for the month of august we decided that it would be a good idea to put some miles on our old mule. in order to achieve this task we booked a coupla northeast runs, a southeast run, and a one off hit in oxford. it wasn’t goin to be easy but we had to have it. sometimes in life when things get tough, you can always dump a mountain dew slushee on your head to put things in perspective. the cities that we hit included baltimore, nags head, ocean city, dc, bethlehem, gulf shores, birmingham, and oxford. for the baltimore/nags head trip we got up early to leave the motherland (knoxville) at 5 am. baltimore is far away and we had to be there at 3pm so we had no other options. we allowed ourselves two hours of stop time for gooey snacks and chocolate milks. we boarded the mule to begin the journey.

it was a long drive, but we finally made it. we were playing a big outdoor show put on by 89.7 WTMD. they’ve been spinning our record up there so we really appreciate them bringing us out. we opened for a band called the bridge, who are out of baltimore, and they rock hard so the crowd was out for the show. i think we ended up playing to 5000 people during our set so for our first showing in baltimore it was a success thanx to WTMD. once we were done delivering hot fire, we had to hop back on the mule to head to the head. nag’s head. nag’s head was cool but we were all tired because of our 20 hour day the day before. they gave us a beach house to stay in, which was cool, and they also let us order whatever we wanted on the menu. i said, “justin. order for me the dirtiest of all menu items.” He said, “ok ol’ cozmo.” i came back to filet mcgoodness with crab lumpy lumps on top. we ate, went and chilled at the beach house, then came back to the venue to play the show. the dance floor packed and the patrons were grindin hard. just a grindin to the guv’nahs.

on our next run, we went to ocean city, dc, and bethlehem for musikfest. we love the northeast because we like sittin in traffic and paying tolls for sittin in traffic. first stop was ocean city for another radio promotion show. this time we decided to leave a day early and split our drive into two shifts. we planned to get a hotel somewhere in virginia. on our route we stopped at a sheetz gas station. these are the best gas stations on the planet. you can order custom chili d’s from a touch screen menu. touch the screen, the d’s are delivered. that night, justin and the murph slept in the mule on the futonius. we arrived the next day early afternoon for load in and sound check. once all that was done, we hung out in the green room and tried to get michael jenkins to swim out to this island for 200 bucks. we also tried to get him to sing lead vocals on blue rose but he would do it for no less than 500 bucks and we weren’t prepared to offer that much of a reward. we ruled the island swim out because there was a small chance he could die. we played the show and it went over well with the people of ocean city. we really appreciate Ocean 98.1 for playing our music.

once we finished we immediately had to drive to dc. we were staying in this awesome house provided by james’s cousin’s husband’s parents. justin said that he would take us to this place. we were all exhausted from lack of sleep and alot of mule hours so justin had an interesting tactic to keep his brain alert. justin has a photographic memory. he can remember anything that has to do with taking photographs. anyway, his new tactic was to build his memory to the point where he can name all the presidents in order, forwards and backwards. by the time the late drive was over he became the the master of presidents. he brought us to our destination safely and we were able to enjoy a full day of poolin and chillin before our dc show. james’s cousin and aunt brought over some eggy mccheese squares and bagles with the homemade salsa for breakfast. it was delicious. thank you james’s family for taking care of us.

