Greetings from Tucson!

Now, I don't really like this picture of me, but considering that I haven't posted a picture of me since I left, I felt like I had to at some point. Besides, the really nice part of it is the sunset anyways...

It didn't come out nearly as good as the picture of Karen there:



So we flew into Tucson on Monday morning, after leaving Texas at 645am, flying to Dallas for a 3 hour layover, then off to Tucson. We got in at 12:15pm and Karen was also flying in from NY. Her flight landed right after mine and we got our rental car and headed up to the hotel. They gave us a mid-size car, and told us they had a Chevy HHR. Karen had never seen one, but I glimpsed one last month in Indiana and thought it looked pretty cool. Kinda cheap-futuristic-ish, but I liked it. Karen warmed up to the car over time as it handles really well.


Nothing really exciting happened on Monday, just did some laundry and got lost trying to find the mountain trail that would bring us to a good view of the sunset. Tuesday we went to the mall and did some damage. I guess it's an inherent feeling of living out of a suitcase looking at the same clothes over and over again. Oddly though, I only bought a couple shirts, a pair of jeans, a black fleece for when we play in cold pits, and a pair of black sneakers, as I only have one, and I wear them every day. "But Gregg", I can hear some of you asking..."where did you get that track jacket from the first picture?" The answer may shock you. Urban Outfitters had a mega sale starting on Wednesday and I got that jacket for $5!!! Yup yup, $5. (This is more of an inside joke as people on tour are sick of me talking about my $5 jacket.)

Tuesday night, Karen sat in the pit with me for act II and afterwards we went to a local bar people raved about called "Frog and Firkin". The kitchen closed like .23420390 seconds before we got there, so we had a beer and relaxed outside at one of the outdoor tables. On the other side of where we were, there was a free poker tournament going on. Apparently there is a Pub League out here and it travles from bar to bar. It had also started before we got there, and couldn't get a seat.

Wednesday we went back downtown to eat at Frog and Firkin. We met up with Jeff (trumpet player) and Steve (trombone player) for lunch. Afterwards we walked around the college downtown, went to Urban Outfitters and later went to the aforementioned mountains you see above you. Karen came to see the show that night, and although there were technical malfunctions that night, the show went off well and everyone seemed to have a great time.

Thursday morning we woke up and watched Lost and South Park from the night before that SOMEHOW magically appeared on my computer. Oh the internet, you do everything...It was then that Karen had to go to the airport to go back to NY. It was certainly a great visit and I can't wait to come home in a month!

Thursday night there was a cabaret by the perfomers in the show here at IBT, the gay bar here in town. It was a great time with everyone singing songs NOT from Oklahoma, thank god. The locals weren't really having it though, but that didn't ruin the night at all. Afterwards, Steve, Jeff, Andy (who plays Judd) and I went out to the straight bars. Stuff closed kinda early though so we only had till about 1:30 before heading home. A very fun night indeed.

I found the casino on Thursday too. I'll post soon about Thurs and Friday's sessions. I'll leave it in a new post so my family can weed through it as it will have poker jargon they won't understand/care about. Some very interesting play indeed, and in my opinion, the best poker that I personally have played in a while. Wow, this is a long post, it took all of Act II today!!