The first time I traveled to Europe I went with family, six months before September 11th. It was the New World for me, and I loved every minute of it. The groggy first morning having breakfast and realizing you get baked beans with your eggs and bacon. The winding streets, the British Museum, the Bayeux Tapestry. Any chance I got I went off on my own, not because I didn't enjoy my traveling companions, but like a toddler first learning to do something, I wanted to do it By My Own Self.

I really took that challenge the following summer, when I traveled all of Britain, Ireland, and Paris solo. Meeting people in pubs, getting good at reading train schedules and finding places to stay on a whim. This mode of travel was best for me at that stage of my life, Mr. Independent. While most of my friends were getting married, buying houses, and having babies, I was Really Living, wandering around with not a care in the world.

A week in Galway last year seemed to confirm that Europe was for me, and I started making plans to perhaps move over there for a while. Nothing much of interest was happening back home, and I thought now would be the best time to make a change.

Well, a change was made, but not the one I expected. No need to go into that now, but I have found that I want different things out of life now.

And the excitement and challenge of traveling by myself seems to have lost it's hold on me.

Just like a musician can't make the same album, a writer can't write the same book (although Dan Brown is convincing me otherwise right now), and a filmmaker can't make the same movie over and over again, a good traveler (that's me, natch) can't take the same trip over and over again. I think I've gone to the well too many times. This week just hasn't been very interesting for me.

I should have someone with me. Friends, a girl, someone. I should be sharing these things with someone. Instead I'm drinking alone in a pub reading newspapers and eating sandwiches from a train station. Welcome to Boredville. Population: me.

So I'm heading home on Monday. I'm done. Sure, Ireland's great, and the scenery is wonderful, and the weather is cool, and the pints taste great. But there are other places I want to be right now, and people I'd rather spend time with.

So Bicyclemark and Just a Girl, I apologize that I won't make it to Amsterdam in a couple of weeks like I said I would. C, sorry we won't be having pints in Glasgow. Perhaps another time.

I think I have a ride taken care of, so don't worry, Mom. I'll get a hold of you soon to give you more details.

For now, the Kilkenny nightlife awaits, and I'll talk to all of you tomorrow.

Yesterday Cork, today Killarney.

I'm staying in Cork again tonight, but it didn't impress me all that much, so today I took a day trip west to Killarney, home of a beautiful national park and the Lakes of Killarney. Took a long hike along a small river (we'd call it a crick back home) and ate an extremely large lunch of roast lamb and potatoes. Now I'm sleepy and warm...

I hate to say this, but I'm actually... bored. The days of traveling by myself aren't as exciting as they used to be. Maybe back in my more selfish independent days the idea of wandering along was more appealing. Right now, I'd rather be many other places than where I'm at.

It's not that anything bad has happened, or that the weather's been terrible. It's just that I can't seem to find a whole lot to do. I had a lot of fun the other night with Linus and Co., and tomorrow's trip to Kilkenny should be a fun reunion with Glen (if he's around.)

But there's only so many High Streets and green hills you can see, and only so many pints you can drink. Okay, maybe there isn't a certain amount of pints you can drink, but I haven't been doing much drinking since I've been here. Just haven't felt like it.

Don't worry, and there's no need to exclaim, "Oh no, why isn't he having a good time?!" I'm quite fine, and the fact that I may not do this trip for a month is actually a good thing. I keep thinking about back home, and getting ready to buy a house, and establish some real roots for once.

It's like that last little bit of me that stayed fiercely independent has finally died off. The appeal of being alone all the time isn't really there any more, and that's a good thing, in my opinion.

So we'll see how long I stick around. Maybe a few more days, maybe another week. Every dime I spend over here keeps winking at me and says, "you know, you could buy a new dresser with part of this..."



More photos here and here.

Just arrived in Cork. It was pouring in Dublin, so this was the perfect day for me to sit on a train for a few hours.

I'll post more later; I'm starving and I need some food NOW.

Cheers,

Brian

Pictures are up now. Just a few to get things started. My favorite one so far is this one. It's a statue of the Three Fates, located in St. Stephen's Green. Notice, if you can, the ball of string the one standing holds. That's for all you Sandman fans.

(Actually you can't see the ball of string. Sorry about that.)

Still no luck on the pictures, but then again I haven't really been taking many. I already have plenty of pics of Dublin from three years ago.

Day Two in Dublin was spent wandering around my neighborhood and the Grafton Street area (the typical tourist congregations and street performers). Saw the Book of Kells and the Long Room at Trinity College, and bought a nice warm hooded sweatshirt; the temperature here is blessedly cool in the mornings and the evenings.

