1) I have been playing guitar for about 3 years and I own an Epiphone Les Paul Standard with upgraded pickups. I personally write all of my own original music which I have performed several times for various crowds of people. One time was actually performed for a couple of drunk guys at Lion's Park.
2) I was born in Bitburg, Germany in the year 1987. I have lived in the city of Niceville for 14 years and also in the very house that I am currently living in for 10 of those years.
3) Last year, my friend Tyler and I climbed up on top of the elementary school roof by way of a chain-link fence near a low spot. We both skated up there for awhile until a janitor noticed us and kicked us off. He seemed more concerned about the fact that we were skating rather than the fact that we were on the roof. He kept pointing to the "NO SKATEBOARDING OR ROLLERBLADING" sign and asking us what it said. Tyler responded to him with, "NO SKATTERBOARDING OR ROLLERBAGGING?"
From there I went to lunch. I can't really remember that too well. I know that I sat with Jay but that's ALL I remember about it. S.T.A.R. Lab was fantastic because, once again, I did ABSOLUTELY nothing. I just hung out with Jen the whole time. We talked about the show tonight and how it she would be going and it would be fun. Anyway, in English I got to do some more story-typing. As we all well know, I enjoy typing stories and such. In tomorrow's entry I will include the little scene I wrote for my class that we were to make up a character who is more than just "page-deep" as I like to put it. Mrs. Ridell calls it something else, of course, but that's what I like to call it. So after that the school day was over and my grandpa came to the school to pick up Marcus and I. He took Marcus over to somewhere near Marlena's house and then took me home and picked up the dogs. I played drums for a little while, waiting for Matt to make it over so we could practice some even though I knew already that there was no way we were going to play at the show. So four o'clock rolls around and I'm thinking, okay he's probably not going to come practice, which is totally fine by me because Farrah really needs me to come over. So, being the kind, caring individual that I am. Hop on my bicycle (I HATE IT!) and start heading that direction. On the way I run into a couple of skater bois who begin to ask me about the "big white van." They could swear that it was going to MY house. At this point I am JUST about to exit the neighborhood but now I have to go back because I must have left just as Matt was coming in. So I go back and sure enough there are Matt and Alix standing in the driveway just waiting. I have a quick conversation with Matt in which we decide that we aren't going to play of course. So I explain to Matt the situation with me needing to go over to Farrah's and he offers for me to stick my bike in the back of the van and take me most of the way there, which is exactly what he did. He took me all the way to the gate. That was mighty nice of him. He told me he would come back to my house at about 5:30 to pick me up for the show. Sounds good to me! I ride the rest of the 100 feet to Farrah's house and go in and converse for awhile. Until 5:15 rolls around, when it is time for me to head out, and her parents show up. Now, I'm not supposed to be there, right? Because only her grandmother was home and they have to have either of them there for me to be allowed in. So I'm basically screwed because her dad AND mom both show up at the same time and my bike is sitting out on the front porch. Hmm... Farrah says that I rode it to Tyler's, he wasn't home, so I dropped it off over there and went out??? I hide out in the closet until the time I'm supposed to be picked up by Matt. This is the part when I pull a Houdini and disappear. Only problem is I can't take my bike with me. They knew it was there. I'm now stuck with a 45-minute (at a fast pace) walk. 37 minutes later: I walk up to the gate guard and ask if the "big white van" had come through within the last little bit. She tells me that the van came in about half an hour ago but she can't remember it going out because she wasn't paying attention to the cars going out. I am in a frantic rush to get home from there, Did he wait? My house comes into view, I am the most excited I have ever been to see that gigantic white blob sitting in my driveway. I sprint the rest of the way. "THANK YOU, MATT! THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!" I explained to him the whole deal with why I am so late after he asks me why the heck I'm walking because I had a bike before. It turns out they had gone to talk with Erin for awhile. It's nice to know that they were about to come looking for me rather than just go without me. Okay, so I grab a box of Capri Sun and take advantage of indoor plumbing for one last time before leaving. We hop into the boat at 6:20, we're going to be late now but fashionably late, at that. I'm sure they will figure out that we aren't playing after a little while of absolutely NO band members showing up. Matt had to go to the auto parts store to buy a new headlight so by the time he gets it and gets it installed it is 6:45. We are now ON THE WAY. We get there at 7:40 P.M. Not bad at all, we didn't miss anything. Life Left was playing when we got there. Seemingly at about mid-set. I greeted everyone that I knew and Jen introduced me to her friends. We went down to the Shell station looking for Peter and Willy because we saw them walking that direction on the way in but they seemed to have disappeared. When I came back, RotFest had just started setting up so I conversed a bit more. I went in and watched most of their set. They definitely do not lack character. The music was not my absolute favorite thing to listen to. It was like, death metal but instead of high pitched screaming it was all growl screams. They were surprisingly good instrumentalists. These guys look like they are at least in their twenties or something. The bassist / growl screamer James is nearing 7 feet tall, wearing a home-made costume consisting of a full leather something or other thing with shoulder pads with like 6-inch spikes coming off of them with arm gauntlets with spikes and the whole nine yards. Huge boots with all sorts of metal stuff in them and everything. Hair down well past his shoulders and a full beard. And when I say full beard, I mean like a FULL, more than Matt's ex-wolverine beard, kind of beard. Guess what? HE'S FIFTEEN!!! And just RECENTLY turned fifteen at that! I hear the exact same thing from three different people because I kept asking because I simply could not believe it. And I didn't believe it until I asked him himself. I had asked him how old they all were and how long they had been playing their instruments. This is basically what he tells me, "Yeah, I can answer that for ya. Let's see, I'm fifteen now, so I've been playing since I was about 11 or 12. And Jeremiah (the guitarist) has been playing for the same amount of time as me (graduated high school last year). And the drummerv(also a 15 year old sophomore) had JUST gotten his own drumset. I was simply amazed by all of this. This drummer was phenominal because of the fact that he had just started playing acoustic sets. I heard that he had played in the school band playing snare or something but in doing that, you don't learn how to do double bass so fast as he did and you don't learn how to do blast beats either. His blast beats were not nearly as fast as Matt's but still fast enough to be unbelievable because of how short of a time he had been playing. Wow... I'm still stuck on that. I just can't believe it. I can't. Okay, off of RotFest. I spent the rest of the time just talking because New Age Blasphemy played and they were only okay... Life Left was similar in style of music and was much better. Jen and Kel had to leave during their setup so I was sad to see them go. I said my goodbye's and then hung out with Matt again. We had some more conversation and whatnot and then the show was over. Ah it felt good not to have to load and unload stuff but man I sure wish the full band could have played. There were actually a good number of people there who came there mostly because they wanted to hear Bitter Dominion. The show was just as big as I thought it would be. I was just as disappointed as any about not playing. I still am... But, whatever man! I still had a great day! We went to Whataburger after the show and got some grub and then headed home. I took a nice long nap on the futon mattress against the side of the van. I slept all the way from Pensacola to Shalimar, where we dropped Chris off at his grandparents' house. It felt good to wake up and then have night breeze in my face coming in through the window. It really was blissful. We then took Alix back home and what not so then it was just Matt and I. I moved up to the front of the band so as to have a conversation with him a bit easier. We talked all the way back to Windward about plenty important stuff. Then I walked into the neighborhood and observed one of the biggest spiderwebs I had ever seen with an equally as big spider resting in the middle of it. Then, as I was walking toward Tyler's house I looked up and studied the stars and the clouds for a moment. What a great last image of the day...-Brice
