23/07/98 - The Ranch Bowl. Omaha, NE.

The Ranch Bowl is a venue and a bowling alley.
During the day they let the bands bowl for free.
I like these 'theme' venues. There's a gig in Seattle that's a launderette and a venue. Wash and go. Today it's bowling. I hook up with Matt (guitarist from Gravity Kills) and we shoot a round. I've only ever been bowling once before and so I don't hold up much hope as to my performance. I got 107. Whatever the hell that means. The big Claydowski I am not.

After a Chinese meal I crack open the fortune cookie and read the tiny paper enclosed within: 'DEPART NOT FROM THE PATH WHICH FATE HAS YOU ASSIGNED'

Hello Thomas Selby Jnr! Do I need a fortune cookie to tell me that I'm trapped on this dolphin for the next five months? I don't think so. But thanks for rubbing it in. A quick glance around the other tables reveals no Kafka. I read the cookie again. What kind of grammar is that? 'which fate has you assigned'. Does Yoda write these things. Try reading that sucker back with a Yoda accent and it all fits in. Mr Lynch? Table for two? Right this way Sir.

The gig is another good one. I wish I had something more interesting to tell you, like the crowd hated us and we had to leave under a police escort, but it's just not true. We had a great gig. We really enjoyed ourselves. We realise how lucky we are to be able to do this instead of a shitty job and the crowd really liked us. Thank you Omaha. During the show Geoff (vocals for Gravity Kills) bobs up in the front row of the crowd and gets down to a few Pitchshifter tunes. Yeehaaaw. There is the obligatory flash of knocker and I'm tonight's victim.

I swear to you we don't ask them to do it, they just do. It's some weird mammary cult. During the gig I notice a gap in the back doors of the venue. Through the doors and outside I can see the day light. These 'All Ages' shows are early and so it's still light. There, just outside the venue, in the day light, are two beach volleyball courts, and there are people playing on them. Some twisted cracker spawn has constructed two full beach volleyball courts, with sand, outside the venue. There are dozens of demon seed shiny happy tan smug beach people bobbling around as we play. Here I am trying to get that spark of creativity going, that first thought with the youth of a nation and Satan waiting outside with ice cold Coke-a-cola and beach volleyball. The scales are tipped.

After the show we meet Rob. He works at a bike shop and he builds his own bikes. He's also constructed a large metal clock frame in the shape of the Pitchshifter eye logo (see pic) and had the decency to lug the thing half way across town to our gig and present it to us as a gift. What a guy. I don't know how in the hell we are going to get this monster home but we appreciate the gift. It's nice to receive gifts from genuinely cool people instead of threats from deranged lunatics. Thanks Rob. Bonus ball tonight, another two cool PSI fans, Mark and Braden show up and present me with a copy of 'Cat's Cradle' by Kurt Vonnegut Jnr. (yes he did write 'Slaughterhouse Five'). You just keep the cool gifts coming my friends. Here I am in the supposed turgid hell of the Mid West, the area of the country that the rest of the country makes fun of, and I get a copy of an excellent book and a large hand made Pitchshifter clock! Gimme Nebraska or gimme death!