EF On The Road: Pre-SxSW (Raleigh to Atlanta to Memphis to Waco?)

"I'm standing where my, uh, living room was and it's not here because my house is gone and it's an Ultimart! You can never go home again, Oatman... but I guess you can shop there."

That Martin Blank was right on the money. In the past few days I've spent time in both my hometown of Raleigh, NC, where I spent my formative years, and in Ft. McClellan, AL where I was born. In neither place was I able to reconcile the past (whatever that means) but I did manage to spend some money. Recession be damned! Allow me to explain, in bulleted list format, what our past few days have entailed. I'll highlight the extraneous spending in bold, yeah? Good. Because we both need some manner of loose framework for this post (to hang our brand new Indiana Jones hat on) and I think the above quote from Grosse Pointe Blank will work just fine.

Back to the old house with us then. I believe when we last left you we were sitting in a coffee shop in Raleigh on Friday afternoon...

Friday
- blogged at my favorite coffee shop writing spot (Cup A Joe at Mission Valley), bought one too many lattes.
- drove around in the rain and showed Mike a bit of where I'm from (had to fill up the gas tank in that behemoth you see above because of the "scenic tour") and did my best to explain to Mike a bit about both North Carolina and my own personal history along the way. He's currently jonesing for some sweet tea, biscuits, and a pickup truck - and knows very well the local axiom "if you want a saint, go to Peace; if you want a piece, go to Saint Mary's" - I think I did a pretty good job.
- bought tickets for the show on Saturday night for some friends at Schoolkids.
- got dinner with a friend, went back to another friend's house to play Rock Band all night long. Highlight: Mike drum-battling some random dude online on Expert to an Iron Maiden song. In my mind, I've already purchased this game.

Saturday
- BBQ lunch with The Rosebuds... great food, great company, fun times all around. Our treat. Can't wait to do it again.
- stopped by an auto parts store to purchase a cigarette lighter to AC outlet converter for the van.
- dinner at The Raleigh Times, amazing beer selection caused us to spend a little extra on Belgian beers.
- went to see Amy LaVere and Chatham County Line at the Lincoln Theatre... the crowd was of the loud-talking during the songs, cell phone on belt holding up khakis, we go see Jimmy Buffet every year set, so we left midway through CCL. As an aside, the Lincoln Theatre is the kind of place you could grow an entire city's music scene out of. How about someone buy the place from whoever runs it now and start booking some solid talent there on a regular basis, eh? Because the calendar simply does not match the potential of the venue.
- went to Slim's and caught The Apes and played entirely too many games of Donkey Kong.

Sunday
- drove to Atlanta, no death trucks, and bought lots of sunflower seeds for the ride.
- went to The Earl for Vampire Weekend and The Walkmen. Nearly couldn't get in because we weren't on the guest list as we were told we'd be, but things ended up working out.
- went back to the motel and work work worked.

Monday
- drove from Atlanta to Memphis and stopped to visit where I was born (Ft. McClellan, AL) on the way... I took a ton of pictures, found my old house (not replaced by a convenience store) and bought an Indiana Jones hat at a gas station in Anniston, AL for $20. I'm an adventurer now. More on this later.
- spotted no less than 10 different Bingo joints along US 78 in and around Jasper, AL. It was oddly exciting to see Bingo after Bingo after Bingo, each parking lot filled with cars.

Tuesday
- BBQ lunch with Amy LaVere and her band mates... more great food, great company, and fun times all around. Our treat once again.
- headed for Dallas (from Memphis) to see Goes Cube play a show... they get bumped up to 8:30pm which causes us to miss their set; which, all things considered, was probably a good thing given that they were kicked off the stage for being too loud after only two songs!!
- kept driving towards Austin and ended up stopping in Waco, TX for the night.

Wednesday
- today, right now, still in Waco and preparing to leave in one hour for Austin and SxSW.
- on tap for the rest of the day are a few Dead Confederate shows, namely one tonight in which they will be opening for that R.E.M. band. Can not wait. It's one of the few things that's locked into my SxSW schedule, another being to catch as many Billy Bragg shows as I can.

Apologies for the "just the facts" format here but we're on a tight schedule with a lot of things to do and see over the next few days. I'd post our probable concert schedule but we tend to like surprising you. So stay tuned, thanks for reading, and we'll either see you in Austin very shortly or back here on EF for your regularly scheduled content (mixed in with some bonus SxSW coverage).

Listen:
"Back to the Old House" by Billy Bragg (originally by The Smiths)