Day 4 Slovenia

We've made it to the EU safe and sound.

This is one of the funniest parts of the day to me.  I wish this was the stuff that people filmed or photographed about tours. The time before soundcheck or a show when the band is sitting around for some mysterious, unpredictable amount of time is intriguing to me.  I think it is always my attempt at engaging in some sort of normal thing--reading, writing, meandering around the internet.  Dylan is upstairs improvising brilliantly goofy songs about Travis which he sings over his cello melodies.  Travis is interneting.  Mike and Rob are outside updating Balmorhea pages.  I'm sitting down on a wooden bench that's been painted to fade into the mural on the wall here at Menza, the venue in Ljubljana, Slovenia, writing to you.  We spend every minute together, it's pretty nice to spread out every now and again. 

It's our third time to play here!  So strange to be familiar with a place that never once crossed my mind four years ago.  We checked into the hotel and walked down the cobble street road to the same Falafel place we always go to.  scrumptious.  Yes, somehow it seems I'm always writing about food but it always seems like such a big part of the day!  It occupies my brain space, what can I say.

We're sound checking now in this frigid room, so I'll try to make this quick.  This is the fourth day but third show of the tour, and already somehow I've gotten sick!  The run around of SXSW left me feeling hurried and frazzled.  I played four shows, the last of which was Balmorhea's performance for the AV Club day party at The Mohawk.  Less than 24 hours after that, I was on a plane and Europe bound.  

I'm sort of still in a daze from it all.  I feel like I just woke up and somehow arrived on the other side of the ocean.  This is only the beginning of 5 weeks of traipsing around the continent.  Time to buck up, perhaps! 

Dresden was the first show (and snow) of the tour.  Went well!  We played an encore preceded by the thunder of the crowd stomping their feet.  Yesterday we drove through a Germany covered white, through Prague and into Austria for our show in Vienna.  We caught up with our old friend Jacques.  I ate a pretty sick Kebap.  Then we played a pretty alright show.

Two down.  Many, many more to go.  Ok, perhaps it's time I stand up and pay attention during this lil ol soundcheck. More to come!

-aisha