Being a normal human trying to have realistic expectations of myself, I originally opted out doing my column this month. You see, the deadline is the 5th and around then, I had just finished two consecutive three-week tours and I was in the middle of getting my gigantic, gas-devouring van (Nine-seater, motherfucker!) from New York City back home to Newfoundland. I was driving an average of like, I dunno, 500 miles a day, my computer wouldn't turn on, and when I was using someone else's, I was trying really, really hard to convince flaky craigslist losers to join us for the drive as to thin out the insane amount of gas required for such a van. It didn't really work out, my boyfriend and I went most of the trip alone. I guess all the potential ride-sharers could sense the stank of nine punks and a lack of windows during a June east coast and backed out. Squares.
Anyways, I'm not a machine! I'm a broke-ass kid lacking the proper technology to keep up with all this shit. One day, when I get a real adult salaried job and don't live in a region with a monopolized
phone service run by corrupt super-corporations taking advantage of our geographical isolation from the rest of the world, I'll do my columns via text message, like those novels in Japan that are ruining the traditional structure of Kanji. Mobile phone novels. You know what I'm talking about. But for now, I'm sharing a 30-buck land line with my two roommates and buying a yearly shitty $200 used laptop after I do something stupid with the last one, like drop it when I'm all shaky during 7 am. security check-in a JFK airport because I chose shitty Brooklyn drugs over sleep.
Blah blah blah, so I got home on the 10th, check up on my square-mail (that's "e-mail" for you squares), and find lambasting from coordinator-in-femi-fascist, Layla Gibbons, for dropping the ball on the cause this month. I guess the boy columnist to girl columnist ratio is way out of whack and when one of us precious few opt out, the scale tilts just that little more towards the Maximum Gender'nEquity. That was two puns in one paragraph. I'm sorry. I'm really grasping at last-minute content here.
Anyways, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I will re-burden myself with the struggle of a consistent
wimmin voice in punk and thank you to the new columns editor (They exist and put up with our shit and do a lot of work and probably representative of the vast and invisible behind-the-scenes work punk ladies do that keep all this shit going), Judy Bawls, for allowing me to submit another gripping segment of My Bands Played Places Yours Probably Didn't an entire week late.

Peterborough, Ontario: I'm not a fan of the "Why live in this place when you can live in that supercity
over there?" ideology but I kind of think it when I go to Peterborough. It's like a sleepy suburb half an hour out of Toronto, a bustling metropolis the scene is young and enthusiastic and the cheap food is delicious and plentiful. But then, shelter is expensive, you can't park fucking anywhere, and it's kind of a suffocating, busy city. And Stu lives in Peterborough, Stu who does FREE SOCIETY zine, which is long-lived, and interesting, and smart. And Stu does DIY shows. He prefers all-ages even though he's, like, old, like 28, but sometimes he'll have to do a show at a tiny bar, where the owner will stand outside and yell FUCK YOU at the upstairs neighbor who calls the cops to complain about noise (although that first band doing a brutally poor mash-up of NO MEANS NO meets the MINUTE MEN did play for over an hour [nobody is allowed to play for over an hour except NAS and FLEETWOOD MAC] and I almost called the cops too), and the bar is next door to a delicious pizzeria that donates pizzas to touring bands, and the 20 people who come will go fucking nuts when you play. So whatever, Peterborough is pretty okay. Recommended.

Orono, Maine: I took these Irish bands on tour, drove them around. I'm tour bossy, it's pretty annoying. But do you need to drink in our van outside the community center that is being surveillanced by cops looking for any excuse to put the kibosh on all-ages hardcore shows? Is it me? Do I drive you to drink? But anyways, it didn't matter, because when my Irish tourmates got busted by cops, they charmed and distracted them with their passports (22-year-old smalltown police: "What?! You're from Ireland?! No way, that's wicked!! Want to try out my night vision goggles?") My friends got to see the world a in new, neater, brighter night-visiony light, the show still happened, everyone got to play, the kids responded to every band with an outrageous two-step circle pit, we got to all sleep in a giant punk farmhouse owned by an extremely young married couple who chainsmoke, run a record label, and hold up the infrastructure of their small scene on their shoulders, and all was well with the world. Highly recommended!

Coming home: My upstairs neighbor is freaking out, he's this borderline-juggalo cab driver that got beat up really badly 18 months ago after kicking two dudes out of his cab 'cause they called him a fag. The situation was a wake-up call for tolerance awareness in the community but now dude walks with a limp and is prone to crazy rages, yelling so loudly the house shakes. That shit is fucking heavy, huh? My bike has a flat, the hole is right on the valve so it can't be patched, so I need a new tube and I'm pretty broke but too dejected to try take my old stressful job back, a kid threw a boulder at me right before I left for tour. Well, a big rock. Anyway, I'm sick of driving, I vowed never to drive again but I've got a half-tank of leftover gas and no other transportation. I predict too-hot summer in-town traffic jams on my way to shitty cross-town food banks and job interviews. So far, I've lined up a paid smoker's survey that I will have to re-learn to smoke for and an interview at the medical university where, if hired, I will have to pretend I have various disorders while medical students touch me a lot. Not recommended.

stay stoked,
juls generic