So, Kathryn from San Antonio sent me the following photos. They are of the Lego Robot Spider and Lego Robot Scorpion that her son Hudson built, inspired by our song!! So rad. The dismembered Lego people are my favorite part. The last photo shows Hudson posing with his work. Fantastic.
Scorpion.
Spider.
Spider & Scorpion.
Hudson Poses With His Creations.
Dr. Pants, The Bloggess & Beyonce.
On some level, I don’t really know where to begin. For those of you who watched on Sunday, do you think, had you been there, that YOU would know where to start?
About three years ago I sent Jenny Lawson direct message on Twitter. I’m sure it’s the kind of DM she gets all the time; “OMG, your blog is so funny, blah blah blah…” I’m sure there are a lot of funny bloggers out there who get those DMs, but might reply with a simple “thank you,” or maybe not even reply at all. But what I received in return was something along the lines of: “Thank you. And your music is like bacon. Not turkey bacon. Awesome bacon.” (If you click over to our press page you’ll see that the quote is there, with Jenny’s permission.)
This began a friendship; at least, it began some sort of 21st century version of a friendship that, on first glance, more resembles some sort of social media mutual admiration society.
I traveled to Texas a number of times to play some shows, and we always invited Jenny, but for reasons detailed here, she never was never able to attend.
Then, a couple of months ago, out of the blue, she sent out a tweet that read something along the lines of “If I don’t get to see @drpants play live soon, I will have to kidnap them and make them play in my bathroom.” And that gave me an idea.
And thus the concept of us webcasting from The Bloggess’ bathroom was born.
Sunday was really something else. I really don’t know how to describe it…I don’t know if it translated when you were watching it on the computer, but there was just a really special vibe in that bathroom, in that house…Jenny, Victor, Laura, Maile and Jason all really made us feel at home, and were wonderfully fervent in their appreciation. It all happened so fast…I wish we had made more time to stick around and hang out with Jenny, Victor and their friends, but honestly, when Jenny emailed me back after I proposed the webcast, I thought to myself, “She’s probably just humoring me…if we really go do this, we’ll probably need to leave quickly so that we don’t stay and bother them.” Jenny is someone who I have an enormous respect for in terms of the work she has done and what she has built; the last thing I would want would be for us to wear out our welcome.
But it was quite clear on Sunday that it would be very difficult to do that.
There were a number of things about the whole trip that were awesome; it was the first time this lineup of Dr. Pants had ever traveled anywhere together. We all got along, we all had a good time. Once we drove past Austin on Sunday, Kenneth was officially further away from home than he’d ever been, Samwise Gamgee style. We had a great dinner together in Austin Saturday night at Maudie’s (delicious…Devin would highly recommend the poblano creme enchiladas), and some hang time with some friends of Dustin’s at Liberty.
We stopped by another bar on the way back to the car, because Devin wanted to have a Guinness on St. Paddy’s Day. After we had walked about a block towards the car, Devin realized he had left his wallet at the bar. He ran back while the rest of us waited…luckily he had left it on the bar itself and the bartenders had found it. Our great friends The Flyin’ A’s gave us a great place to crash Saturday night.
I pulled a similar trick to Devin the next morning when I left my computer bag at Progress Coffee when we left to drive to Jenny & Victor’s house, and didn’t realize it until we were in their driveway unloading. I called Progress, and they had the bag, but they would be closing before we could get back to Austin to grab it. Victor asked me what was going on, and volunteered to go get the bag. Unreal, you guys. The guy has just met me, and he’s driving back to Austin to get my bag. Still so grateful.
And what of the webcast itself?
We’ve fit into smaller spaces than that bathroom, believe it or not. We were so excited, and Jenny was, too. Jenny, Laura & Maile made enough noise to make up for the fact that there were only 5 people actually present in the audience. Juanita and Copernicus were, of course, present as well. Dustin, Kenneth, Devin & I had a ridiculous amount of fun, and I think everyone else did also. (Of course, if you missed it, you can go watch it HERE.)
I just want to thank Jenny and Victor once again for this experience. It was truly our pleasure. There are some murmurings of doing it again next year…here’s hoping.
“That didn’t even make sense,” Kenneth groaned, as he applied a fresh coat of salve to his bruised shoulder.
David lay unconscious in his seat, head slumped over and arms hanging in the aisle. The ankh symbols on his skin were fading, but the effort of breaking the curse of the mummy’s guitar strap was too much. Still, he was in better shape than the others.
Dustin’s arms were in casts and Devin’s head was bandaged after they fought their way out of Egypt.
“Why did the Scorpions attack us again?” Kenneth asked. “They’re not even Egyptian. Those a-holes are German. What were they even doing there?”
Devin pulled the ice pack away from his still-bloody mouth. “Curses never make much sense, but my guess is they were doing a North African tour and somehow the wording on the sarcophagus of ‘set upon by scorpions’ accidentally pulled them in.”
“I don’t know, man,” Dustin replied. “Maybe it was the curse, but Schenker seemed really into it when he attacked me with his guitar. Probably just the frustration of being on the road, though. Everybody needs a release.”
The band members thought long and hard about that, except for David, who hadn’t heard anything the others said and was having his default dream about meeting Doctor Who.
After a while, Kenneth got up to find a stewardess about some ice and maybe some kind of alcoholic liquid to pour over it. It occurred to him that they had all just kind of boarded the plane without seeing any crew members. There was no safety lecture. No one pointed to doors here, here and here.
Oh, crap, he thought. We’re on another effing ghost flight.
“Guys. Guys, get up. There’s a problem,” he said. “Ghost flight.”
Devin covered the eye that wasn’t already covered by bandages. “How did we not see this earlier? Nobody even gave us peanuts.”
“Would somebody draw some crucifixes and Stars of David on my casts? That stuff usually wards them away,” Dustin said. “If any of them become solid, I guess I kick them.”
Ghost flights were the worst. Not only was the in-flight entertainment non-existent, the ghosts always try to get you to commit suicide and join the haunted crew. The lack of in-flight entertainment was, in fact, one of their ploys. Oh, and they always try to land in ghost towns, too, which don’t have great airports.
“I guess I’ll try to deal with the ghost pilot,” Kenneth said. “Maybe he’s got some unfinished business that we can handle for him, by way of a trade.”
But when he opened up the cockpit door, there was no spectre lazily playing with a ghost iPad while “driving” the plane. Instead, a swarthy and muscular gentleman wearing a fez was holding a lamp.
“Genie?” asked Kenneth.
“I prefer Djinn,” said Fred, the Djinn. “What’s up?”
“We thought this was a ghost flight,” he replied.
“No, this is a magic airplane,” Fred said. “Didn’t the stewardess tell you?”
“What stewardess?”
“Oh, man, rub that lamp. Shelli will pop out and hook you up. Try the hummus.”
–Written by Greg Elwell
If you’ve been paying attention to our Twitter or our Facebook Page, you already know about this, but WE ARE DOING A WEBCAST FROM THE BATHROOM OF THE BLOGGESS. This is a hugely awesome thing for us, and we’re really excited. Check it out:
Please share this video with your friends, and tune into our UStream Channel at 4:00pm central on March 18th.
