It's on!!

I am in the bowls of the Gwinnett Arena picking up a wireless signal from Dream Theater’s broadcasting station. I was supposed to be picked up in an IKEA parking lot at 10pm Wednesday night. 12 hours later I was picked up in the parking lot of my dad’s old church. I stepped on board drained and exhausted. Four hours later was out first stop in Spotsylvania, VA. I ate lunch at Panera with Paul, tour manager, and Paolo, merch dude.



The other guys went to Super Wal-Mart for food. They loaded up on groceries and kept them in the bus’ fridge.



I thought the whole Wal-Mart thing was lame until I was sitting on the bus starving several hours later with out anything to eat.

The next stop was at a Flying J somewhere in North Carolina. The characters always come out at the truck stops.







We met a guy named Bill Thornton that looked ZZTop’s mad scientist uncle. Bill lives in Southern Cali and travels around the country lecturing on how to sue the government.





I didn’t get a chance to hear his whole deal because Robert Minter was talking to Warren, guitar tech, about his famous blues father, Louisiana Red. Robert wanted to show us his dad’s guitar and get a photo.



Warren and I followed Robert to his rig to see this guitar.







We hung out for a while then retreated back to the bus.



We ended up eating dinner at TGI Fridays at 10:30 pm. I got to use my social mastery and convinced the waiter to hook us up with free salads. It’s the little things that really make a tour.

The rest of the band flew down today just in time for load in. We are way out of our league. All the other bands brought their own drum risers. Not carpets but risers! The drummer for Fear Factory calls himself the Mexicacutioner. Get into that!! Dream Theater’s drum set is 36 pieces. The tech wants me to do a photo shoot of the assembly. This is insane!