Last night was the first night of real "fun" on the trip. Met up with Linus and a few of his friends and stayed out late drinking a lot of lager. They were a lot of fun and we had plenty of good conversation. I hadn't eaten any dinner, though, so the lager went right through me and I must have made about 10 trips to the toilet.

I was forced to eat a late-night meal of Burger King at 10:30 at night, since it was the only place open. I still can't get used to the idea that everything shuts down around here so early. Had a nightcap at the pub below my hotel room, which was deserted except for a guy named James who worked for RTE television. He had a rich look about him, so I was probably talking to some talk show host or something and didn't even realize it. Or maybe he was just a nice dresser.

And now it's 8 in the morning and I'm typing about a bunch of random crap because I have nothing else better to do. Nothing really opens up around here until 10, but my eyes popped open right at 6:30 and I couldn't fall back asleep.

I'm realizing that traveling for a month is like an endurance race. You don't try to get everything in all at once, like a 100 meter dash, but instead you pace yourself (and your spending cash) for the long haul. I can't do a museum or a fancy dinner every single day or else I'll be broke before the first of August.

The possibility certainly exists that I can cut the trip short, but I'm not ready to think about that yet. Too many things to see, too many people to meet.

And I already paid my registration fee for the Tolkien Geek-Fest in mid-August.

Punchy the Wailing Baby

Punchy was one of four, count 'em FOUR babies that were sitting in my section of Cunnilingus Airlines. I think Punchy's parents must have been heavy drinkers or crack addicts or something when they had him, because this baby wouldn't sit still and wouldn't shut up. He moaned and screamed so much I could barely hear the sophisticated comedy of Miss Congeniality 2 (known in France as Miss Detective Part Deux).

Nothing much to report here. I think due to jet lag, a post-wedding hangover, and utter exhaustion from the move and from finishing up Limelight, I was a pretty tired puppy. In the past 8 days, I've slept in 4 different beds. So I more or less have slept for 17 of the 24 hours I've been here.

Or tried to, at least. The Georgian Hotel is a pretty sweet place. The room is big, clean, and the bed is extremely comfortable. It's also built right over a pub!

Unfortunately my room is located directly over the beer garden of the pub, where some band (I have christened them the Larry O'Davis Experience) played hits from the early 80s until about 11:30 PM. I've never heard so much Rod Stewart in my life.

So a mixed first day. Everything should be opening up about now, so I'm off to wander some museums and other such places. I've been having some trouble loading pictures from the camera, so you'll have to wait for those.

Hey everyone,

Arrived in Dublin safely and swiftly. I was able to get into my hotel early, and so I promptly slept most of the day. It's about 6:30 PM and I'm hungry and I need to give Glen a call. I'll post more tomorrow, and I'll tell you the tale of Punchy the Crying Baby.

Cheers,

Brian

P.S. When I left Chicago it was 101 degrees at O'Hare Airport. It is a much cooler 68 degrees here in Dublin. Lovely.

I'm in a swanky Hilton Hotel in Springfield, wasting time until the wedding starts. I've slept late, ordered room service, and now I found the ethernet connection in the room, so I'm wired up to the world again.

There's a Gus Macker Tournament in town this weekend, and all morning someone has been bouncing a basketball against the wall which connects their room to mine. I think I must kill them soon.

Thanks for all the Best Wishes and Bon Voyages, everyone. It's so good to know I have friends, family, and random bloggers across the world following my words and pictures as I take off for parts unknown. It makes the whole solo-traveling thing a bit less lonely.

So long for now...

The Big Move is done, and I'm back living in the small town where I grew up.

It's a bit strange, being back home, but nice as well. There's nothing like small-town living.

After dinner I couldn't take facing one more unpacked box, so I headed out for a beer at one of the local watering holes. One place is called Kelly's Pub, and they serve Smithwick's on tap. I stayed until closing, drinking and talking and having a good time chatting with the locals. A nice prep before the big trip.

My sister called me this morning to inform me of the new bombings in London, and asked me not to go. I can't do that, though; I'm ready to fly out and wander NW Europe for a while.

I gotta love modern technology. I was all set to cancel my broadband account, but the kind folks at Comcast transferred my account for free to my folks' place. So here I sit in the basement and I write tonight.

Tomorrow I head to my state's capital, to see my best friend get married. And then on Sunday I take a flight to Dublin. So no updates for a few days. The first new post should be from Ireland. Hopefully I'll be able to find a place to post pics easily, and I can keep all of you updated on my exploits.

