5/26/11 St. Joseph, Michigan

Its been almost 2 weeks settled in St. Joseph, Michigan staying with family as the Colorado Countdown begins. I have been working 12 hour days making almost $200 each day I work painting condos on the beach. It is a beautiful place up here but It is continuously raining each day making it difficult for work at times. This work has been the best opportunity for me to get prepped up for my trip out west. Last night I found out that my best friend Jonathan back at home is going to be joining me on my journey on June 19 in Colorado for a few weeks as we rage across the west coast.
Today instead of working in a nonstop downpour we headed to the Casino at Four Winds which was my first experience at gambling in a casino. Scott, the fellow I have been working with gave me $20 to gamble off and ended up with $200 cash within the hour but the lucky feeling was lost when I kept throwing money in and walked out with $60. Scott is a great man who has been working me as much as I need to including weekend and is paying me well for my hard work. He is probably the best boss I have worked for as he is just some old hippie who lived the lifestyle I am living now in the 60s and 70s. It is a good time listening to all of his stories of his travels and gives me good insight on experiences to come in the near future.
I will be catching my first Phish show in Detroit, MI on June 3rd with my cousins while I am in town. I am very much looking forward to the show as I will see all of the friends I traveled with on Furthur tour as all of the vendors from the show follow Phish tour each year. From there I will be hitting the road to Denver, Colorado and work my way to Telluride to see the heart of bluegrass at Telluride Bluegrass Festival. The festival is sold out but with the funds to pay for a ticket at face value I don't believe it will be a problem getting inside to see the funk down. After the festival I will be joined up with my friend to travel for a few weeks.

Seems as though these fellows enjoy gambling on table tennis. We will be setting up a tournament match 1v1 with money on the line before I leave to the next town. Let us hope that those winter nights of continuously slamming on ping-pong will pay off.

Just keep truckin' on.

5/16/11 St. Joseph, Michigan

It was good to visit back home for a week to spend some time with friends and family but shortly after wards headed back up north to spend time with other family in the hopes to make some extra cash for my summer trip out West. On the way up to Michigan I was stopped in Indiana about to call it a night when I met an old hippie while playing my 5-string banjo outside of a McDonalds. Russell was his name, and he explained to me about his work of transporting commercial vehicles around the U.S. after listening to me play some bluegrass tunes. This fellow to whom I just met, asked if I would follow him back south to Fort Knox, KY so he could drop off his truck and get a ride to the border of Michigan. I was convinced to have the extra company when he told me he would pay for the rest of my gas to get to St. Joseph, MI. It was far from a boring drive having the extra passenger on board who was just another happy traveler.
I arrived into St. Joseph, MI to stay with my cousin Kyle who also works on website design and is a great musician. It has been awesome to spend time with my cousins and the whole family up here. Ever since I got into Michigan though it has been long hard work on the websites and such. (I will save you from listening to the boring, long details.) There is a big music scene with my family and their friends up here and I have been playing keyboards with them while I am around. I haven't even been playing the banjo at all since my stay, just the piano, but it has been quite awesome. We are going to play at the Livery tonight for some drinks and fun.

I will be here in town for another 12 day at least in the hopes that I will make the Summercamp music festival before I make the trek out West.