Feb
23
2009

Sunset

(Add / View Comments) (0)PhotosMonday, February 23, 2009 - 09:13:34 pm
(Posted Under: Photography)
One of the surprising things about the bushfires being so bad, is that they haven't been that noticable in terms of sunsets, especially in comparison to other years.

However coming home tonight I witnessed the sort of sunset that was more identifiable with summer 2006 and 2007.

As a result I ended up with some incredible photos.

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What was particularly impressive was the amount of blue in the sky despite the vibrant orange / red sun. It's been a while since I've taken some really jaw dropping photos, but that was certainly remedied tonight!
Feb
18
2009

Circular Quay

(Add / View Comments) (0)PhotosWednesday, February 18, 2009 - 09:28:51 pm
(Posted Under: Travel)
It was nice waking up today knowing that we didn't have do anything other than check out the sights of Sydney. Previous to last night we'd planned to spend today at Torronga Zoo, but given everything, we decided we'd check out the Harbor Bridge and Opera House instead.

We started out going south on George, with the intention of checking out the hotel where I stayed the last time I was in Sydney. It was by all a fruitless effort, wandering around Thomas Street (ironically we walked by the back of it). While we'd walked incredible amounts since Saturday, we decided and agreed without much effort that we were going to take the train to Circular Quay today, especially given the size of the blisters on my feet last night. So it wasn't that difficult to abandon our search and head over to Central Station. Weather wise, the day had started out as horrible as yesterday, and on arrival at Circular Quay there was a down pour. Which last about 10 minutes, before blowing over and revealing blue skies - which we hoped we were going to have for the rest of the day - and thankfully did.

Photobox ImageLast night I'd tried to spot the Harbor Bridge from Darling Harbor, which wasn't at all possible, however today, we had the bridge to the left, and Opera House to the right - no shortage of sights. We first headed over to the Opera House. It was interesting seeing the entrance to the Botanical Gardens and that we were actually fairly close (more so than I realized anyway) on our walk to the hotel yesterday. It was also interesting looking out towards Potts Point and the naval base and seeing how the first hotel wasn't that far away. We spent a reasonable amount of time looking around and taking photos - including one of Katie making our with her new lover - the Sydney Opera House. In honor of the story on Rove about the weirdo who married the Effel Tower. [smile] Hilarious!

Photobox ImageWe then headed over to the other side for a closer view of the bridge. As previously mentioned, on the plane at at the top of Sydney Tower I thought the bridge looked a lot smaller than I had imagined. Down here at Circular Quay however it looked a lot more like what I'd expected.

Throughout the day I'd wanted to walk across the bridge, but it seemed like the day was disappearing fairly quickly, so it was questionable about whether it'd actually be possible. Though, with still a few hours before our flight, we went on a search for an entrance to get onto the bridge. By all accounts, initially it didn't seem like you could without walking all the way back to the Cahill Express Way, which I didn't think we had either the time, nor the constitution for. All the same, we starting walking back, following the bridge along Lower Fort Street. Either way, I really enjoyed how everything looked around there, which was a contrast to the inner city, which I struggled to enjoy all that much yesterday.

Photobox ImageAs we continued on, we hit an entrance to the bridge. Although it was getting later in the day, I absolutely wanted to at least go up there. Once up there, the quest turned from just that, to walking across there. I grabbed Katie's bag, which she'd been carrying almost all, and off we went. I took some sort of pride in carrying that Crumpler bag, that was loading with 5kg of paperwork for the last time, across the Sydney Harbor Bridge. The views, particularly of the Opera House were great from the bridge, and made for some great photos.

Once on the other side, which was more suburban we took a bit of rest, before deciding to walk down to the water and Sydney's Luna Park. It's something that we talked about doing initially a week or so ago, but I really didn't think we'd get to it today. But alas, we did, which was really cool, especially since we can now say we've stepped inside both Luna Parks. By the time we were ready to go, it was obvious we should start making our way to the airport. Once we got over the bridge, I really wanted to walk back over it (with the 5kg of paperwork [wink] ), but there certainly wasn't time for that. Which was fine, I was quite impressed and somewhat surprised that we'd actually managed to squeeze in everything that we did today! We went down to the pier to catch a ferry back, but since they didn't go direct across the quay, we opted for walking back to the Milson's Point train station, and catching a train back over the Harbor Bridge, and on to the airport.

