Smashburger

We didn't play the Guitar Toss this year—they only get "amateur" bands—but we went down to listen to a band or two. First we ate lunch at Smashburger. Now that's a tasty fucking burger. High class beef and cooked right. Also perused Down in the Valley current stock. I had some Bowie albums on my wishlist, but oddly they only had 3 Bowie albums total, none being what I was looking for (The Man Who Sold the World, Heros, and Low). But I found a live Drive-by Truckers album I didn't know about (it includes CD and DVD), from their performance on Austin City Limits. Man I love that band. Also got the extended version of the new Rancid album. Lastly, a Big Bad Voodoo Daddy album that's all Cab Calloway tunes.

The first band we listened to looked about 14–17. 4 guys playing very bluesy stuff for their age. The songs sorta sounded like Indigenous or Arc Angels, and they were all very talented on their instruments. I was impressed. I knew I wouldn't like the next band. I thought they were gonna be some kind of Dead/Phish hippy love band because one of the guys had his jeans rolled up to just below his knees, like some teenage girl from the '50s. I didn't get it. They were totally not what I expected, but I still didn't like the music at all. They had a black chick singing R&B type shit. Her voice was hurting my ears, so we left.

Went out to Ikea looking for some sort of interesting floor lamp and place mats. Found a lamp. That place is fun to hit once or twice a year. All sorts of people to gawk at, from hot MILFs, to all sorts of foreigners strolling slowly with their large brood, to white trash hillbillies (dad with his dirty sleeveless T–shirt, mom with a bun in the oven and generic smokes on her breath, son with a strange brown and bright blue camouflage outfit over his 12–year old beer gut) who heard about the dirt cheap prices and limped the rusty, sputtering '80 Granada into town. We also walked in circles more than once. The place is fucking huge and winds around back and forth, so it's impossible to know which direction you're going.