Four weeks of wandering a wonderful place. Four weeks of trains and pubs and meetin bloggers and old friends.

Please be sure to comment often while I'm gone. It gets a bit lonely on the road, and it's always nice to hear from a friendly voice. I'll be checking my bfauth at gmail.com email more than my bfauth at comcast.net mail, so if you want to write me, you know where to write.

Peace, and Cheers, Everyone.

Brian

It's Moving Day. Back soon.

I stayed up until 5 AM reading that damn Harry Potter book. It's pretty good.

A nice shot at Bush in the first chapter (at least that's what I thought.) Another thing the Right can complain about.

Eerie, too. Increased security at King's Cross Station, fear of attacks from the Dark Side.

Jo Rowling is my hero.

The ESPY Awards were held on Wednesday, don't you know. Among the various high-achieving athletes were other celebrities such as Jessica Biel, and the ever-present camera whores Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachay.

Why bring the B-list celebrities to the ESPYs? Because 99% of all athletes are incredibly ugly. Curt Schilling. Great athlete? No doubt. 2004 World Series. Bloody sock and all that.

Handsome man? I don't think so.

I'm not sure if I want to see the world's finest athletes in tuxedos and formal gowns. We get so used to seeing them in their "uniforms" that it's a bit strange to see Payton Manning and Serena Williams all gussied up.

It's like when the tomboy girls you went to high school with suddenly slap on an ill-fitting gown and wear make-up for the first time when they go to prom.

Ahhh, fuck it. The only reason I'm writing this is to say that Maria Sharapova looks good in anything.



Thank You, Lord, for Hot Russian Tennis Players. First you gave us Anna Kournikova, and we were blessed. And now you bestow upon us Maria Sharapova, who may, in your infinite wisdom and broad constitutional powers, may be even hotter than the first Hot Russian Tennis Babe.

"Territory folks should stick together, territory folks should all be pals..."

You should have seen those kids tonight. Opening night on a real stage, singing and dancing their hearts out to those obnoxious Rogers and Hammerstein songs.

Thank God I have other people that like doing musicals. They're not my thing, but watching the kids come backstage after the big numbers, and the happiness and exhilaration in their faces is just infectious.

After five years we finally got the chance to show everyone that Limelight means business, and that we know what we're doing.

I felt like Pinnochio tonight.

"I'm a real boy!"

Tonight after a workout and a pork chop dinner I had some restless energy. I could have watched the All-Star Game, but I wasn't in the mood to lay about on the couch.

So I headed down to the empty stage at the junior high and got out the black paint and finished repainting the stage.

Every year at the end of our season we have to repaint the stage floor. When the school was built three years ago the original floor became warped before the first bell even rang, so instead they screwed down a cheap plywood floor and painted it black. And so after a year of shows the floor gets nicked up and paint gets spilled and tape marks pull up the paint.

So we repaint.

Got half of it done on Sunday with the clean-up crew, but we ran out of paint. So I decided to finish the job by myself tonight.

It felt good, being there by myself, listening to music and working up a good sweat while I made the stage new again. It's been good to us and we've performed many great shows on the boards. And now as we make the move over to the big-time, our days on that "old" stage may be numbered.

Dear Jesus,

I don't ask much from you, but if you have any power, please speak to our dear President and make sure that he sends that manipulative, lying sonofabitch Karl Rove with his bags packed by the end of the week. I know the Bush administration is all into loyalty, but the way I see it, if you decide to oust a CIA agent out of some petty retribution to a guy who complained about the way the war in Iraq was going, you're pretty much headed for Fucked City.

Books read since April 1st:

The Princes of Ireland, by Edward Rutherfurd;
The Mother Tongue, by Bill Bryson;
Neither Here nor There: Travels in Europe, Bill Bryson;
The Lost Continent: Travels in Small-Town America, Bill Bryson;
State of Fear, by Michael Crichton;
Assassination Vacation, by Sarah Vowell;
Batman: Year One, by Frank Miller (reread);
Live from New York: An Uncensored History of Saturday Night Live, by Tom Shales and James Andrew Miller;
A Year Down Yonder, by Richard Peck;

Currently reading: London, by Edward Rutherfurd.

Obviously I'm sticking with travelogues these days, in preparation for the big trip. Wanted to read some of the big ones before attempting to chronicle my own long trip through Britain and Ireland (and the 'Dam.)

Live from New York was very entertaining, mostly due to the fact that the SNL players and writers themselves do the talking. The rare times the authors interject with their writings the book suffers; I think Shales has a major hard-on for Lorne Michaels.