On entering the airport from the station, I got a huge sense that I'd been there just yesterday. And whatdoyaknow, it's because we were there yesterday! [smile] We checked in, and sat around for a bit at the domestic check in counters, which was pretty cool - the windows behind the counters at Sydney, with a purply dusk coming over the sky. Having some downtime we both noticed that we'd gotten somewhat burnt today, which was funny given that we'd been fine in Queensland. After applying some water to our red skin, we moved inside the departure section of the terminal, in search of a Sydney gel cube, to complete the collection for places we've been, and have thus far been unsuccessful in finding. Sydney Airport wasn't that much more helpful, and I had to settle for a gel filled ruler instead, like what we saw on our quest in Queensland. After which we headed to our gate, with not too much time before we were boarding, and heading back to Melbourne.

Once at Melbourne, waiting to be picked up in the quick pick up section, I had another deja vu, of doing the exact same thing. Except, it wasn't a deja vu, we actually had been standing in the same spot just two nights earlier! [smile] At least this time all we had to worry about the next morning was getting up for work, rather than getting up at 4:30 to come back to the airport. neither the less, it did feel a little like groundhogs day.
Feb
17
2009

Sydney

The Juant Up And Down The East Coast Continues

(Add / View Comments) (0)PhotosTuesday, February 17, 2009 - 09:28:05 pm
(Posted Under: Travel, Operation Desert Rock)
Last night we got home at ahout 12:30, and didn't get to bed until after 1:30. Just to get back up at 3:30, to head back to Melbourne airport for our 6:00 flight to Sydney! <insert School Of Rock quote>.

Self check-in was an absolute blessing this morning. As was flying Virgin Blue in general. Having a Tiger experience this morning would have been a bit rough. Unlike Saturday, we had about enough time to grab some potato chips and munch them down as a hearty breakfast before boarding. We were back out on the tarmac, for the third time in the last three days. For something that seems rare to do, we've had no shortage of it. The flight was mostly a blur to me, it didn't take long to be passed out, only to be woken up again before long.

Flying in to Sydney was cool, because of the few times I've done it before (only twice previously), I'd never seen the harbor bridge (from memory anyway). This time I saw it from the air - it was impressive how small it looked. One of those iconic things you see your whole life, and then it looking not as big as you'd expect in real life.

Once getting off the plane we headed outside for a smoke, which was quite familiar from when I came to Sydney in 2004. By this stage, we were both in good spirits, but definitely feeling worse for wear. And just hoping that we'd both hold up well in the interview, given how sleep deprived we were. Yet at the same time, ready to rock. It's kind of a weird feeling. One second wanting to collapse, all the while excited and ready to grab life by the balls. Which became a theme for the whole morning.

After the nicotine hit, it was back into the airport to catch the train. Now, a train from the airport to the city is a good idea. An idea that Melbourne might want to think about. Right away we both commented on how much nicer the trains were in comparison to Melbourne too.

We jumped off at St. James station, and set out to find a supermarket which proved to be a bit of an adventure. Wandering around a foreign city, is different like that. I also noticed, right on exiting the train station how Sydney is a lot more British looking. In anycase, we found a Coles express, and in the process walking around passed the building where we had to go for the interview. With the knowledge of where that was, and the annoyance with the hustle and bustle of the city streets, we headed back to the park adjacent to St. James Station to re-coup.

On the way we'd passed Sydney Tower, which we headed over to to kill time until the interview at 11. It's something we wanted to do anyway, so that ability to do it when we had time to kill anyway was really good.

