We went to Disneyworld!!!!

I believe I left off after Omaha. That night we tried to grab some food after the show, but apparently the only place open was a casino. Food was pretty good though. I also played the $4 I won at the gas station in various machines and ended up walking away with $27.64!

We were supposed to drive to New Orleans for a couple of nights off, but there was a miscommunication and we ended up parking somewhere for the rest of the night. That meant the next day we still had 14+ hours to drive. Plus we still had to get our tire figured out :( On top of all of that, we were driving down the highway when suddenly we hear this weird noise. We’re looking around making sure none of the vents on the top of the bus are open, when Kim notices our awning is falling off one side of the bus. We pulled off at a truck parking area that was luckily near by, and the boys took the entire thing off.

Apparently, that morning before I woke up, Riggs was restringing one of Kim’s guitars and was playing silverchair on it. As many of you know, I used to be a HUGE silverchair fan back in the day. They actually had a big influence on the type of music I listened to, and even my decision to become a vegetarian. But what you may not know, is that I used to know how to play the basic drum part to “Anthem for the Year 2000.” That’s right, I used to be a drummer many many moons ago. I actually have a lot of music in my background. I sang in church choir for 12 years even though I can’t actually sing. I had 4 years of bad piano lessons (though I’d like to take it up again). Played cello for a year but didn’t like it, so I switched to percussion and played that in school for 7 years. I marched bass drum all 4 years of high school, as well as taking percussion/set lessons for those four years. So there’s some Snork trivia for you!

I don’t remember what all we did that day, but that night while we were on the road, Riggs, Kim and I watched “The ABC’s of Death.” That was interesting. I believe the next day we stopped at a Whole Foods and stocked up on groceries and water before finally finishing the trek into New Orleans. We didn’t get in until abut 8pm :( We stopped into Marie Laveau's House of Voodoo while waiting for our table, and got some dinner. Then Riggs, Kim and Jr went back to the bus to record some vocals they didn’t get done before tour, so Mike, Jeff and I hung out on Bourbon street to stay out of their way. It was a little lame because it was a Tuesday night. There were the giant hordes of drunk people and obnoxious clubs were open, but the Beignet place was closed and Jazz music seemed to end early :( We spent most of the night hiding in the dungeon bar we went to last tour, chatting with the bar tender and bouncer. They were pretty cool people.

Some swamp land

The New Orleans show was awesome, as always. Lots of regular fans came out, including Tommy, who brought us wonderful roses (again!) and much needed cases of water. Seriously, you guys have no idea how precious bottles of water can be. They actually came at just the right time too because a couple of the shows after that they stiffed us on our cases of water we’re supposed to get, but luckily we had some on the bus. Thanks again Tommy!

After the show, Kim, Mike, Jason and I attempted one last meal of New Orleans/Cajun food, but the place we went to was kind of lacking. We got a bit to eat anyway and headed to Pensacola, FL. Load in was an hour later than usual, and of course, being Florida, it decided to start raining at that time. It made trying to load in and set up in time super awesome. But, we all managed, and it was a good show!

Open Your Eyes

Love the colors in this!

Riggs is causing Kim to morph

Riggs without a face again

Eyes Set to Kill

Then we were onward to Jacksonville, FL. Unfortunately, there were 2 places with the same name as the venue we were playing at, and we parked over night at the wrong one. We were sitting around for an hour wondering where they were to let us in, meanwhile they were at the other place wondering where we were. Finally, after an hour, the promoter called Jr to figure out where we were, and we figured out we were at the wrong place. That meant, not only had we lost that hour, but we now had to drive across town in afternoon traffic. Luckily we still had a decent amount of time to load in/setup, and there was parking right across the street. That is, until after all of the bands finished loading in, and the police came and told us we all had to move. It sounds like he was nice about it though, and directed everyone to a church parking lot they could park in.