we played at a place called the red palace which is located in this artsy district. it was a really cool venue with good sound. we ended up selling out the show which was exciting for us, and we gained a whole new fanbase that night. it was my turn to take us out of the city. we took one of the main arteries out and after a mile or so the mule was the only vehicle on the street. suddenly, two intersections up, two cop cars clog up the four way as if they were blocking us. we were being monitored. it turns out that they don’t let mules drive in front of the capital building so they stopped us to see where we were goin. the cop walked up and noticed that we all look like a bunch of opie taylors so he very politely rerouted us to our destination. we woke up the next day and gave ourselves 5 hours to make a 3.5 hour trip to bethlehem pennsylvania. doody decided to take the wheel for this leg. he hasn’t driven in a while, and definitely picked a pretty horrible day to come back out of the bullpen. it was raining pretty steady when we started the trek and the garmin was having an information meltdown . it kept leading us to the this parking lot that was clearly not an entrance ramp. we finally found our entrance by just driving around and randomly stumbling upon it. the rain really started to come down so we all decided to stop for some long sandwiches at quiznos. they were the toastiest of all. i got a chicken guacimus, extra chee baconius, mug root beer, and a 9 count bag of sun chips. we finished up and hit the road. immediately we run into the traffic jam of ages. we slowed down to about 25 mph and maintained that average speed for about 3.5/4 hours. at this point the garmin said we will not arrive until 7pm and that is when our set was suppose to start. we were all on edge and the rain kept coming down. torrential downpours of unmeasurable fury. eventually the traffic cleared up and doody started breakin “mule” land speed records. when doody drives, i feel like i should wear a full body harness and a football helmet. we got closer and closer to the festival and the edge factor was at an all time high. we were on the phone with the stage manager trying to choreograph how we were going to get all of our stuff on stage and set up in record time. in the midst of all this chaos i forgot that i had to tee tee. the stagehands greeted us as we pulled up and started hauling our gear to the stage. we ran up on the stage and got everything set up and checked, then hit our first note by 7:15. pretty solid. two songs in, i had to pee so bad that it was coming out of my eyeballs. i had to position myself in this weird stance where i would occasionally sway to relieve the discomfort. the crowd was dense and ready to rock so that definitely helped my situation. they were hungry for the guv’s and we delivered a full size platter of american rock and roll, then i went to the bathroom. to reward myself, i got two roast beef raps, ½ of a corndog, and ¼ of jenkins’ fries. it started pouring rain on us as we were ordering our food and we all got soaked. we sprinted back to the bus to chill and eat our deep fried snackers. all of our clothes were completely wet and we had about two hours to drive to our hotel. the only way we could make it to our hotel, especially after such a chaotic day, was dewskis and the journey to the center of the earth. we stopped at a gas station to get some dewskis to fuel us for the trip. this was james “mcdewski” trimble’s idea. he got the name “mcdewski” from an incident that happened while he was trying out for medical school. one day, when he was studying, he drank a code red dewski every hour on the hour for 24 hours straight. mcdewski. we started chuggin dewskis and listening to the journey to the center of the earth. it’s a story about these three people going on a journey to a land that resembles fraggle rock. this dude narrates it with the accompaniment of an orchestra full of laser sounds and funky bass. they run into mythical creatures like woozles and hefalump’s on the way. go ahead and do yourself a favor, take the journey. you won’t regret it. then i put on soulive for the last hour and a half. we finally made it to our hotel to get some good rest.

i didn’t pack any non stage clothing for our gulf shores/birmingham run so justin told me that he would buy me a t-shirt. on the way to the gulf we stopped at a gas station and i had forgotten about justin’s offer earlier. when i got back to the mule, he presented me with the most beautiful t shirt in all the land that he bought off the t shirt rack in the gas store. it was clad with eagles and motorcycles taking up all the prime real estate in the torso area. it made me feel free and sassy. both shows rocked hard and we also got to stay in our manager’s beach condo. thank you greg. our friends, ponderosa, played at the gulf shores show as well and they always dominate. we love doin shows with them. oxford was really cool because we had the pleasure of playing with zac brown recording artist levi lowrey. him and his guitar player, danny mcadams, agreed to do some music videos with us. we will put those up soon. they killed their set then we came up and did our thing. thank you to levi, danny, and our fans that drove from all around to see us in oxford. the majority of our crowd there did not live in oxford. kinda weird, but still a cool experience. on the way to our motel, justin ran over a deer. he said that he is sorry.

this week we will be preparing for our first appearance at the tennessee theatre. it will be the most knoxville weekend ever invented. scott miller, guvs, ut football, firecrackers. don’t be weird. buy your tickets.