Goodbye Germany, HELLO ITALY

Seeing as I only have a little bit of time, I will try to make this short. I have fully recovered from my unfortunate sickness, having spent about three days completely out of it and wishing I were either dead or home. I fought hard, drank lots of water, refrained from boozing, and was overall responsible about my plan of attack. The unfortunate thing about that, however, is that James has caught whatever bug I had and is now so much worse for it. I am feeling a little bit of survivor's guilt on that subject, now watching James stumble around zombified with fever, headache, cough, and the rest as I jump around happily and with renewed energy. I guess that's the way it works, though; sort of a family affair.

Our show in Berlin turned out being one of the best yet, as we rocked for a crowd of about 120 in a dingy, run-down club called the Mudd Club. Mom and Dad were in attendance, smiling and applauding away after every song, and so was Mr. Earl Harvin himself (drummer on the MBD album and all-around P R O). I found myself a little nervous before the set on accounts of Earl's being there, wanting to make sure I played perfectly and rocked efficiently. Upon meeting him, I found that Earl is just a normal dude. He was extremely personable and friendly, and I sort of felt like I was meeting Magic Johnson or something. I was even conscious of my voice going up a couple octaves as I introduced myself.

After the show I went back to my parents' hotel and ordered a HUGE room service burger that tasted like a German version of an American classic. Still delicious, though. I found Berlin to be a city without a true identity outside of its historical underpinnings. Apparently the entire former East Berlin has been revamped so heavily that it bares little to no resemblance to its past form. Obviously, i had no say on that matter, but was drawn anyways to its architecture, and especially the huge amount of graffiti on every block. In some ways it reminded me of places in NY like the lower east side: sort of grunged out, but with lots of personality and a palpable vibrance to it. Shara and James and Brian went out for a bit after the show, partying up Berliner style. Needless to say, I was sad to have missed out. But having my parents in town was AWESOME. I got to do some much needed laundry, switch out my broken suitcase for a functioning one, and I got some general TLC from Mom and Dad. My lady awakened me with a phone call at about 7am, and as I rolled over in my cot bed to look out the window, I saw a BEAUTIFUL sunrise - one which I will not soon forget. I will post a pic of that sunrise in the next blog, as well as some pics from the drive through Switzerland and into Italy. VERY pretty stuff.

We have four shows in the next four days, and so I will be pressed for free time in which to blog, but I will do my best to keep updates happening. I am in Milan now, which is a city made up of an entirely too fashionable populous. I'm doing backflips trying to keep up.