The show itself was another good one. Both locals, Sons of Sam and Manna Zen have played with us before, and there were again many fans I know, as well as some first timers. However, after the show, as meet and greet was winding down, they suddenly started blast house music and getting drunk partiers in. Kim rushed out of there quickly, but I still had almost all of merch to pack up because meet and greet took so long. Mike was quickly hauling stuff outside as I got it packed, when suddenly he stopped coming back in. I thought maybe they had pulled the bus back up and he was loading, but I kept looking outside and didn’t see it. There were drunk people hanging around the last bit of merch I had inside, so I didn’t want to leave it and go outside to see what was going on. Finally after about 20 minutes I texted Jason asking him what was going on. As soon as I finished, this big, ex-military (he told me, not even having to stereotype there), guy came over because I looked lonely/needed help and started asking if I needed a drink/if I lived around there/how long I was in town for/etc. Luckily Mike came back in and started hauling more stuff outside (Apparently he’d been right outside the doors watching the stuff while Riggs walked Kim back to the bus) so I started hauling stuff outside with him, and as soon as we got it all out I hid on the bus.

Once we were packed up we got away from Jacksonville as fast as we could. I think we tried finding some food after we got out of town, but ended up at a truck stop Denny’s that night before heading to St. Petersburg. 

St. Petersburg was AWESOME! We got there on time for an early load in, got set up, and I actually had a chance to hang out and get food before doors. There were so many cool murals around the city, and Riggs, Mike and I got some really good Greek food. There were all of these cool little shops along the main road, but sadly for some reason a lot of things closed early. Especially all of the cool sounding coffee shops. Apparently no one needs coffee after 2pm in St. Petersburg?

The venue in St. Petersburg was similar to the Mesa Theater we play at in Grand Junction, CO except a little bit smaller. That was cool though because it was PACKED! This show was our highest turn out (and best merch night) so far this tour! The show was great too! Kim said later that she was told the owner is this big biker dude who apparently NEVER likes any of the bands that play there. Someone told him to check out their set, so he went down to see it, and never ended up leaving because he loved them so much. Hopefully that means we’ll be back, and with an even bigger crowd! I had a chance to talk to a lot of awesome old and new fans. One woman brought her father along because he’s had many bad experiences with female musicians treating their fans badly, and she knew he HAD to meet Kim. He really seemed to enjoy the show and getting to meet Kim :D I think this is also the show where during “Be My Friend” Kim made the audience choose their favorite member of One-Eyed Doll. She gave the first choice, Junior, then went to say the second choice and someone yelled “MELINDA!” *blushes*

Hair whipping action

Kim flying over the drum set

A little dark, but Kim doing acrobats off of Jr's shoulder

There was one down side of the night, which requires some back explaining first. One thing I do while setting up before the show is find a sturdy, preferably tall, chair for Kim to do meet and greet at the end of the night. She likes to be able to stand/sit on a chair because it keeps drunk people from leaning ON her during photos, which hurts her back. I have a couple of signs I usually put on the chair because it’s cute, it keeps the venue/other people from taking the chair, fans know where to come after the show, etc. Despite it being RIGHT next to (or slightly behind) the table, with a sign taped to it, people still will randomly sit in it. So I’ve had to start setting Kim’s mirror, stickers to throw out, little bin of sharpies, etc. in it and hope people don’t steal it. Just to keep people from sitting in it. So on to this night…

There’s a woman with her boyfriend/husband/sugar daddy/whatever hanging out in the merch area the entire show (the way it was set up, I had a railing almost all the way around my area with a opening at one point where people could get through). She, for whatever reason, decided to wear stilettos to a rock show. And she clearly was incapable of standing in them all night. At first she started sitting on one of the columns in the railing. Then she slowly started sliding one cheek over onto Kim’s chair. Pretty soon her big butt had shoved all of Kim’s stuff over to the edge and was fully sitting in Kim’s chair. It got to the point where all of Kim’s stuff was about to fall off into the trash can behind her chair and I was going to ask the woman to move, when she got into a fight with her boyfriend/husband/sugar daddy/whatever and they left. But not before I took a picture. There have been plenty of times I’ve offered up Kim’s chair to people with disabilities, injuries, are tired and need to sit for a bit, etc. But there’s a new rule. If you wear heels, despite the fact that you’re not able to stand in them all night, and try to sit in Kim’s chair, I will take a picture of you and post it in my blog.

