When we got to D.C. we met up with Stephanie’s old greenpeace friend Matt and his boyfriend Paul. They were really sweet and they have this huge cat who was even sweeter. We went walking around the Adams-Morgan neighborhood and I checked email and stuff at this monster crowded coffee shop called Tryst. Then we had really excellent Ethiopian food at Bezkerem or Mezkemel or something like that, with Cristen from Madison and her friend from Virginia Beach, both of whom just happened to be in town. And I found a beer that hadn’t been opened. And I drank the beer. No dead wildcat though. Actually I didn’t so much find the beer. It was more like I ordered it.
Then we headed to the Velvet Lounge to load in, but there was nobody home. While we waited another van pulled up and four young guys hopped out, and I remembered that Aloha was playing after us, and this was them, and they are on Polyvinyl, the same label as Kyle’s band Rainer Maria. I had met some of them last year at the Polyvinyl Showcase at the Knitting Factory during CMJ last year, so we shot the shit a bit and they went to Ben’s Chili Bowl for dinner.
My friend Emily came down from Baltimore with her friend Janick, so there was a healthy crowd for the show. The sound guy Rob was a little intense but also very professional and so everything sounded great. I pretended like I was playing and talking to Emily so that made the show a breeze since we’re old friends. The reception was very warm and I felt like I could enjoy doing music again, which was good cuz as you may have noticed there have been a lot of bummer shows on this tour.
Glen from Easton also came to the show, and he invited us to crash at his brother’s place in Annapolis. So after a late night stop at the Wawa to order some sandwiches from the Internet (not really) we headed over there and fell asleep in the den down in the basement. It was really dark in there so we kind of overslept, not waking til about 12:30 in the afternoon. We packed up pretty quickly in the drizzly rain and after saying goodbye to Glen we got on the road for New York. I looked forward to being home for a couple days.