Band trip

Whew, after four days of going around doing stuff, we all got back last night in one piece. Here's a day-by-day outlook.

Wednesday: Not much. Driving, dinner, then more driving. We got to the hotel at around 9:30.

Thursday: We played two concerts in the morning, with the second one being better than the first. Organization was a bit of a problem, but got better as the trip went on. Then we went down to the Portland zoo. I used over half my film there (yes, I still use that ancient technology called film), and half of that is of penguins. Then we went to Washington Square mall. To my surprise, I bought a lot more than I expected. One thing was a T-shirt with that emblem you find on the Hylian Shield from Zelda - Ocarina of Time (this one, to be exact), and I bought a 2-CD Glenn Miller collection from a store that was having a 30% off clearance sale.

Friday: We played at a concert at a school on the coast. I broke a string. During a solo. Which isn't entirely a bad thing, except the entire guitar goes out of tune. For me, that's twice on the trip, and twice during a solo, and the first for each were on different occasions. Oh, well. One thing I make sure of when I buy strings is that they come with extras. I'll replace it when I get the chance. Then we went down to Seaside (yes, that's the name of the town. You can also find the town of Boring there.). The beach is great, even if we didn't go swimming, and the shops there are really cool. I bought a really nice leather bag for my laptop and it cost me 20 bucks. But the best part is that I found an In the Groove 2 machine there and I got to try it out. Other than the fact that the volume was too low, it was awesome. I want to try another one sometime; I only got one game. I also saw an F-Zero AX machine there. We went to a cheese factory (awesome) after that. That evening we went down to Fred Meyer (for fellow Canadians wondering what that is, it's kind of like Wal-Mart meets Safeway) and I found a shirt that looks like one of those football t-shirts with the "property of" thing in big letters, except it said "Property of Jesus". It's awesome. I wanted the one that looked like the eBay logo, except it said iPray, but I didn't want the same shirt as someone else. Oh, and self-serve checkouts rock.

Saturday: We went to some outlet stores in the morning, which was a bit more interesting than I expected, but I didn't get anything. Then it was a long drive home. I saw Mr. Holland's Opus in its entirety for the first time. It's a great movie. It was interesting to note that on our way out, the US customs people checked our passports and everything, but the Canadian customs people on the way back let us go after the driver reported us. We got back tired, but in one piece.

Since it's my last trip, I can post favorites.

Grade 9 - Nelson - My fave of the four. I dunno why, I think it was the hotel with the really nice pool, even if I forgot my swim trunks that year.

Grade 10 - Prince Rupert, Northern BC - A lot of driving. I didn't get the bus I wanted either. Other than that, though, it was fun. Least favorite of the four.

Grade 11 - Lethbridge - I liked it. Having access to a DDR machine for 3 hours helped. Can't think of too much else. 3rd.

Grade 12 - Oregon - I bought a lot of cool stuff, found an ITG2 machine, and did a bunch of cool stuff. But something about it seemed missing. 2nd.

This trip also gave me a lot to think about, but I don't really feel like talking about it right now. I've talked enough, anyway.