I wish she'd have turned around so I got her face

Apparently I was too busy during ESTK’s set to get any pictures of them :(

Next was Easter Sunday in Orlando. Sadly, this show was the exact opposite of St. Petersburg. I’ll skim through the negative so I don’t bring everyone down. The “venue” was a small bar, they allowed smoking, there was a kid windmilling his arms every time there was a pit, it was a low turn out, there were hecklers, and when Kim gave everyone a choice of a sing along or more yelling over her, some guy yelled, so she cut “Be My Friend.” It was really sad because there were a bunch of fans in OED shirts in the first row, and it was their only VIPs first ever show :( A fan told her about an all ages venue called The Haven, which sounds awesome, so if you’re a fan in the Orlando area, call them and bug them about bringing OED there. 

On with the positive! Inviolate was one of the openers! They played about 4 shows with us on the Witches tour! Always good seeing/watching them! :D I actually brought my Inviolate shirt this tour, but I think I wore it the first day on the way to SLC so it was dirty. 

They wore our bunny ears! :D

The drummer has handle bar mustache bunny ears

Also, since it was such a small place, and because of where my merch ended up being set up, I could watch the whole show pretty close up. I got a picture of each band for Instagram, but I don’t really have anything for the blog because I was watching the show.

After that awful show, we had 2 (TWO!!!!!!) days off. Jr knows a guy, Shawn (If you’re reading this, hi! *waves*), who is a chef at Disney. He got us all in and got us skip the line passes. So we got a couple of hotel rooms for the next couple of nights. We got to shower and sleep in real beds. Unfortunately, as always, there was some work that needed to be done on the bus. Jr slept on the bus, then got up at 8am to take it in. They wouldn’t let him leave it there, so he had to stay until it was done. I don’t think we finally got to Disney until 3PM. Also, Kim REALLY needed a recovery day, so she didn’t join us :( It sounds like she got some much needed R&R, a couple of massages, and an awesome back cracking. We also lost Mike half way through. After a few rides he was over the crowds and being herded around like cattle, and took an Uber back to the hotel to hang out in some peace and quiet. Which I totally understand!

Riggs and I being scared in the Haunted Mansion

Everyone on Pirates of the Caribbean

Thanks Shawn!

We rode some rides, got some funnel cake, watched the fire works over the castle, bought some souvenirs, and saw a bit of the parade when we got trapped by it trying to leave. After leaving, Shawn dropped us off at Universal City Walk to meet up with Kim and Mike, and eat at a place called Cowfish, which has burgers, sushi, and a cake batter milkshake. 

Unfortunately, they were almost closing, and they had no milkshakes. Luckily, there was a Coldstone downstairs. However, we found out after we left the restaurant that they close at 12, not 1am, on Mondays. But Jr found one near by that closed at 1, so we quick called an Uber and rushed over there and ended the night with some ice cream before heading back to sleep in a real bed for one last night.

Apparently we weren’t the only ones eating well in Florida. I have several bug bites. And something always seems to bite/sting me really bad. I’m pretty sure during the Witches Tour I wrote about stupidly climbing a sand pile in flip flops and posted a picture of a nasty bite/sting I got. Well, something got my upper calf this time.

This was taken a few days after the initial bite/sting. Luckily the day after it started going away and is almost gone. The crazy bruise I got on my thigh the beginning of tour is normal colored again, but all scabbed up still :(

And that about brings us up to date! It’s Tuesday the 29th, and we’re on the road towards Nashville, TN. I’ll hopefully get to post this the next time I have a consistence wifi connection and enough time to upload photos :D Until next time! *waves*

Beginning of Spring 2016 Visions Tour

The 2016 Visions Tour has officially started. And, as always, it’s been a rocky start. My paperwork was temporarily lost so I worked the whole week before. The day I set aside to do laundry everyone in my apartment complex seemed to be doing theirs. Packing was done very last minute, but I think I got it all. The night before I met up with the band, the recording studio flooded. My bags somehow ended up on the flight after me, so there was a panicked period of time when I thought I may not have any of my things. Currently as I write this paragraph we’re sitting in a repair shop in Salt Lake City because the generator isn’t working. But hopefully this all means that the rest of tour is going to go smoothly :)

The beach

Fancy mansions on top of mountains look like little boxes from an airplane.