Photobox ImageDespite the weather being really crap, it was quite humid and waiting to go up the tower was fairly painful given the heat, and lack of sleep. After getting the tickets, and then an extremely long elevator trip we made it to the lookout. The bad weather made the viewing somewhat less enjoyable, but at the same time, it was an absolute godsent to have a place to sit, relax and check out paperwork. It was also good to get a sense of where everything was from up there.

As it got closer to 11, we headed back down and over to the consulate. The whole experience was vastly different than our experience at the consulate in Melbourne in November. Firstly, there was no scanning of barcode tags. And there was virtually no-one there, and hence not the two hour wait. Unfortunately I had to go back down to get cash as their credit card processing was not working, which proved to be quite an adventure getting back to the ground floor. On finally returning, it was a very short wait before the interview. Leading up, especially given the lack of sleep, we'd hoped that it was going to be a quick thing, but were all the same expecting an intense, long grilling. The ease of the process completely surpassed my 'best case' hopes. Literally about 3 questions before the clerk said 'Congratulations, your visa has been approved, welcome to the US!". Always being prepared to expect the worst, or a long drawn out process, I wasn't fully ready for that, especially not after only three casual questions, and the excitement combined with the feeling of "really?" was interesting. Which I guess is just natural, when you put so much time and effort into something, you're always expecting to have to do more even when the payoff is moments away.

All in all we were in and out in under 45 minutes, most of which was probably me going and getting cash. As we left and found a place to regroup the excitement and reality really started to hit. Certainly the excitement, which now was reaching notable levels for the first time in the whole process. Throughout the process, there is always the concern of getting everything that needs to be done done, worrying about if things don't work out - so much so, than in some weird way, to some degree that you loose some site of the reality in amongst all the effort to keep things on track. Finally, being granted what your shooting for, the excitement on why you were shooting for it can finally kick in!

After a good 10 or so minutes of reeling over everything, we decided to get to the hotel. We stopped past the train station, but inevitably decided to walk it, no doubt somewhat influenced by the renewed adrenaline we were now running on. Which is really saying something, given the busyness of our trip to Queensland, and still having had minimal sleep. We eventually made our way to the Botanical Gardens, through The Domain, and towards the hotel. Walking pretty much the extent of the Naval base at Wooloomaloo, we established we missed a turn off somewhere. At this point, it was time to accepts defeat. We'd already pushed it pretty far, and trying to push it any further was just taking it too far. So I set out on hailing down a taxi. $5 later we were outside our hotel - well worth every sent.

Since we had to pull the Sydney trip together in 2 weeks, we'd opted for Challis Lodge in Pots Point for both the location (close to the Opera House and Harbor Bridge), and price. We both new it wasn't going to be fancy, but we've stayed in "boutique" hotels before (Congress Hotel, Tuscon) and can "slum it". But not long after checking in, it became apparently that we're not really up for slumming it this much. [smile] If we'd had a room inside the old terrace style building, maybe it'd be okay (not that we saw those rooms, so who knows), but the rooms out the back weren't what we were expecting. For mine, it was comparable to a backpackers hostel, and if we'd wanted to stay at a backpackers, well that's what we'd have looked in to. After a bit of a recoup, which included me napping for an hour or two, we both decided that we deserved better than this, and that it was just wrong after our good news to not be staying somewhere comfortable.

On coming to this agreement, we headed around the corner to an internet cafe inside a Blockbuster to find another place to stay. Just walking down there the area convinced us more that it was time to get the hell out of dodge. Within half an hour we'd checked out, happily forgoing any refund, taken a taxi to George Street and were checking in to Breakfree On George. Which combined with everything we'd already paid made for a somewhat expensive 1 nights accommodation, but was without a doubt worth it.

After checking in and finally resting a bit, this time in comfort, I was ready to hit the town. After all, our plan had initially been to get the interview out of the way, and then spend the afternoon seeing the sights. It was getting on to 5pm and the afternoon thus far been spent on getting the first hotel, and then relocating here. Plus, it was time to eat.

