. not even any fliers for our show. bailey made some phone calls, and was somehow able to get ahold of someone who wasnt the promoter, but at least knew what was going on...basically, the show got cancelled without any notice from the promoter. from what the people on the phone told us, the promoter didnt put any effort into the show, and figured nobody would come, so why bother...he was right, nobody came, but it also wasnt promoted. what a piece of shit. we met up with some local kids who were really awesome and they showed us a good time. we all went to this taco truck that was parked in the parking lot of a covienience store. fuckin weird. but really cheap and really good. we walked to a grocery store to get candy and treats and energy drinks, then decided to drive through the night to cannon city, colorado. this was also a town that looked as if it were stuck in the 1950's. matt, eric and i went to a diner so matt could get a hamburger. i swea to god, it was straight out of the movies. oh yeah, and we went to a thrift store that was owned and operated by....fuck, what are those people called that dont use cars or electricity.....you know, like from that movie, King Pin, starring woody haroldson...ah well, you get the idea. fuck im so bad at telling stories. but i digress. it was a weird fucking thriftstore. we went to the venue once we saw the promoter was there. it was like a vfw hall. awesome. it was a friday night, so TONS of kids came out. i think there was something like 150 kids there. we played with some AWESOME bands that night. Bankrobber, Crooked ways, and Killing Kings. this show was so awesome and full of energy. crooked ways covered an opivy song. stoked. after the show, i guess some girl attacked john or something. i dunno, it was werid, but im gonna fck up that story too, and it will just bore you to death.....basically, john got in a fight with a drunk chick and it was awesome. so anyways, the REAL party was when we all went to dennys afterwards. i think there was something like 25 of us. and we were all giving the waitress a hard time. but she was a good sport and gave us TONS of free food. we ALMOST had her convinced to let us play a show inside dennys. that shit would have been awesome. she actually said "ok, you guys can do it" but then a bunch of cops walked in, and she was like "on second though, get the hell out of here" whatever....would have been so cool. we drove through the night again and made our way to steve's house from killing kings. the place was awesome. super nice apartment in denver, colorado. we slept there over night and in the morning, steve and i went to the grocery store to get a bunch of food. we came back and steve and his girlfriend made all the food for us. waffles, eggs, fruit, it was awesome...probably the best breakfast of the tour. we hug out and watched bad movies all day. i slept some more, then we made our way to the show. the venue was at a pizza place. stoked. i guess it was more like a venue/pizza place/bar. pretty cool place. it was killing kings cd release show, as well as the band, eyes fall open. the show was cool. not so good for us. but it was still a fun time none the less. there was this really awesome/weird looking zombie dude at the show with a pink mohawk and tons of gross make up on. after the show, i found out, his name is Maris the Great. and he kills bands. check it out. www.maristhegreat.com so cool. so anyways, he came and hang out with us for the rest of the night. we ate at a place called, Illegal Petes. its this really awesome burrito place. kind of expensive, but way worth it. one of the most delicious burrito i have ever consumed. we walked around downtown denver for a while. maris was kinda freakin people out a little bit. pretty awesome good time. once again, we drove straight through the night to go to salt lake city, utah.

this was a big day for lots of us for a few reasons. brians parents live in salt lake city. grave maker was buying a new van/trailer in salt lake city, and matt and i have a great friend that lives in salt lake named Rory. so, we were all really looking forward to getting there. Rory met us at brians parents house, and they had TONS of food ready for us. it looked like thanksgiving. it was so rad. they even had lots of vegetarian food. and some really good pie. it was so cool. after eating our faces off, matt, eric, rory and i went to go check out rory's house. somehow within 10 minutes of being there, i ended up being naked in rory's bed. the thing that really sucks for rory is, well, seeing me naked, plus i smelled fucking HORRIBLE. i hadnt showered in a few days. sorry bout that dude. but at least it got some good laughs. after i took a shower and got some rest, we went on a nature hike of sorts. it was so incredible. mountains and waterfalls and streams and trees everywhere. so beautiful. it statred raining, so we high-tailed it out of there and met up with some of rory's friends. we didnt have much time, so we basically just went to 7-11, then to del taco then to the venue for the show. this show was REALLY strange. being that we were in salt lake city, and we are a hardcore band, i assumed the show was going to be full of hardline, hardcore straight edge thugs. turns out, they only go to tough guy shows these days, so we were safe. haha. it was quite an eclectic show. the headlining band was called, Boom Boom Kid. they were from argentina. they were like this ska/punk hardcore band....really good actually. entertaining at least. and a bunch of really weird punk bands that seemed like they were stuck in the early nineties played. our set went over ok. nothing special. same with grave maker. it was a weird weird night. afterwards, matt, rory, eric and i went to get some mexican food, and harrased some locals mormons. not in a bad way. then slept, ultra hard.