A sign things are looking up; We stopped at a truck stop in the Reno area to dump/fill up water. The store was lacking in the cookie department, so we wandered around looking at the displays of guns they for some reason had.

I got bored and decided to drop a nickel in one of the 5 cent slot machines. 777 came up, and 80 nickels spilled out of the bottom! Some workers from the casino came over to card me. Lol.

$4 in Nickels!

This tour's crew is all familiar faces, depending on how long you've been around. We have Jeff from last tour driving again, and Riggs as stage manager/guitar tech. This tour, we also have Mike back! Mike and I toured together our very first tour back in 2013. He also did the next 2, but eventually stopped touring to pursue his own music. It's great to finally have him back again!


After leaving the previously mentioned repair place, we had to go pick up the rest of the merch! That made for an interesting, chaotic first day dealing with boxes and boxes of merch. That, and since merch was packed up before I met up with the band, I had no idea where anything was. But, we got through it, and it was a really good first show! Merch was in a different area so I didn’t get to actually see any of the first show :( The room was so packed, and overflowing into the hallway, so I couldn’t even poke my head in.

What's going on?!?!?!

Look at that awesome shirt!

Grand Junction, CO was completely different though. We were back at the Mesa Theater, and had an early load in time. I took advantage of that, and attempted to sort out our new merch. I sadly only got through the hoodies and restocking a few things before I had to put it all away for doors. But, I got to see the whole show! There were a couple of good locals, Open Your Eyes and Eyes Set to Kill were both awesome (there’s one awesome, Ben!) and One-Eyed Doll always rocks it. One guy came up to me half way through their set to tell me how bad ass Kim was. This was his first time ever hearing of them, and he was blown away. He’s seen a lot of musicians preform, and she’s at the top. I told him to be sure to come back to the table after their set to meet her, and he was first in line :) Also, during their final bow, the entire theater was in a thunderous applause. It was crazy!

Another awesome part of the night, Michael brought me/us cheesecake! :D So far every kind I’ve tried has been amazing! If you’re reading this, Thank You again!!!!

This tour in Denver we played at a venue called The Roxy. If you read my blogs, you may remember that we usually play a sold out show in this awkward BBQ place. Luckily, since we keep selling out, we finally got to play at a place more like a music venue. It’s nice being able to load-in early and not have to set up around people trying to eat dinner. No pictures from the show (other than some blurry ones on instagram) because I was busy sorting and folding merch.

After the show, we went back to Riggs’ favorite place, Breakfast King. Jr apparently forgot to bring a coat this tour, it was cold out, and we had a bit of a walk from where we parked. So he wrapped himself up in a blanket. Luckily, even though it was just after 2am, they didn’t think we were crazy drunk people and actually let us in. They sat us in the same booth as last time which was funny.

THIS is how you do hot chocolate!

Next we were off to Colorado Springs and Sunshine Studio where they always take amazing care of us. Not only them, but the fans! We had an awesome home cooked meal, and a care package, complete with Girl Scout cookies (which are almost gone. I like Samoas *hint hint* Actually, I shouldn’t say that, now we’re going to have a bus full of cookies).

One of the openers was a band from Denver called LaRissa Vienna and the Strange. They were really awesome, and seemed like awesome people too. Sadly they left before I could get a shirt or CD :(

Open Your Eyes

Eyes Set to Kill

Epic lighting on ESTK

Kimberly in the crowd

Delaney, Brock and a Snork!

Hadr, Snork, Keter

Lastly, before our first day off, we were in Omaha, NE. Usually we play Des Moines, IA but this tour we're back in Omaha for the first time since... Mushroomhead I think. We also had trouble getting there. We hit a bump one night, which apparently did something to one of our tires. We had to stop every so often on the way to refill the air in one of the tires. But, we made it an hour before doors and managed to get all of our stuff set up on time :) We weren't sure what the turn out was going to be like since we haven't been here in a few years, but it was awesome! Thanks to all the awesome fans that came out!