so we picked up a hitchhiker. he was probably in his mid 50's. i think he just goes from town to town working at bars until he feels like moving on, like a christian jack kerouac thats not as smart. after we dropped him off, we saw a beagle on the side of I-65 outside of decatur, alabama. we turned around and pulled over, and three of us got out of the van and tried to go get it. it took us about 15 minutes to get close enough to touch her, because she kept barking and running a few feet back whenever we got within 50 feet. finally she lay down and let me go up to her and pet her. we carried her back into the van and started driving again. she had a collar with the name "gulley" and a phone number, so we called. it turned out that she was a run-away hunting dog and they didnt even seem to care, so we decided to call them back and tell them that she escaped when we pulled over. we felt vindicated when the owner said that she didnt care because they got a good year of hunting out of her and they were probably going to just let her loose anyway.
we drove the rest of the way to nashville, but we werent able to get on the show, so we hung out at danny's friend's house and made buttons out of random things we cut out of magazines. then we drove to bowling green to stay with nathan's friend. i like to town there; it has a cute town square and an organic fair trade coffee shop with delicious soy chai latte.
on to lexington. dirty punk house, rad kids. the kids there are sort of like hardcore kids that found crimethinc. or something, but totally legit. we played a rad show at an infoshop to a small but very appreciative audience, and then drove to louisville.
we built a fire and stayed up late playing uno and "never have i ever". the next day ben and i checked out the local skatepark and it was totally awesome. it was a free outdoor concrete park with lights at night. we both wanted to go back after the show, but it rained.
the show was ok, i liked the space and there were a few really cool kids there, including the ones that we stayed with.
we also got into a fight, which was about the most fun id had in years. this mall-metalcore band that played was drunk and acting shitty, and lee put a kingdom sticker on the back of one of their cabs when the house lights went out so they could do their light show. later on when we were packing up, one of them told davin that the person who did it had to come outside and apologize for being disrespectful or they were going to fight us. i mean, of all of the reasons to get mad at a show, a fuckign sticker. they peeled it off and it didnt leave a mark. shit, attrition and kingdom have done way worse to each other just about every night. i went outside with a big group kids and saw the singer of their band in a shouting match with ben. the details arent important, but it ended with ben telling him to go home, him telling ben to make him, and ben saying ok and laying him out with one punch. he could have said it to just about anybody else (if he told me, i would have walked away), but he picked the wrong guy. then everyone jumped on everyone else... it wasnt a big fight and it was over quickly. no one really got hurt. it was just plain fun, like a brawl in a saloon. i think we're going to put a sticker on the dudes car on the way out of town.