the next day, was a sad day. we parted ways with our friend rory, and drove seperately to our last show of the tour with grave maker. the show was in twin falls, idaho. we got to the town really early, so we did some sight seeing. idaho has lots of really cool nautre shit, so we took in in. we also went to a grocery store and saw some local kids that were planning on going to the show (if their moms let them of course) and we went to little ceasers pizza. this was a really small town. the kind where there is only one main road going through town that has everything on it. after messin around for a while, we drove to the venue, which was also a bar and resteraunt. we pulled up and saw all these dudes with tattoos all over their faces! nuts. i thought for sure this show would have tons of fights. everything was really cool. the opening band was compiled of 3 kids, all under the age of 13. their parents were all at the show, giving them support, AND money to buy shirts from the touring bands. , then a band called pricsilla played. they are a really bad ass christian hardcore band with 2 singers, tons of energy and hell heavy break downs. really good band. our set went over pretty well. people are REALLY fucking rough in twin falls. im really suprised a fight didnt break out. but i guess it was all in good fun. i made a really sappy and homo-erotic speech about how awesome the guys in grave maker are, and thanked them for sharing the road with us. oh yeah, we bought them a cake from the store. it was awesome. vic, the promoter of the show gave it to them for us while i was making my rediculous speech. all in all, it was a great last show with those guys. their set totally went off. one of the best nights for them. we went to a local diner after the show where i had the worst oatmeal of my entire life. but it was a fun time. oh yeah, there was this HORRIBLE drunk girl in her mid-30's at the diner, and bailey had her convinced that grave maker was actually the band, sum-41 and i was their rich and well endowed tour manager. naturally, she wanted to hump, so bailey took it upon himself to give her my phone number and as soo as we left the diner, i was getting all kinds of weird and creepy text/voice/picture messages from her.....thanks bailey.

