So I'm flipping through my camera and I guess the only way I can remember specifics is to watch these videos and explain them. I must say though, it does a pretty accurate job of describing my summer, and anything new I've done is captured I think, sans a few awesome days.
The first video here is an AMAZING Chaudry house performance, got to see For Serious This Time and unfortunately my camera died and didn't get to catch my fav songs or the other bands, but as always it was an amazing night. I really hope to play one next summer, great motivation to keep me going.
There have been some fun drunk nights, one night Jake came down to LI for a night and we had an amazing day actually, we went out to Long Beach and jumped off the rock and I showed him David Weld's with Kyle and we found the old little fort people built out of driftwood and rocks, it was so much more legitimate now and painted beautifully. So like, romantic and unnatural to Smithtown. That night we met up with Dom and Andrew and we got Famous Dave's and it was cool getting a bunch of the old roomies together. Played some SOLID slap-a-hoe and drank at my house with my sister and all her friends... Dom and Jake and Kyle crashed and it was a fun night. Gotta hit up Staten Island for sure soon.
So many good nights with Tyler too, the one night that's standing out to me right now the most is the night we chilled in his backyard and played cards by candlelight then went out for a walk all around and it was very nostalgic and funny. Oakside never gets old.
Then one weekend me, Dom, and Eric drove up to Binghamton to chill for a weekend. Met up with James, Kelly, Erin, Katie, Katelyn, and Ari, and Adam, Evan and Pete were there too for the summer. Both nights I got way too drunk and it was way too much fun... Ari's house was cool and I LOVE my house, it's got such a nice flow and there's not much to say about this weekend other than how incredibly pumped it got me for next year. I also realized yet again how lucky I am to have been roomed with the people I did freshman year, and to have met the girls, and everything just seemed so loving and serendipitous that weekend. God the videos are embarassing though.... This bonfire was sick though even though Dom and Eric had to start DUKING IT OUT AT THE END FUCKING GUIDOS.
I'll be sure to write about more of these nights as I remember them, but as of now I wanna get to these Midwest videos.
So the 4th of July we went to Weber's house for a party and it was pretty chill, I didn't drink because of the weekend hahaha, but I had a lot of fun, played the name-on-forehead game, bonfire status, good talks. Stayed up til like 4AM to catch our train, which was miserable, then caught our 630 bus or something, and slept so hard. Such a good bus ride, megabus is THE BEST. Also, let it be noted that throughout this entire trip, collectively, we have listened to Bon Iver (Self Titled,) like 15 times. Slept to it like the whole time. Arrived in Pittsburgh, explored, got great sandwiches, found out everything was fucking closed on Tuesday (WTF,) chilled on the Ohio river for a while. Braided a fishing rod out of random long grass, and tried to catch fish, but alas, we did not succeed. Traveled across a bridge, saw a real fisherman, saw an AMAZING sand sculpture, then Chris came to meet up. Hit up a Pirates game haha, which was actually a lot of fun! Then we got stuck in a parking garage for like 2 hours and got back to Chris's house, chilled and watched a random movie with Donald Glover. Kid's the man.
Woke up, hit up this sandwich place, forgot the name, but it was absurd. French fries and coleslaw and so much fuckin meat on it. Then got on the bus and dipped to Cincinatti. Arrived and followed this local to a little corner shop to get some beer, then waited around by this live music at this place called Fountain Square, it was pretty chillin.
Then our host Ryan picked us up, my first American couchsurfing experience, and he was the man. Showed us all about his cars (he was a BMW mechanic,) had some beers, talked about his racing career and music. He used to jam with Josiah Wolfe apparently. Got a good nights sleep, woke up VERY early and caught a bus into the downtown area.
Trekked decently far to get to this art museum, only to find that we got there 2 hours before it opened. Sweet. Ended up sleeping on a park bench for a little while haha. Finally entered the museum, saw some sweet art, some sweet circus posters, it was cool, and most importantly, free. Then we trekked back and went to the countries oldest farmers market (so we're told,) and it was decently cool. Expensive. Had my first "coney," which is apparently the quintessential Cincinatti food, which is pretty much a chili cheese dog. It was gross. We took a long walk through a decently sketchy area... sketchy enough to see drug deals and 5 dollar games of c-lo being played. Pretty cool I guess. AMERICA! Hopped on another bus, Chicago bound.