We headed down to Darling Harbor, on foot, which for all extents and purposes wasn't that successful for either food nor sight seeing. However, it did mean that we got to see Darling Harbor, albeit against a rainy and miserable backdrop. After walking around the whole area, we made our way back, again on foot, in the hopes of finding some food and drink options. Before leaving I'd decided that I wanted pizza. We frustratingly walked most of the way without finding anything. It was kinda frustrating to me that in Surfer's we there were too many places that we wanted to eat and not enough time, here in Sydney nowhere we wanted to eat. Once back on George Street, Katie was convinced that it was going to be good to us. Half way back to the hotel we hit a Safeway, and on the next block, a Pizza Hut! Which was really like finding an oasis in a desert! Armed with Coke, chips and hot pizza we headed the remaining few blocks to our hotel. Ahh, everything was finally coming up Millhouse!
Feb
16
2009

Surfers Paradise

(Add / View Comments) (0)PhotosMonday, February 16, 2009 - 09:27:07 pm
(Posted Under: Travel)
This morning we slept in as much as we could before checkout time, which was nice, given the whirlwind that is our life. We then packed, and ate the warmed up dinner from last night (Seaworld) for breakfast.

Given how terrible the whether was when we arrived (pouring rain, not really much different to arrival last year), the weather yesterday was glorious, and today wasn't looking any different. Although it's been a really short trip, it's been absolutely awesome, and I'm so glad that we opted to stay for 3 days.

After checking out we went down to Cavill, and on the search for another souvineer gel filled block, when I am apparently collecting now. As a result, we ended up walking around more than we would have otherwise intended. In the midst of this we also phoned New Mexico to find out what time they were opened for lunch. Which, unfortunately they weren't at all. Which was a huge disappointment to me, although, all the same, I have no regrets that we didn't try to go last night. As we've more than discovered, we're great at pushing ourselves - you're not hard core unless you live hard core - but we know when not to push it too far, and that would have been, without a doubt. Instead, after consulting the slew of brochures Katie always seems to accumulate [wink] we decided on Montezuma's for lunch. After walking around more, and becoming triumphant on a Gold Coast gel block, we started to make our way to Montezuma's.

Photobox ImageMuch to my surprise, it was only three blocks from Cavill, and was a much shorter jaunt than I'd expected. Which rocked my world, because I was ready to be sitting and eating! Why do we love this place so much? Because it's fucking awesome, that's why! [wink] The decore was as good not, if not rivaled the Melbourne location. Immediately on walking in disappointment about New Mexico was all but gone. [smile] After going out the back for a smoke (overlooking the beach), and then coming back inside, I couldn't help but be really reminded of actually being in Mexico. Helped along by the Tecate I ordered being in a bottle. Literally the first time I've drunk Tecate out of a bottle since I was in Mexico.

Lunch was awesome, as the food always is at Montezuma's, and it being half price for lunch was a bonus. It really makes me sad that the Melbourne location isn't closer to work! Though, maybe as far as my wallet is concerned, maybe that is a good thing. [wink] In anycase, lunch was awesome, and just sitting down was very welcomed.

After eating, we headed down to the beach (impressively for the first time since we've been here), basically to kill some time before heading to the airport. Since it was pretty much as hot and sunny as yesterday we found a good shaded spot, and talked about how good the trip has been, entertained ourselves with topless beached whales [wink], and dipped our feet in the ocean (before we leave again). Around four we took off, with the plan to walk up to where we stayed last year and catch the bus from there. Ironically it turned out to be a good homage to our last day last year, where we did pretty much the same thing, replacing lugging a laptop with dragging a suitcase along the beach. It was somewhat less windy than last year, but we had the exact same questions about whether it being too far, and on arrival at Wharf Road determine that it wasn't. After a quick stop to rid our shoes of sand (which Katie's sandles seem that they will be filled for a long time to come) and then a brief moment of posing as Japanese tourists at the duty free place so Katie could use the bathroom, we were on a bus and on our way back to the airport.