the next show of our tour was in Portland, OR. i was looking forward to this show more than any other show of the tour because, it was our first time playing in a basement in a house (arctic circle pit fuckin rules!) AND we got to play with Broadway Calls, one of my favorite bands. this was one of the best days/shows of any tour i have been on yet. as a matter of fact, it was such an awesome experience that it made me fall in love with portland, and now desire to live no where but there. we got to jesse's house early, so we figured we would just walk around and kill some time. jesse came out of the house and caught us before we took off. he showed us where this awesome vegetarian taco truck was down the street from his house. i got 2 tacos and a mexican soda for less than 5 bucks. so cool. matt went to a thrift store across the street and bought a really bad ass adidas jacket for 10 bucks. i was bugging jesse with all my questions about the bands Tragedy and Broadway Calls. but he was really cool, and showed us a really good time. we walked around a little bit more, then went back to the arctic circle pit to get ready for the show. i set up merch on a washer and dryer, and a little work bench he had set up...pretty sweet. i went outside to call my parents, and all of a sudden, 2 familiar faces rode up on their bikes. Savage, a girl i met last time we played in the northwest, and jeff from vegan this. its always nice to see frinedly familiar faces when it is unexpected. apparently jeff just recently moved to portland and had been hanging out with savage. small world right? so then, im catching up with those 2, shootin the shit and all, then my friend elyssa from san diego walks up! what the hell? and apparently she ALSO recently moved to portland...so i start catching up with her, and i hear someone say, "hey wes!" i turn around, and its my friend, Jade, from LA. this was fuckin intense, like straight out of the twilight zone. all these people i know have migrated up to the beautiful city of Portland. Friendly Dave (we stayed at his house during our first tour) came to the show, and showed lots of support for us...he is such a great guy. after we played, a band called Bridge and Tunnel played. they are from new york. such a great band. they reminded me a little of hot water music, but with dualing male and female vocals. they blew me away. then broadway calls played. it was one of the best sets i have ever seen a band play. they have SO MUCH energy and played flawlessly. we were so lucky to get to play this show. one of the best nights of my life. after the show, we went to this really bad ass vegetarian hot dog place (i dont remember the name) josh and ty from broadway calls were there. i got a hto dog based on josh's recomendation and it was great. here's the weird thing. it was also a bar. my friend elyssa was with us, and she is under 21. so, no big deal right? we will just eat outside. so we all ordered our food, and they brought hers out in a bag and said, you cant eat that outside of our place, you hav to leave because you are under 21. fucking rediculous. i never heard of anything like that. but whatever, every place has their rules i guess. so we all piled in the van, and made our way to elyssa dorm where we were gonna try to get some sleep, but her roomate was asleep and its a tiny place so we just slept in the van in the parking lots of the dorms. the next day, we drove to Astoria, OR, where they filmed the movie, Goonies. it was cool, we checked out the goonies house and all the different places where they did shit for the movie there...it was awesome. astoria was a really nice town. very small and intimate. the cool thing about oregon is, on the coast, the forest meets up with the ocean. so its like hella redwood trees and next thing you know, its just water as far as the eye can see. oh yeah, and we saw a bald eagle flying. fucking epic.

after portland, we drove up to seattle. i was NOT looking forward to this show. the last time we played in seattle, we ate it, hard. no one liked us. we were definitely not welcome haha. this time, the show was at a house called, the Jolly roger. the dude who booked us there is named Cameron. this guy is so fucking solid. we got to his house, i never met him before, and he let us all in and said "just hang out and make yourself at home. im gonna take off for a little bit." he literally let a bunch of strange dudes just kick it at his house while he was gone....who does that? the house was really cool. he had laminated posters up on the ceiling, a huge fuckin flat screen tv and tons of good dvds. the show started right on time. it was a free show, so they were asking for donations. someone made cupcakes for us, i dont even know who, but they were hella good. (the guys in my band are gonna hate me for saying "hella" so much. haha) between every band, cameron walked around with a jar and made everyone give donations. all the bands that played were really good. all real different too. the headlining band got their set cut shirt because the cops came...busted! but they ruled hard. they were called enemy camp. reminded me a lot of late nineties metal core. really fuckin awesome. our set went over really well. everyone at the show was SO nice. after the show got shut down, we set up our merch tables and sold quite a bit. especially to this one drunk guy. it was awesome. we gave cameron a poster to add to his collection in the living room. the jolly roger is definitely one of my all time favorite places. i cant wait to go back there.

our next show was in southern oregon at SOU. south oregon university. we got hooked up with this show through jesse from portland. i posted a message on the northwest hardcore board, saying we needed a show in ashland/medford, and he called up his friened MACK ATTACK to hook us up...this night was interesting to say the least. the show was in a class room at the univeristy. i think about 8 people ended up coming. there was mack and his friend, mack's girlfriend and her friend. a skinhead named chad, then 3 other random people. turned out to be a really fun night. we were the only band to play, we played Ian Mackaye is an uncle tom 2 times. once was an encore specifically for mack. the microphone cord was long enough to reach all the way to the back of the room, so of course i ran around like an idiot. somehow, between donations and merch sales, we ended up making about 80 dollars. fuckin awesome. afterwards. mack treated us to some delicious taco bell, then we went back to his apartment to party. he showed us his record collection, then we watched the movie, smokin aces (which i only wanted to see because alicia keyes is in it) of course, i was the first one to fall asleep. blaaaaahhh. our whole time in oregon and seattle was an amazing experience. meeting jesse, mack and cameron was really really awesome. i love meeting new people in general, but it makes it so much better, when those new people are such awesome people. thanks guys!