London is another dense history-packed account of the rise of a great city, but I've only just started it, and I'm sure it'll languish for a while once Harry Potter #6 comes out on Saturday.

I haven't decided on any books to take along on the trip. I don't feel like carrying the weight around, so maybe I'll just buy cheap paperbacks along the way and discard them when I'm done. The thought of actually throwing out a book is antithetical to me, so I still don't know what to do.

I can't believe I actually spent the last few years avoiding books. I don't know what happened; I just stopped reading 'em. Maybe it was the job; this new one is a lot less stressful, and so my free time has increased. So there's one good thing I can say about it.

Happy Reading, Everyone...

I move out of this apartment in about 10 days.

I've been very happy here. I got it painted the way I like it, it's been comfortable, warm in the winter, and cool in the summer. And here's the funny part: I've lived here longer ( 2 years and 4 months) than any one place since the early 1980s. I guess I come from a family of gypsies.

As I had hoped to do long ago, I will pack everything up into a storage facility, leave for Europe for a month, and then return home (the parents' place in Sandwich) for a couple of months while I shop around for an inexpensive place to purchase.

I don't need anything big; just a couple of bedrooms and a decent-sized living space.

And plenty of room to have people over. I miss having my annual New Years Eve party.

Still, it's a bit hard gettting started with the packing. The theatre season is sill going on (we finished Alice last night) and I just can't bring myself to start packing up the books and CDs and taking apart the stereo system. I like it here too much.

But it's time to move, and time to actually buy something. No sense throwing my money away in rent anymore.

Wish me luck...

What a day. What a horrible, horrible day.

While I was in the shower my Uncle Jim called me on his way to work, telling me to turn on the TV. Thought I should know right away, since I'm headed to Great Britain next month.

Words and places all too familiar to me: The Underground. King's Cross. Tavistock Square, where my great-grandmother once resided on a vacation many years ago.

Took my mind off things putting the sets together for Oklahoma at the beautiful new stage, a long dream about to be realized. Then I had to return to the other stage to lecture the teenage actors about why they should be making their entrances and NOT copping feels off each other in the dressing rooms.

Two hours before Alice in Wonderland was set to open its first performance we noticed that no one had bothered to turn the air on for us.

Oh, but that's not all! Shortly before the curtain went up everyone was joking about the seedy-looking man who sat in the back, by himself (not counting his blue duffel bag with maps sticking out of it.)

"Hey, we got ourselves a railroad bum!"

After the lights went down we heard a crack of a can opening. During intermission I walked over to his seat while he stumbled to the bathroom and saw two empty Natural Ice beer cans. When Torgo finally returned, I asked him to leave.

"Can I get a ride?"

Umm, no, you can just leave. This is a school, and there are children present. You need to leave now.

"But I saw Alice on Comcast cable yesterday, and they broke his clock. I was wondering how much it was going to cost me to fix it tonight."

(What the fuck????????)

Sir, you need to leave now or else I'll call the authorities."

"But who'll pay for this?" (He points to his empty palm.)

I eventually got him to gather his things, but as he walked out he turned to me and said, "You'll get your later."

The police were called and picked him up on a country road heading south, but I declined to press charges. A sad, mixed-up man who is most likely a danger to people, but I wasn't the man to decide his fate that night.

* * *

After all of that was over I crashed at home, opened a bottle of scotch and watched Spider-Man 2. I needed to escape from the bizarreness of the day and think of a world where there are heroes.

I always wanted to be a super-hero. Ever since those magnificent first notes of John Williams' Superman theme appeared in 1978, I was hooked.

For a time my hero was that silly Ralph Hinckley from The Greatest American Hero. My grandma made me a costume that I wore for Halloween for at least two years (and probably wore under my clothes a bit too much when I was 9.)

Who doesn't want to be a hero? Who doesn't want to be Batman, lurking over the darkened city, watching out for thugs and psychotics, protecting the innocent from the evil in the world?

Who doesn't want to swing from Manhattan's skyscrapers like Spider-Man, saving the love of your life and having a ball while doing it?

Wouldn't it be the best to be Wolverine and let that inner beast out every once in a while, taking apart the bad guys in a berserker rage.

I want to be Superman, soaring above Metropolis, promoting truth, justice, and the American way. (The good kind of American.)

I want to be a hero.

The most exciting moments in film and comics are the ones where the hero uses his powers for the first time and realizes what he is, and is reborn. Think of Dash in The Incredibles. All his life he's been told to suppress his natural gifts, and on the island, to save his family, he finally gets to let loose, and he literally runs on water, and his exhilaration is infectious. I leaned forward in my seat, my face hurting from smiling so much. What a moment!

