So Tiffany and I
have been driving her car around Texas and Louisiana showing my film. That’s
the only part of the country I really didn’t hit on my tour last summer.
In New Orleans,
only 7 people showed up for my film. The theater owner couldn’t believe it.
He said it musta been the war. It was the second night of the war and people
stayed home. In all the other cities, the turnout was much better, but I still
think that the war was effecting it. I told people in the Q&A each night
that I wasn’t watching much TV. Kinda a “What if they gave a war and no one
watched?” thing….ya know? Their ratings would fall. I’m still staying informed,
I glance at the paper each day. But they want to hypnotize us with their TV
coverage. Just look at the graphics and sound effects, it’s very very Hollywood.
They want you panicked. I won’t buy it.
Not watching was
partially inspired by something Ian MacKaye told me right after the World
Trade Center was bombed….he said, “I don’t watch the TV coverage…I won’t let
them work their magic on me…”
I watched the Viet
Nam war on TV when I was five. It was like a football game, a score board
of “our” dead and “their” dead each night. Shit….I’m sick of this.
Here’s a little
bit of info you all might dig—George Dubya Bush and his daddy ain’t even real
Texans. They’re from Maine! They just
own land here to be able to seem “down home” to the voters, and also for tax
reasons. All real Texans know this. …..Do you know what a “Hat Act” is? It’s
what real cowboys call fake country singers like Garth Brooks. Me thinks Dubya
is the most successful hat act ever. Why sell a million records when you can
kill a million people? That’s a much bigger boner, no?
In New Orleans Tiffany
and I also visited Maggie McEleney http://www.gallerygorgon.com/
She’s in DIY or
DIE. She’s a very good friend of mine, an ex-sweetie, and wonderful artist.
I haven’t seen her in person in about ten years, and we had a blast. She was
very sweet, we hung out and had some yip dog juice and burritos on her veranda
while watching the traffic on the street below her studio. It was a magical
good time. She even gave Tiffany a dog collar for her dumb Dalmatian. It had
belonged to Maggie’s dog, who died recently.
Maggie and I and
Tiffany are all Irish and we got to taking about that, because Maggie was
the float queen this year for the New Orleans St. Patrick’s Day parade. (Kinda
like a little green Mardi Gras). Maggie showed us the beads she threw out…looked
like Mardi Gras beads with big gold potatoes on them. I thought they looked
more like golden bloated livers.
Maggie told me that
Sigmund Freud said that the Irish are the only people incapable of benefiting
from psychoanalysis. I think this is because if you got God you don’t need
it, and if you’ve got liquor, you don’t want it.
a
crawdad on the street in New Orleans
The
Blacksmith Shop-A bar I used to drink at in New Orleans--also the oldest bar
in the Quarter. (photo taken out of a moving car)
When Tiffany and
I showed up in Baton Rouge to show the film, at a really cool art gallery,
two cute hippie punkie kids drove up and said “Do you know anything about
the showing here tonight?” I said, “Yeah, it’s in two hours, I’m the filmmaker”.
Jill invited us to her house for a
home cooked meal! We met her folks and had a good ole southern hospitable
time. Yum. I love art and food and humans.
Great Q&A that
night, and out of 29 people there,
15 bought copies of the movie! Really smart folks, great questions, and people
were quite moved by the film. And one gal is gonna do her thesis on the film!
San Antonio we had
about 50 people. For some reason, no one had questions at the Q&A, but
people asked individual questions of me later. I guess they were shy. One
really cool old man bought a copy. He was about 80 and said he was gonna donate
it to the local video rental place. He also gave me a copy of the International
Worker Paper, or whatever that commie rag is called.
Austin showed at
a real theater. 60 people, good screen and sound, good Q&A. After went
out for dinner with Tiffany’s favorite cousins and her brother. I also met
her mother on this tour. She’s nice.
Austin is the San
Francisco of Texas. Beautiful people everywhere, a million bands, a hundred
clubs, artists and hipsters akimbo.
In Houston I did
a cool radio interview, and an in-store where
I played music, and showed the film in two different bars. Great responses.
The whole tour was
great. Met lots of cool people, broke even, and touched some lives with the
film.
We went to see a
cool puppet show with puppets doing drugs:
http://www.houston-press.com/issues/2003-03-20/calendar.html/1/index.html
When I got home,
I ran into Steven from the Flaming Lips in the Burbank airport. He saw me
and said hi. That’s the second time in a few months that someone I haven’t
seen in ten years recognized me. (first time was Eric, a bike messenger I
worked with 15 years ago in San Francisco) I think that’s a good sign that
I’m aging well.
I miss Tiff, but
it’s good to be back amongst my things. I’m sipping coffee from my new Alamo
coffee mug. It says “The Alamo: Cradle of Texas Liberty”.
md.
Tiff is the only
girl I’ve spent 12 nights in a row with in ten years. I usually hate that
shit, and I loved being with her.
April first. She
just called!
She’s coming out
to see me in two weeks! Yeah!
Life is good……………….
me asleep in the car on tour
Tiff at the ALamo
At hotel checkout
