***disclaimer*** again, this one is out of order. i'm gonna do part 7 now. hopefully 8 & 4 tomorrow. then 5 & 9. sorry, it's just a lot of writing and i'd rather get the fresher stuff out first. raw emotion, better memory, so on, so forth. somehow this 'week" will end up having nine days in it. deal with it. ***end of disclaimer*** when i'd finished me prerequisite 2 hours of writing each morning, i ran into travis aka trouble jr. trouble jr was my old roommate in seattle when i lived above graceland. he and i moved to l.a. together. i lasted, he didn't. it was the first time i'd seen him since he left l.a. same ole travis. love that guy. we walked to my old favorite bagel shop, grabbed a bite and decided to make the attempt of attaining the rest of my stuff. it was mid afternoon and somehow i'd been blessed with one decent weather day in seattle. we drove to bellvue, windows down, kanye west blaring and laughing about old times and how people'd changed. when we got to zane's parent's house, the garage was locked. i waited around for a while, called, nothing. how the fuck was i gonna get my stuff? my friend mike (i'd go into more detail as to who mike is, but i'd hate to endanger his career) called and travis and i decided to go over to his house. hugs and high fives were all around (i'm gonna leave this stuff out, unless otherwise noted, anyone who shows up in this post was happy to see me). we talked over a few beers and chips, mostly about music and the biz. after an hour, mike broke out a bag of cocaine and offered it to us. hell, it's 3pm, why not? i think we each did about 5 lines. i hadn't done it in long while, and i've gotta say, it was some of the best shit i'd ever had. natalie called. we agreed to go meet her at the 411 (where i was staying). we thanked mike for all of his hospitality, hopped in the car high (onlife) and drove over to the 411. travis went to his room to take a shower. after passing some weed around, natalie, oliver and i decided to get more food (the munchies!) and walked back down to broadway. we meandered around awhile, undecisive and hungry. every 5 minutes we'd see another group of friend's. we even got coersed into going over to kyle & jillian's house. i loved seeing everyone, but it'd be another hour before the main objective of FOOD was accomplished. we made plans with everyone over 21 to rendevous at the cha cha that night. "ok, nice to see you, gotta go, hungry!" after i got food (falafel!), i made contact with annie. i was near her house and wanted to see her. i parted ways with natalie and oliver and went over to her house. talking to her on the phone was fun, but when she opened the door and i saw her (as well as everyone else on the visit) a flood of memories entered my head. annie is the kid sister of my friend katie. i met her at shows. she'd sneak in underage and everybody knew, but no one said anything. you know, those girls. i tried talking to her a few times and she always blew me off. after i'd finished my first comic strip, i needed a model to play my ex-girlfriend in the photos. even though she doesn't look like her, facially, annie at the time had a similar hair style and body build. i showed her the script, asked her if she'd do it and to my surprise she said yes. we made a date to make it happen. zane and annie met me at my house. i was playing myself and zane was taking the photos. it went by quickly and there was a lot of chemistry in the air. when it came time to go out on the street, we'd all had a couple beers and were having a great time. we took the 'make out' scene photos and annie and i just never stopped kissing. i don't know if we were ever officially on boyfriend/girlfriend status, but we hung pretty heavily for about a month straight and relasped every so often afterwards. it was fun, we were friends and there weren't any serious strings. it was almost perfect, but weird that i dated a girl i met while she was playing my ex-girlfriend (and maybe if i stopped asking girls i have a crush on to play them, that would stop being a problem). anyway, annie looked good. a bit tougher looking than i remember, but good. we spent about two hours sitting on on the couch drinking tecate after tecate, smoking cigarettes and making fun of the food network. i spilled my guts with crazy hollywood stories and she filled me in on all the latest seattle gossip. there was a little wrestling and a lot of laughing. i wouldn't be lying if i said it was one of thr best times i had in seattle and maybe one of the best times we've had ever. i'd also wouldn't be lying if after all that, when i was leaving, i tried to kiss her. we didn't and it was more like the hug, momentary pause, look in each other's eyes