I’m sitting in a hip little restaurant in Manitou Springs Colorado called The Mate Factor, eating an amazing chef’s salad. Tomorrow night I’m playing a neat venue called HMS Ancient Mariner. (ok, honestly I don’t remember the last chef’s salad I’ve had that is this amazing!) Manitou Springs is an artsy little town, tucked away at the foot of the rockies, directly above Colorado Springs. I always enjoy playing here because of the copious amounts of artists, actors, musicians and seekers wandering around. Even the people that run The Mate Factor are part of a commune called The Twelve Tribes, an interesting protestant movement started back in the 70s. Everyone lives together, works together and seems to have “everything in common.” Apparently, they’re worldwide as well.
Anyway, the funny story of the day: I picked up four hitchhikers today just outside of Salt Lake City. Just look at them, they’re awesome. First off, their “handles” are (from left to right) Zero, James, The Beast and EO. I subsequently renamed James to Jimmy-Pop, and EO to Captain EO. They’re apparently doing a federally subsidized hitch-hiking trip across the states. Every time they stop off at a homeless shelter for youth, the federal government donates $500 to it. I don’t think I really believe them; but it was a great story so I said hop in. But first, before I let them in the truck, I made them put all their weapons in their bags and their bags in the back of the truck. Yes, that’s right, I said weapons. You can kind of see the machette hanging off the back of Captain EO’s bag, right by the frying pan. They each had a few knives each hanging off their belts. It was hilarious. The next few hours across Wyoming I attempted to impart all my hitch-hiking wisdom. For instance, “don’t carry big weapons on your belt” and, “don’t dress like the trenchcoat mafia.” They were super cool though: just a bunch of buddies wanting to see America together. I let ‘em off in Cheyanne, Wyoming. They’re headed North up to Gillette in case anyone’s headed that way and see four kids who look like they’re SWAT.
If you remember, drop a prayer or two for them. They’ve only been on the road a couple of weeks and they’ve already had all their money stolen along with three out of four of their wallets. (I dropped them off at a truckstop and watched them dump their bags against the wall and all of them go traipsing on inside… leaving all their earthly possesions outside.)
Peace, hope and love.
3 Comments
June 16, 2009 at 10:06 pm
just curious, do you know who the trench coat mafia was? just might stir up bad memories is all…
June 17, 2009 at 10:34 am
This is the greatest blog story I’ve read in some time. I can’t even tell you how hard I laughed. Hope you’re having a blast…
June 18, 2009 at 2:12 am
Hmmm…