I wish we had heroes like that, the ones that know right from wrong, and find the bad guys, and leave them hanging from lamppost with a note from your friendly neighborhood web-slinger.

It sure would make the world a lot easier, wouldn't it? To know that we have true protectors in the world, that use their powers for the good of mankind.

Instead we have the world we live in, where violence and terror and death lurks around every corner.



I'm going to watch Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban now, and escape into another world for a little bit longer.

Saturday we celebrated Duder's birthday.



His real name is something else, but Duder will do for the pseudo-anonymous blogging thing.

We had a big party and ate brats and drank a beer called Oberon and it tasted like it came from Faerie itself. I could have drank myself silly on it but I was a good boy. Hangovers don't come cheap anymore.

At the party, we also got swag. It was sweet, in a metrosexual kind of way. (Mrs. Duder works for a cosmetics company and I got some man-shit.)

Sunday. Sunday? What the hell did I do on Sunday? For the life of me I can't even remember now.

Oh yeah. The day of Big Talks and Big Eats.

Monday was the typical Fourth of July stuff. Parties and more brats and fireworks, but I only watched them as I drove home. Didn't really feel like celebrating America's achievements this year.

Interesting blogs of note right now: Drone1047 is up and running, the drama nerd with the filthiest mouth in the world finally has a blogger site, and look who got engaged.

I think I'm suffering from dehydration.

No one's really reading blogs today, on account of the weekend holiday, and I'm off to a party as well, but I wanted to post a few of these great pictures from last weekend's show.

We always have a big cast board that shows all the actors' head shots and who they play in the show. I thought it would be a good idea to make the pictures look like FBI surveillance photos, since our version of Romeo and Juliet was about two warring mob families in the 1960s.


Somehow I have completely screwed up my sleep habits. Last night fell asleep around 3 AM, after watching National Treasure (meh), woke up at 6, and realized by about 7:30 I wasn't falling back asleep. Read the paper, did some laundry, ate some toast.


Around 11 I was feeling a bit sleepy (I only had 3 hours of sleep, you remember), and so crashed back onto the bed until around 3 in the afternoon.

If my arithmetic is correct, that should be 7 hours or so. So it's not like I'm sleeping my life away. I just seem to be doing it in chunks right now.

Now I am suddenly realizing that I need to bring some sort of appetizer or dessert to Duder's birthday bash. And I'm not going to be one of those guys who brings in a platic container of grocery store chocolate chip cookies.

Nope.

Shit. The party's in a half hour. I've got work to do.

Can I suggest the Limelight diet to you? Here's how it works: work 9-10 hours on stage under the hot lights, never get a chance to eat anything, and sweat your ass off building and painting sets until the wee hours. I've lost five pounds in five days, people. It's awesome.

Last night on my way home from said set construction I got a call from some friends I'll call Steve and Edie. They live in the south suburbs, but whenever they're in the Naperville area we always grab a few pints down at Quigley's. So I quickly showered and raced downtown to have some Guinness with 'em.

Not having eaten anything for most of the day allowed the beer to go right through me, and I had a quick-ass buzz going. I also haven't been drinking much lately, so the tolerance has lessened a bit. Anyway, it comes time to pay, and I realize that in my haste to get to the pub, I left my wallet at home.

Now Steve and Edie are still in that phase of youth where everyone pays separately for everything, and there was no "Aahh, don't worry about it, you paid for most of it last time (which I did)." Steve puts $7 on his card, and Edie puts the remaining $40 on hers. I am now in Edie's debt.

I feel bad, because we're all teachers and Steve and Edie don't make a whole lot right now. So it is decided that they will come back to my place to get the cash and to keep the good times rolling. We cook up some frozen pizza, drink more beer, and I become Professor Brian.

Professor Brian likes to sound important and knowledgeable about music. Sometimes Prof. Brian will go on and on and on about bluegrass music, but last night the lecture was about Phil Spector's Wall of Sound. Poor Steve. I think I lost him when I made the transition to pre-Pet Sounds Beach Boys music.

Somehow Edie decides she's going to share the bed with me (I'm still trying to figure that one out, but there's no story there) and we all crash/pass out. They left in the early hours of the morning and I awoke with a thick head and a dry mouth.

Oh shit.

Justice O'Connor is retiring from the Supreme Court.

And Chief Justice William Rehnquist is due to depart any day now, due to his battle with thyroid cancer.

That means the President gets to select at least two new members of the court before his term is up.

I don't even want to think of the possibilities.

Hold on to your butts, people.