we didnt have any shows for the next few days, so we did some sight seeing until our show in reno. remember when i said shit was gonna get worse with sergio? this is where it happens...

so, we are in arcata, CA. it was a sunday. our next show was on monday in reno with ceremony. its about noon on sunday, we are at a gas station, getting ready to leave arcata, and this kid, (sergio) comes out of the van, with tears in his eyes and says in his little ewok voice "hey guys ive got to go home. i have an unpaid traffic ticket and im being summoned to court. my parents REALLY want me to come home and take care of this." .....................................................................................................................................................................................
this CANT be serious right? i wish it wasnt. we tried reasoning with him. although he sucks at drums and he made everyone in the band hate him, we still needed him to finish the tour. we tried telling him "dude, its not a big deal, just call the court and reschedule the date. its not like thee is going to be cops waiting for you outside of your house if you dont go to court." he started crying, "i have to go home, my parents want me to come home" translation - "im a big fuckin spoiled baby, and im home sick, and mommy and daddy will buy me a last minute plane ticket that costs 1000 fuckin dollars to come home because i dont want to be on tour anymore." fucking busted....i couldnt believe it. i wanted to leave him at the gas station. but matt has too big of a heart for that. even though this kid was TOTALLY fucking us over, Matt, being basically a perfect human being, said "we have to do the right thing, we will take him to the airport." this was pretty much the only time i have ever been upset or frustrated with matt. i mean, he WAS right, and taking shit for brains to the airport was the right thing to do, but i was SO MAD about it. so, on our way to Sacramento to take fuck face to the airport, we started brainstorming about what to do. we REALLY didnt want to cancel our shows. some really good friends worked pretty hard to get the shows for us, and we wanted to figure SOMETHING out.

I like food. Food is good.

yesterday, for the most part consisted of eating, sleeping and reading. not too eventful. well, until Led got home from work anyways. Led's helper/maid/whatever you want to call her made breakfast for me. i had vegetarian sausage (frankfurts) from a can, oatmeal and bananas. the sausage was interesting to say the least. it almost had the consistency of tofu. less than firm tofu. it tasted really good. this was the first time i have ever eaten oatmeal without any sugar or flavoring or anything like that. it was comparable to only what i can imagine pourage would taste like. and feel like. it was pretty good, but just kinda threw me a curveball, because, i guess since im an average american, when i hear oatmeal, i assume its going to be instant flavored oatmeal that takes a few seconds to zap in the microwave and tastes like heaven. the bananas were fucking INSANELY good. apparently, the philippines is the number 1 exporter of bananas for the entire world (according to led. and i believe him.) the bananas i ate were those really small ones, that look like plantanes, but they arent plantanes (thank god) they are just miniature bananas. i guess since they are so small, they have more flavor and a much better consistency than your average banana. im siked to eat more of them today. as a matter of fact, i might go to the market and buy a shit ton of them. it will most likely be like 50 cents for a large quantity.

so, after i ate, i FINALLY took a shower. it felt so fuckin good. i wouldnt neccecarily call it a "cold" shower, but definitely not hot. i couldnt figure out how to change the temperature on the shower head without getting electricuted. you see, the shower head is connected to a pipe that is coming out of the wall and from another part of the wall, there are electrical wires that are taped to the pipe and connected to the shower head. i assume that the wires is what makes the water hot, but my assumptions are usually wrong. needless to say, water and electricity dont mix, and i got hella shocked when i touched it....haha. but it actually worked out for my benefit anyways because it was really hot out byt the time i took a shower, so the cold water felt amazing. im actually looking forward to taking another cold shower today.