Our flight back was vastly different to our flight up, in that there were no major disasters, and the flight crew seemed to have a better grasp of english. Before long, we were walking across the tarmac at Melbourne airport Hunter S. Thompson style (well, kinda [wink] ), and waiting to be picked up. With clear knowledge that in just a few ours, we were going to get back up and do it all over again!
Feb
15
2009

Seaworld

(Add / View Comments) (0)PhotosSunday, February 15, 2009 - 09:26:19 pm
(Posted Under: Travel)
This morning after a much welcomes night of sleep, we headed out to catch a bus to Seaworld, not before stopping at a Coles (now open, woo!) for some supplies and to pick up some more brochures, which Katie spent most of the bus trip frantically leafing through looking for entry deals.

Photobox ImageWe arrived a bit later than we would have otherwise planned (10:30ish), and after a few steps from the bus, I had to exclaim "Christ on a crutch!" on seeing the line. Although the place had been open for half an hour, the line of people flowed well in to the carpark. It was somewhat surprising, given school has gone back, but I guess it was a Sunday. We considered coming back tomorrow, but given having to get to the airport, we stayed the course. At the end of the day it took just under and hour to get inside the gates. It seemed like it was going to be a Disneyland experience all over again (crowded), but once we were inside, it was all good, though we were constantly on the go to fit everything in.

Photobox ImageFirst stop for me was a cigarette while Katie got donuts (with our all day meal deal), and then over to watch the Fish Detectives show. Ironically my camera batteries died half way through it, which was an incredible pain. And kind of testament to how full on things have been the last couple of weeks, since I'd obviously planned to charge them, but just haven't gotten around to it. Kind of a kick in the teeth to have to buy batteries at a theme park though.

After the show we had a bit of time to recoup, and look around. Although we'd both commented on how Seaworld was more expensive than both Dreamworld and Movie World, we were both impressed by it, and was definitely worth it, not only because it was the only theme park that we didn't do last year. And to that end, it being really good that we decided to make the trip 3 days rather than just one, or two as we were originally looking at doing.

We stopped off at Seaseme Street Beach to pick up some batteries, and also a Seame Street Beach enviro bag for Katie. Where I learnt that she had seem some last year, and had wanted to come to Seaworld since, pretty much so that that she could add that to her enviro bag collection! Aww, how cute! It's quite impressive how giddy you can make my girl by buying her a $2 environment friendly Seaseme Street Beach bag! [smile]

Photobox ImageAfer that we touched some sting rays (another animal for Katie to add to her impressive list of animals she's touched in Queensland), which really seemed like a liability suit just waiting to happen. A huge tank of sting rays, unsupervised, inviting anyone and everyone to touch them. Messing with a string ray didn't work out that well for Steve Irwin1. Neither the less, it must be safe somehow, and we left without any barbs sticking out of ourselves. [smile] From there it was over to Shark Bay. Definitely one of the highlights in my opinion. The Melbourne Aquarium is pretty good, but really pales in comparison to the two tanks of tropical fish and sharks at Seaworld.

Photobox ImageAfter this we headed over to the Seaseme Street Beach show. Sitting next to me, was one of the most excited audience members. That's right, Katie's enthusiasm and excitement about the show rivaled that of any of the 3 years olds there! [smile]

From here, we decided that it was time to cash in on the unlimited popcorn portion of our meal deal, which was the major selling point of the deal, but had been largely overlooked, due to how busy we'd been since we didn't get in to the park until around 11:30. Unfortunately this meant a walk back to the entrance of the park. Which immediately turned into a hustled walk right back to the back of the park for the dolphin show, when we denied entry on the monorail because we had popcorn. Our only complaint with Seaworld (other than the stupid "no food or drink on the monorail" rule [wink] ) was that the narrow long layout of the park makes it hard to quickly get around to the attractions.

On the way we stopped back at Seaseme Street Beach for the scheduled photo opportunities, for Katie to get her photo with Grover. Which turned out to be a disappointment, as it was a $15 a pop affair, which is a bit rich. We'd expected all the characters out, and not to have to pay for a professional photo. That, and the fact that there were no roving characters throughout the day left Katie a bit cold.