and make a decision kind of moment. i was leaving and i wouldn't see her in a while, so i said fuck it, but it didn't happen. she was sick and i was living in the past. i realized i was running late for my night out on the town. it was already 10pm and i was planning on being at the cha cha by 11pm, but not before going by graceland (to say hi) and neumoe's (to see some of the shin's show). by the time i got to my car, it was almost 10:30, so i scrapped neumoe's and decided to go for the sentimental value with graceland instead. when i arrived, i walked in and was shocked by the renovations. i knew, but i didn't know, you know? it was huge and everything we'd always planned, but already looked really run down and i was sad about that. i saw andrew (sound guy), joel (door guy) and april (bartender). we exchanged a few pleasentries but talked mostly how sad it was about scotty, former head of security. i saw him on the street earlier that day, pale, thin, with scabs all over his face. i walked up to him and tried to say hi. he said hi back, but kept walking. dude wouldn't even look me in the eye. he'd fallen off the wagon and was now a street junkie. probably hocked that jawbreaker cd i let him borrow too. i swear to god if another friend of mine gets hooked on that shit i'm gonna go kill them before they have a chance to kill themselves. i've lost too many good buddies to that shit and it's just fucking depressing to watch someone deteriorate into a pale comparison of who they once were. i finally made it to the cha cha. i walked in and it was like i'd never left seattle. the door guy still knew my name, all the same bartenders, the red and black lights were still making everyone look terrible and the mexican theme was as gawdy as ever. i made my way to the back room where everyone was hanging out. over the course of the next three hours, i'd see almost everyone i'd wanted to and break my seattle drinking record. let me buy you a shot, no me! as the fight went on, they won, i didn't. it got to a point to where i was barely conscious, but still audible. i meandered my way around the room trying to talk to everyone i wanted to and everyone who wanted to talk to me. update after update, face after face. i did my best to take it all in, and if there's anyone who felt neglected, i'm sorry. next time i'll be there for more than 24 hours. when the cha cha closed, it was as if i'd retaken my mantle as party king. everyone kept asking me where it was and i drunkedly responded "i don't live here." eventually someone came up with a destination and in pure seattle style, the entire bar migrated to the party house. this time it was union & boren (the classic cross streets!). whose house? i don't know. kelly, carly, anna oxygen, kitty, jacob and i piled into the pretty girls make graves tour van with jay clark (who'd just returned from tour in europe hours before) at the helm. we found our way to the apartment. there was a crowd waiting outside to be buzzed up. it opened as we approached. good timing. right after i walked in, i felt an arm around my neck and a familiar, "frankie chan." i looked over and it was megan, one of the many seattle players (not that 'they' have a club name or anything). she said, 'look who's back in town. you gonna make out with me tonight? i missed your good kisses,' and i, still incredibly drunk and barely able to walk and/or make intellegent desions said, 'ok.' we found ourselves in a corner in the hallway before going up to the party and took a couple moments of privacy. when we got upstairs, the party was in full effect. everyone and their mother was there. in the course, i managed to repeatedly, accidentally break a chair, fuck a loaf of bread (but not really fuck) and take a few more of those 'smoke' breaks with megan. it was a lot of fun, but at 5am (when mike finally showed!), it was time to go. our original group were the only one's left. anna and kitty went there seperate ways, carly and jacob had left earlier to 'be alone' and jay, kelly and i got back in the van. they dropped me off at my car and i went back to the 411, shared a few words with natalie and oliver ala sleepover style, and crashed out. i woke up at 11am procaliming, "shit!". i was running late. i packed up everything real fast, said a few hurried goodbyes and drove to bauhaus. one last good seattle coffee. ahhhh. i drove back to zane's parent's house and the garage door was finally open. i'd made some calls after last time. i spent a good two hours loading my car with everything i had left and some of zane's too. this was it, it's official, i am not a seattle resident anymore. at 1pm, i got back on the freeway and began my solo trek back to los angeles.
6/1/04