if you know me personally, you'll know that im not much of a reader. i am currently reading my 3rd book. now, what i mean is, throughout my childhood, middle school, highschool, after graduating, i either faked through reading books, or just gave up halfway through. somehow during highschool, i was able to read the back of the book, MAYBE skim through some cliffnotes and write a spectacular book report. ive always hated reading. for our first international tour (central america) my good friend, Jim Rice gave me a book to read called, Of Mice And Men. it was a short book, and i had already seen the movie, so i knew the story well. i started reading it on the way home from costa rica, and i finished it at the airport during my layover in LA on the way to reno to see my folks. i was REALLY into that story and i loved the book. so i guess it was the first book that i voluntarily read all the way through. when i got to my parents house the next day, i started reading one of my moms books called, A Child Called It. i finished it, but i definitely noticed a decline in testosterone in my body after reading it. so anyways, my girlfriend let me borrow one of her books to read while im on this trip called, Extremely Close and Incredibly Loud. she didnt think i would even read it, so i was determined to finish it all the way through because i promised her i would. to my suprise, its been a really good way to pass the time. i enjoy the story a lot, and gives me something to do while i wat for my buddy led to come home from work so we can bro down.

speaking of bro-ing down, when Led came home from work yesterday, he changed out of his work clothes, and we headed towards the mall. i guess there are 2 malls in this town. the one we went to was fucking HUGE. 4 stories tall, NOT including the parking structure. and there are SO MANY american stores here, you wouldnt believe it. it was a really cool experience though. everything is very highly secured with tons of security guards. the funny thing is though, the security guards here ACTUALLY care about their jobs AND your safety! we drove into the parking structure, where they very nicley inspected the vehicle for bombs and other weapons. then, we walked up to the mall, and at the entrance, there were 2 security guards. one male and one female. they even had a desk at the entrance and signs, seperating the entrance line into 2 lines. one for male inspection and one for female inspection. its crazy though. at home, something like this would NEVER fly, because everyone would complain about how they are being treated like criminals and what not. but honestly, they are just protecting their shit, protecting their people, and making it a pleasurable shopping experience for everybody. especially during the holidays, the crime rate out here is through the roof, so i thought it was pretty cool that they had all the security. and like i said, they were insanely nice people for being security guards....and they are also very helpful. they know the whole mall like the back of their hands, so if you ask them where a particular store is, they are happy to tell you what floor it is on, what stores it is near, and how to get there. fuckin awesome.

we ate at S'barro pizza. we were going to get a pizza at yellow cab, but i only wanted to get one slice, and yellow cab doesnt sell byt the slice. the price differences and similarities are so crazy. i can nevr get used to it. usually things are WAY cheaper out here, but sometimes, more expensive. for instance, a small cheese pizza at yellow cab is 5 dollars. well, you can get a large pizza at little ceasers pizza back home for 5 dollars. so, i jus tfigured its due to the fact that its an american pizza compan, and you are paying for the shipping prices and what not...BUT we went to s'barro, and got a slice of pizza for 1.30. when you get a slice of s'barro pizza at home, its at the very least, 2.50. so, i dont understand it, but i will ALWAYS go for the cheaper pizza. its crazy how much these people care about other people, care about their jobs and just care about life in general. it really makes me feel like a piece of shit sometimes. check this out.....we went to dairy queen to get ice cream. all the empolyees were super enthused to serve us, and they were really fast and courteous and all that good stuff. if you go into a dairy queen in southern california, you know that it is definitely the exact opposite of that...in so cal, you isually leave a dairy queen wanting to kill someone. and on top of that, while we were enjoying our blizzards and/or hot fudge sundaes, they asked us to fill out a customer service sheet to tell them what we thought about their service and how it can be improved.....at a dairy queen! it was unreal.

its also hella populated out here. something like 14 million people, JUST in manila. so, it was really really busy at the mall. it was almost like shopping at south coast plaza in costa mesa on black friday, but instead of everyone being assholes and having fake boobs and suv's, it was all just really nice, regular people.

when we left the mall, we headed back to led's house to watch the movie, Dont mess with a Zohan. i definitely fell asleep during the first 10 minutes. i think i am still adjusting to the time difference. Matt is going to arrive today. i think around 1pm. im really siked to see him. im not sure what we are doing tonight, but im sure it will be fun. Led is SUCH an awesome guy and he is taking such good care of me. also, imelda (the girl who picked me up from the airport) is awesome and so much fun to hang out with.....its really nice being able to communicate with everyone because they speak such good english. im sure that since matt will be here tonight, we will have a great time and i will have more adventerous stories.