Photobox ImageWe made it back to dolphin pool (ironically passing a popcorn vendor! You bastard! [wink] ) in time to catch most of the show, which was something I didn't want to miss. From here we took the monorail back to the entrance to cash in the rest of our meal deals - which turned out to be a good deal, since it was $16 odd a person (2 donuts, lunch, an icecream, and unlimited popcorn all day) and the meals themselves were $14. By this time it was almost 5pm, which goes to how we really didn't have time throughout the day to worry about eating. I guess the heat (it was a scorcher) also helped in us not being that hungry throughout the day. But we got our meals and icecreams, the meals which neither of us could finish - which brought on a predicament with our plans to eat at New Mexico tonight. We were both too hot, too tired and too full to be able to conceive doing that. And trust me, I have been really looking forward to a melt your tongue off spicy New Mexico taco, but at this point, more food was the last thing we could think about! [smile]

After stopping at the incredibly packed gift shop, we headed out, and home, stopping off along the way to try and pick up some more drinks, only to find, once again, every supermarket in town was closed!
Feb
14
2009

Valentine's Day

(Add / View Comments) (0)PhotosSaturday, February 14, 2009 - 09:25:10 pm
(Posted Under: Travel)
This morning we headed to the airport early since we got a left, which gave us plenty of time to kill at the airport. The smoke from the bush fires has definitely been the worse today, actually surprising it's taken this long, since the bad day was last Saturday, but the smoke didn't really follow. However, it was bad enough today to be really glad to be going up north and getting away from it. It was a bit of a kick in the teeth that one of the restaurants had burnt food inside the Tiger Airways terminal, so there was really no getting away from the burning smell. If it wasn't bush fires outside, it was burning food inside!

Not surprisingly, there was nothing but a blanket of smoke to be seen when the plane took off. Given how bad it looked driving to the airport, this wasn't that surprising, however it lasted a lot longer than I expected (until we were somewhere over NSW). The flight was pretty good, except for the turbulence at the end, the kids behind us screaming (in delight!) each time the plane dropped, the inevitable throwing up of passengers, and being put in a holding pattern outside of the Gold Coast airport - all stressing Katie out quite a bit. And making us wonder if our fears of getting the cheap flights through Tiger had been realized! [smile] However, all was okay, and we touched down after 10 minutes of circling the airport, much to Katie's delight and relief!

With out feet on the ground, after a smoke and decompression time, it was out to the highway to get up to Surfer's. It was noticeably nice knowing the area and transport options this time around, which made it easy to get to our hotel. On the way we noticed a Montezuma's restaurant, so we immediately put the location of it into the vault. It's actually weird to think that the last time we were up here we didn't know the wonders of Montezumas. It's really weird that July last year was the first time we'd eaten there, it seems like much longer, probably because of the amount of times we've been since.

On arrival at the apartments we were quite impressed by the Mexican / Spanish influence of the apartments. This was completely unplanned, we'd chosen the place based on price and location, but worked out damn nice. After some well deserved downtime, we headed out to find some supplies (noticing that Chevron Island was probably the bad side of town) and then chill a bit more, before heading over to the Hard Rock Cafe around 9.

On getting down there, Katie went on a brief mission to find cheap entry to Seaworld. After that, we went off to find the entrance to the Hard Rock Cafe, which funnily was just as hard to find as this time last year! Must remember that it's actually on the street, not in the mall.

Photobox ImageImmediately on entering it was obvious that this was absolutely the best thing to be doing for Valentines Day. We threw this all together about 3 weeks ago, which seemed somewhat extravagant, but being here, no doubt that it's absolutely where we should be for Valentines Day. Despite the inclination to branch out, I went with the usual chicken fajita. Much to Katie's delight, since we booked for Valentine's Day, we got a free desert. My girl, she likes her free stuff! She was also quite chuffed with her collectible glass that her drink came in.