Arrived pretty late in Chicago, asked around, hopped on a random ass train, got to a random ass place, started heading north. We were trying our hardest to get to this theater that the Flaming Lips were performing The Soft Bulletin at, we eventually found it, and started looking for scalpers, and we found some to buy, but then somehow Greg found this kid who wanted to just give us 2 tickets if we gave him some liquor... also, it should be noted, we had no where to sleep that night, and were planning on sleeping on grass somewhere not sketchy, and like had scoped out some spots. Anyway this kid seemed decently sketchy but like, whatever, free tickets, sick. We get in and everything and we're chilling with him and his girlfriend (I assumed), James and Maddy were their names. The show was AMAZING, such a crazy fun show, lights and props and everything. They even played Do You Realize?!? and it was breathtaking.
Anyway apparently the kid said we could stay with him that night, he got progressively cooler, started out seeming like just some thug looking for free booze, then he seemed like really druggy hippy and whatnot, but he was nice enough, so we took him up on his offer. Walked to his car and he ended up telling us these CRAZY stories about him like, chilling with Steve Tyler, and doing acid and the Electric Forest, and getting arrested in Las Vegas, and soooooo much stuff, all the while we sat at some park and his car was on for no reason. So then he tells us he's on acid now, and that he met this girl 3 days ago, and they just travelled together after Electric Forest and a lot of drugs, and we still figured we'd stay with him, so we met him at his place, which we later found out wasn't his, so we broke into his friends place, who we never met, and then he was like "yeah he's probably not coming home tonight. also I didn't tell him you guys were here. We're going out for a bit, be back whenever." and he left til like SEVEN IN THE MORNING and we were so confused and I was scared hahahaha. Also he told us stories about him like dosing his friends with acid, like a lot, so I didn't like eat or drink anything he offered haha. Sooo that was a better night of sleep than sleeping on the streets I guess. The next day we explored more of Chicago, saw the bean, got deep dish, swam in Lake Michigan, played some frisbee, got some custard. Great day. Bussed it overnight to Saint Louis.
Arrived in Saint Louis at like 6 AM, and explored the city looking for ANYTHING OPEN, but nothing was hahaha apparently no one lives in like the downtown area. Saw the arch, it was pretty magnificent. Then this girl Maggie picked us up, we were crashing at her place. She had a very nice southern style house, and a nice family. Showered, relaxed, then hit up the zoo which was SICK saw some awesome animals and PET SOME FUCKING PENGUINS (illicitly.)
Then we went to the science center and it was kinda lame, but we talked about a lot of interesting stuff regarding family life, and racism, and being brought up into that environment, and religious schools and whatnot. Very interesting and foreign stuff to me. AMERICA. Watched this omnimax "Sea Rex," but really didn't watch cause it sucked and I just slept hahaha. Went back to her house for naps, and reading and chess playing. After that we had a home-cooked meal which was great, and then we met up with her friends at The City Museum. The place is indescribable.
I've never felt happier, and I genuinely felt like a child again. It was the best place I've ever been. At the end though when I was like, crawling through nothing but wire about 6 stories above ground, it got really fucking scary hahahaha. Also the giant dome that you can climb up bars all the way up to the roof was the scariest thing I've ever done. Everyone who reads this should somehow make it a point to see this place before they die.
Then we went back to her place and slept. Back to Chicago the next morning by like 9. Walked down to China town and met up with our host, Kate. She was really cool and lived in a super nice neighborhood. We pretty much just went to sleep, and the next morning we got chinese food and super good tea. Walked around more, walked to Northerly Island which was kind of underwhelming... although we successfully skinny dipped Lake Michigan, in broad daylight, potentially in front of a lot of people. Twas awesomely badass. Then sat around Millenium Park for a while, saw some nutso fountain with moving faces on it...
pretty odd. We each bought a bottle of wine and saw some free live music from Bombino (sp?) and Delicate Steve. Both pretty chill. Got more win and cider and explored some more then ended up back at Kates for more drinks and some pasta and snacks and accordion playing and chilling. Sick night.
Woke up, walked to the bus stop, now I'm here in Cincinatti at some married couple's house. They are Eugene and I wanna say Shellia but that's probably wrong. Anyway they are very very chill and told us many tales about Switzerland living, and roadtripping america for 6 weeks, and crossing russia and everything. Very very cool couple. They also taught us how to brew beer which I think we're gonna do and then we went out for coney's and beers (they were less gross this time.)
This was rushed. I'll come back and write more and post more videos, but I have a bus to Pittsburgh in 4 hours and my laptop is gonna die anyway. Great days man.