long live masterpiece

i woke up to the most awesome sound this morning

and by awesome, i DEFINITELY mean horrible. i woke up around 4am to the sound of a a female cat, in heat, basically sending out a mating call to all the possible neighborhood feline courtiers. it was similar to the sound of a woman who is pregnant with an alien being repeatedly stabbed in the stomach by the terminator. neither her nor the unborn alien will die, they just continue to scream in unbearable pain and anguish for the entire world to hear. aaaaaaaaand of course, the cats mating call doesnt so much attract male cats that want to hump as much as it annoys and aggravates the entire neighbor hood of dogs that in response to the screaming, start barking and howling. oh yeah, and you know how im scared of ghosts, paranormal, aliens, horror movies, etc etc? i definitely could have sworn this morning when i got up to see what was going on, that i saw the asian girl from that one horror movie....the grudge, in the bathroom for like a split second. so, needless to say, i couldnt fall back asleep. the funny thing is, i didnt even think that movie was scary. but i guess now that im in asia, its a lot more possible that some really weird and hot asian chick is constantly lurking in the dark corners, ready to kill me. its already so warm out today. oh yeah, Led gave me some bad ass t shirts that are too big for him. a hopeless records t shirt and a mr. T experience t shirt. fuckin awesome. i have a feeling that today will be an amazing day, full of fun and adventure. i was REALLY looking forward to taking a shower. buuuuuuut now im a little apprehensive about it.

i mean, i dont want that grudge chick bothering me. but i smell really bad. well, if i die in the shower, i lived a good life. goodbye forever.


wesley james sisk

Posting from Manila, Philippines. December 9, 2008

shits crazy. EVERYTHING is in english out here. billboards, street signs, bumper stickers.....everything. its VERY westernized. which is awesome because i get the best of both worlds....everything is cheap as fuck here. gas is .80 cents per gallon. a frappucinno at starbucks is like 1.50. i mean, for the locals, its all relative. the minimum wage here for an average worker is like 120.
00 per month. so, thats why everything is so much cheaper. when i arrived here it was about 89 degrees. fuckin crazy. when i was going to the train station in reno it was 36 degrees. oh yeah, and i already vomited today. it was a little embarrassing. but for whatever reason, my stomach doesnt agree with rice, and thats pretty much the main food here. so, i have THAT to look forward to. so, im hangin out with my new friend, LED, here it his house. its awesome. he has a cat named Keanu. named after the actor, keanu reeves. and a dog who hates me named trixie. its so awesome hanging out with my new friends led and imelda. tomorrow we are gonna eat pizza. so im obviously siked about that. ill have some free time tomorrow. oh yeah....right now, its 10:13 pm in the philippines and its 6:10 am back home. fuckin insane. and it took me 23 hours to get here from LA. hopefully tomorrow night i will have tons of good stories.

fucked the dog part 2

for the next 4 days, alex and Q drove us around, introduced us to all their friends, and basically just showed us a good time....if they were at work, the 3 of us would just go to the dollar theatre and watch a movie, or hang out in jack in the box for hours drinking water and surfing the internet on my laptop....

finally, Lopez, the owner of the transmission shop called us and told us the terminator was fixed....it cost 1300 bucks....we tried giving them 1000 and my guitar, but he said my guitar was ugly and he didnt want it...haha. oh well, it was worth a shot...

the next day was the last show of the mexico portion of the tour....it was in.......

Piedras Negras, MX

we drove down to mexico, just the 3 of us...the dudes in the red alert were going to come along, but they ended up having to work......the directions we got to the show were completely impossible to understand. they were all in spanish...we had a street name...thats it...no adress, just a street name....so we get to the border, go through all the checking of bags, trailer, blah blah blah......and we asked the border agents how to get to the street that we were looking for....we showed them the directions we had.......did i mention they spoke no english???
SOMEHOW, between the 3 of us, we were able to understand the hand motions they were giving us while telling us directions in spanish, enough to make it to the show with suprisingly little trouble..... the show was definitely in this kids backyard on a residential street....so cool...

