Get to hotel, grab the guitars, pile into elevator. I decided on a group shot in the mirrored ceiling again. That was fun. I stopped off at the hotel room with Todd to drop off my gear and relax for a few minutes before we both headed upstairs to Squid’s room, where the rest of the crowd was. “The only thing worse than TV in the middle of the night in Vancouver is TV in the middle of the night in Regina,” said Todd as he flipped swiftly through the channels. Soon we wandered upstairs to the post-show gathering. My Swordfish bottle opener, always hanging from the beltloop of my pants, came in handy with the Coronas that night. We lounged around on the beds, listening to music pumping out of Dave’s tinny computer speaker (attached to his discman), and watching Jimmy Eat World and 30 Seconds To Mars on TV. We also looked over the video I shot that night. Despite the sound pickup being really shoddy on that sort of camera, it’s really not too bad considering it was my first time ever even holding a video device! I was quite pleased. But Dave hates watching himself. And he reprimanded me gently for giving him gum (which he asked for) because he thought he looked like an idiot chewing it on stage. Then he noticed that the whole band was chewing away on gum. How charming. I have to make sure I get a copy of this thing. “My First Video.” Perhaps I’ll put a clip online here. Alas, before too long, the beer was gone, the people were getting sleepy, and Squid was kicking us out of his room.

Todd and I got ready for bed, and then sat around reading for a few minutes. We literally closed up our books at precisely the same moment, which is just a little bit spooky. And then it was my turn to gush for a bit. I sat on the edge of his bed, thanked him for bringing me along, and rescuing me from my stagnant home life for a few days. I don’t know how seriously he took me at the time. He probably just wanted to get to bed (“Now I’m going to sleep like a leeeeeetle baby”), but I can’t possibly stress enough how much I appreciated him tolerating me on the road for a few days. He indulged me by saying I was good to have along because I carried a few guitars around and made sure drowsy drivers didn’t run off the road. But I have said, since I started getting into this photo thing, that one day, I’m going to go on the road with a band. Now I’ve done it, however brief, so... goal accomplished. Basically, Todd saved my sanity. And I’m sure he can save yours too, if you let him. He’s just that amazing.

The next morning, I woke early. I generally do when I’m not home. My mind is on constant alert mode, because I know I have schedules to keep and other peoples’ interests to consider. I made sure I was up, showered, and ready to go before Todd was even rolling into that first morning stretch and yawn. Humans are so appealing when they sleep. Totally oblivious of themselves, absolutely pure-looking. I know people get creeped out when I mention that I’ve looked upon them while they sleep, but there’s nothing else for me to do in that only-person-awake scenario, and I find it relaxing, so they’ll just have to contend with that. I want to touch sleeping faces. It’s nothing sexual or anything, I’m just a tactile person and an aesthetic person, and there’s something so charming and irresistible about a body at rest. It’s almost painful. But he woke to a call from one of the other guys. He said he had weird dream flashbacks that he couldn’t entirely remember, but he wasn’t giving up any information. Possibly the most amusing thing that morning was watching him try to open up the laundry bag, his hair thick and tousled around his face, his black-frame glasses still on. They look neat on him. I never would have imagined him with glasses before. “This is the first time I have had to use instructions to open a bag.” I keep saying ‘morning’, but it was nearing 1pm by this time. Before leaving, he also wandered over to the closet, explaining that he was going to take a pillow with him. Yet he had to justify it to himself, because he felt bad about snitching it. “I’m a thief with a conscience.” I suggested he call the front desk and complain that there was no spare pillow in the room, but then that they might ask to search his bags as proof. Todd made a strangled noise at this and zipped up the bag, pillow inside. I also passed off a couple demo discs from a band I know in Winnipeg who was going to be attending Todd’s show later in the week, and wanted to see if Todd might be interested in doing a tour together or doing some producing for them. I’ve recently spoken with a member in said band, and I hear the meeting went quite well.

Finally, everyone was packed up and ready to go. I redid the group photo from the night before in the daylight, as grasshoppers leapt all around us in the toasty midday sun. Todd thought he had lost the card from a guy who was at the show who owned a restaurant and offered to hook the band up with breakfast, so we just went to Humpty’s. As we stood around in a cluster in the lobby, waiting to be seated, the waitress approached and said, “For three?” Puzzled looks. “Uh, no, for four…” Squid stepped aside, and suddenly I was visible to the waitress. “Oh, goodness, I didn’t even see you there amongst those guys!,” she exclaimed. A veritable forest of six-foot-fourish guys. And little five-foot-two me. Awfully humourous. Like being in a forest. A really nice forest (flashback quote from the Railway Club).

We sat and yapped all breakfast long about wisdom teeth, classic rock (of course!), work in Vancouver, and celebrity sightings. It was an easy, conversational, casual breakfast (lunch), and a pleasant way to end my trip with this bunch of stellar guys. We piled back into the van, made a stop at an Esso for more gas and to get as much of the splattered bugs off the windshield as possible (mostly uneffective), and then they dropped me off at the bus station by 2pm. We had just popped in the Parlor Trixx CD that Kyle had given Todd at the show. Wow. I was a bit veclempt at leaving them. I had really had a good time, even though I was exhausted, and a lot of the time was spent just watching TV or watching people sleep or sleeping myself. But the point is, that was done outside of Vancouver, with delicious scenery passing by the windows of a moving van, and with a trio of people I don’t normally do things like this with. It was an experience, and that’s what made it so damn cool. Now, I was looking strangely forward to the trip home alone where I could collect my thoughts, listen to music, and concentrate solely on the things passing by on the ride.

I hugged the boys goodbye, thanked them, and sent them on their merry way after they pulled up in the bus-only section of the terminal. I walked into the station, where I had spent so many hours the year before (if I retrace my steps from my lunch-finding quest last year, I’m pretty darn sure that my first dead-end walk took me right past the hotel where we stayed this time), and noticed a drastic change in the place. The once-nameless cafeteria-style diner had been replaced by a not-too-big-of-an-improvement Robin’s Donuts franchise. Alas, with a giant turkey and red pepper sandwich in me, I wasn’t too hungry, and would have to find something else to do to occupy the almost five hours until my bus was scheduled to depart. I got a pretty snarky reception from the ticket guy, who insisted on telling me grumpily that I could have saved myself a bunch of money if I would have bought my ticket ahead of time. I called home then, chatted for as long as I could, and then settled into a plastic chair to read for a while. It was sometime around then that I realized my one casualty of the trip – my red ink pen that Todd used for the set lists, and who-knows-what-else as he walked around thoughtfully chewing on the end of it all day, was now his property. Better than leaving my shades on the bus, I suppose, and hopefully he managed to get some more use out of it on the tour.

Continue to Part IV : The Trip Home