This year, the Gin Blossoms encounters were few and far behind. Though there was a guy playing acoustic again, there were no Hey Jealousy covers. The Hard Rock had also refreshed their collection, so no New Miserable Experience gold record either. Overall I think their collection was a lot better last year, and the memorabilia was more thinned out. However, there were some notable items, like Toad's Fear on vinyl, and a letter from Slash to (My) Michelle, which Katie also enjoyed given that she's currently reading the Slash book and knows about Michelle. Impressively we didn't leave until after midnight.

Afterwards we headed back to the apartment, not before attempting to pick up some more supplies, which began our annoyance with Surfer's Paradise and supermarkets, which apparently don't say open past 6pm, even on a Saturday.
Feb
10
2009

I've Trained My iPod Well

(Add / View Comments) (0)Tuesday, February 10, 2009 - 08:28:30 am
(Posted Under: Music Music)
So this morning I had my 'Essential Tempe' playlist on random, and wass listening to Buy American while passing the City Condos on St. Kilda Road. On the side of the building is "Promenade", which prompted me to think that I wanted to listen to that song, by Jason Longo. The very next song was Cactus Fields, by Jason. Which I happened to skip. Next song up on shuffle mode - Promenade! Why thank you iPod for for reading my mind! Really spooky!

Either I have it trained well, or it was just on a Jason Longo kick, because the song after was Ashamed by Muddy Violet's. And no, the playlist in question doesn't have that many Longo songs on it.
Now Playing: The Pistoleros - Hang On To Nothing
Feb
04
2009

The Rise Of Declyne Continues...

Steve Larson Leaves The Peacemakers

(Add / View Comments) (0)Wednesday, February 4, 2009 - 08:00:59 pm
(Posted Under: Tempe Music Scene Tempe Music Scene, Music Music)
Well, it seems that the previous blog, and the decline referenced thereof continues. News today, Steve Larson has left Roger Clyne & The Peacemakers.

It's unclear exactly who initiated the split and what the reasons behind it are (one can make guesses, even without much of an imagination), but one thing is certain - this is the final nail in the Roger Clyne & The Peacemakers coffin.

One of the reasons for holding back on comments on how terrible the band has gotten, and reason for holding out a flicker of hope for the band, was Steve. Despite the decline, Steve somehow, someway brought a glimmer of credibility to the band. I didn't mention it in my previous blog, however, over the weekend I did discuss with my associate that we wished Steve would just quit the band. It's a double edged sword, since he was the last thing that made the band remotely interesting, though it was also hard to take Steve playing in this bastardized version of the band that was getting worse by the week. My initial thought to the news was 'thank fucking god!'. The second being that the band is over. Even if they don't know it yet, it is.

Given the state and the direction of the band, the thought of Larson getting out there and doing more of his own stuff is feally rewarding. This should be really great - the mind boggles in relation to what Steve is going to do from here. *cough* Dead Hot Workshop reunion? Probably not, but anything is possible I guess.

As for the band, the end is near, and it's really been a long time coming. I remember 4 years ago, a certain musician predicted that the band was on it's last legs. Admitadly it was a premature prediction, but in highensight, it actually wasn't that long until the band started to suck. Since then, the doom has felt more and more iniment, pretty much each blunder that has followed.

One of the more interesting aspects of the split is the timing - the day that the first track from Glow In The Dark is 'released'. Which really poses the question - will the band avoid implosion long enough to get all the tracks released (14 weeks from today)? Probably. However, if not, I wouldn't fall out of my chair with surprise. Just the way I didn't today. Steve leaving the band is kind of huge news, as he effectively goes back as far as PH (even if he was the opener for those shows [wink] ), but then again, it really wasn't that surprising, especially coming off the long conversation of last weekend. In reality they'll probably stay together long enough to get the 14 tracks out. But beyond that, I give them anywhere between 6 months to 3 years. Actually, 3 years seems like a huge stretch. Let's say 2. If they're still together beyond that I'll be completely shocked. And if not - I called it! [wink] I mean, folks, you've got some serious problems when you have fewer original members in your band than the Gin Blossoms do! [lol]

In any case, this is actually more of a relief than a shock. Rock on Steve Larson I say!

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