sergio (our fill in drummer) was there before us....then our best friend Luis showed up....it was so awesome getting to see him again....he had good news and bad news for us....the bad news was, gravemaker couldnt make it to this particular show for whatever reason....the good news was, he got thr promoter to gaurantee us 150 bucks for the show, AND even better news, that luis was coming to the next 2 shows with us...STOKED!!! oh yeah, and he gave me and matt his band shirts....

we set up merch and waited for the show to start....there was at least 100 kids there...everyone was REALLY nice...since it was so close to the border, there were a few kids that spoke perfect english......that made things a little easier...the opening band only played cover songs....it was pretty cool...they played songs from bands like The Clash, sex pistols, Ramones, rancid.....pretty sweet....then a bunch of metal bands, then us.......this was our first show and the beginning of our nightmare of playing shows with sergio on drums....fortunately, we played through horrible equipment and the kids didnt care how bad we sounded because, it was hella embarassing....... he definitely pulled the songs off way better in practice before the tour than he did at the show....it was still a great show though...the kids were great...there was a group of girls that stood in the front and screamed the whole time as if our band was the beatles or something....after the show, we sold tons of merch, signed lots of autographs, took lots of pictures....oh yeah, and one of the girls that was in the front screaming the whole time, didnt want to stop taking pcitures with us, and as her friend was taking one of the pictures, this girl DEFINITELY french kissed me....and she didnt speak ANY english what so ever.....aaaaahhhhhh, only in mexico

later we ate a bunch of good food at a little hole in the wall then made our way back to the states....we got to the border check at about 2 am....of course they checked our bags, trailers, blah blah blah, and they sent luis to the main office to get his passport checked since he isnt a US citizen....he came back to the van and he looked like he had just seen a ghost....they fucking denied him entry into the US!!!!!!!!!!! what the fuuuuuck?????? they said he was supposed to have a permission slip of sorts to leave mexico....basically they just wanted money....so what we did is, bought luis a bus ticket from nuevo laredo, to laredo texas....they didnt give him any trouble there...

this is where things started going downhill. we made it back to texas, we met up with the dudes in grave maker at the hotel room that they stayed at, met the 2 new girls they had with them (weird) and made our way to pick up luis. after we picked up luis, we went to the bank to get all the money that we put in sergio's bank account. i put in 500, matt put in 400 and eric put in 100. so, we were of course, expecting sergio to withdraw 1000 dollars and disperse it between the 3 of us accordingly. to my suprise, sergio came back from the teller and said to me, in his voice that sounds like a mix between an ewok and a dying alien, "hey, uuhhh, i might be a little short paying you guys back all your money, i had to buy some shit in mexico" of course, at this point my blood is boiling like crazy. i try to keep cool and tell him, "look dude, if we dont go back to the van with 1000 dollars cash, there is going to be a problem....the problem of course being, YOU STOLE MONEY FROM US!" and his response was, "well, what was i supposed to do? i had to buy shit in mexico and i didnt have any money..." - you are probably asking yourself, "is this guy for real?" sadly, the answer is yes.....yes he is....so i said, "ok, how much money do you have?" he said, "530 dollars, but i can get the rest of the money by tomorrow" so i told him it was cool if he just gave matt and eric their money back, and i will wait for mine for the next day. no biggie, right? so, shit for brains, calls his mom, she tells him that she transfered 500 doallrs into his bank account.

since my bank account closed, due to the whole mexico fiasco, and even if it wasnt closed, there were none of my banks in the area, i asked sergio if i could just use his debit card that was linked to the bank account that his mom deposited money into, to pay my cell phone and insurance payments. he said "no problem" so i get hs card from him, call verizon wireless to make my payment, and they said that the card i tried using was DENIED. what the fuuuuuuck??? so, then he had his mom give him her savings account # and routing # so i could pay my cell phone payment, via electronic check from their account. i made the payment, it went through, its all good. then instead of going through all that hassle again for the insurance payment, he just gave me the rest of my money in cash. i wish i could say that was the end of the story, but by the time we get to arcata, CA, its going to open wide up again and get much worse.

the laredo show was AMAZING. definitely one of the best shows of the tour. a ska/punk band played, some other good hardcore bands played...and our boys in the Red Alert KILLED IT. they were so fuckin awesome...definitely check that band out. oh yeah, and i sang a song for them. 7 seconds, young til i die. (thanks guys!) and bailey played bass for one of their songs while Q, the bassist of red alert sang. we had a really great set that night. the kids were awesome, shit for brains pulled all the songs off good for the most part, it was just really really great. of course, grave maker was amazing as usual. it was so awesome having our frined luis with us. he made the show so much more fun. we sold TONS of shirts and cds that night. i think the most of the whole tour actually.

afterward we went to taco palenque, ate until we got sick, then slept our asses off.

we drove to mcallen texas the next day. this was almost as small of a turn out as the lubbock texas show. the opening bands were interesting to say the least. one of the bands did a good hatebreed cover. now, we cut our set down to about 6 songs because sergio could handle most of the songs on drums. and for the mcallen show, we basically only got to play 4 of those songs, because all of a sudden, he forgot almost ALL of the songs. so, we played an embarrassing 4 song set, and i basically left the venue, wanting to kill sergio, then of course kill myself. somehow, we still got paid good money, and ate at taco plaenque again for the last time, then slept at the promoters house. early the next morning, matt and i went to mcdonalds to get some iced coffee (have you ever had iced coffee from the fast food tyrants? if you havent, and you arent vegan, and you dont mind giving money to big corporations, i suggest you try it. its fucking delicious. otherwise, its probably not for you) and we went to get haircuts after that...which i regreted big time, because for some reason, the lady ended up giving me a marine cut, and i just dealt with it, as opposed to having her shave the rest of it off. matts haircut was much more pleasing to the eyes. but then again, matt is just way more pleasing tho the eyes than i am in general.

the show that night was in corpus christi texas. very small turn out. the people that DID show up were all really cool. we got free pizza. we played with the band, The Golden Age. they ruled really fucking hard. sold a few shirts, made new friends. pretty good night.

after that, we made our way to forth worth, texas. the show was supposed to be in dallas, but for whatever reason, it got moved. the venue was really awesome. it reminded me of the che cafe, but with out a kitchen. they had lots of graffitti and political propaganda and zines and shit like that. they also had what they call, the "free store" basically people just donate clothes, games, whatever, and you can take whatever you want for free. i took a pair of jeans that i later found out didnt fit me. the show was GREAT. so much better than the night before. somehow, i managed to convince a bunch of kids to get naked and mosh for us in exchange for free t shirts. oh yeah, they also had a rope swing in the middle of the venue. and bleacher seating. both of which got utilized. the local band from that show that really stuck out was called, Decades. SUCH a good band. kind of like a mix btween modern life is war and the suicide file, but more punk. after the show, we all ate at the waffle house. and austin, the guitarist of decades, PAID FOR ALL OF US TO EAT!!! this was insane...who does that? honestly? what a great guy. that night, abunch of dudes decided to go to this stripclub in fort worth that is owned by vinnie paul of pantera. apparently you get in for free if you have a valid and current tour laminate. those of us that arent into strip clubs (including me) , stayed behind to sleep. i guess by the time they got there, it was closed for the night anyways.

after parting ways with our new friends in Decades, we went to Altus, Oklamhoma. this show was really cool. the venue was in the basement of a comuntiy center that they called, the blue room. because all the walls were painted blue. AAAAAAAND the room was air conditioned!!! so awesome. this place was chud city...in a really good way. everyone was really nice. LOTS of cradle of filth t shirts, thick black eye make up, really big ball chain necklaces, etc. oh yeah and one kid had straight up, real vampire teeth...nutz! it was an awesome show. we had tons of fun..although, i cant say we played very well. it was still a good night. we stayed at one of the othe bands house. i cant remmeber the name of the dudes, or the band. and i feel like a dick for it cause they were great people and a great band. oh well. i woke up the next morning, somehow cuddling with john (i wasnt complaining. he is a hot dude) me, matt and eric went for a walk to check out the town. it was really cool. its like the town was in a time warp and stuck in the 1950's. or at least it looked like the 1950's as portrayed in movies. then we drove to witchita, Kansas.