The life I love is makin' music with my friends

Fact 8: I’ve been on tour with a band.

I knew it wouldn’t take long for me to fall behind on my facts. :\ Friday I had massive internet problems. It was out for at least 5-6 hours. I was not a happy camper. 😉 Saturday I was a shop-a-holic and the car got a flat tire. Getting that fixed was an ordeal in and of itself. Sunday, mom painted the top half of my walls with primer, while I peeled wallpaper off the bottom half. Oh what fun! When I was online, I didn’t feel much like writing facts.

I want to play catch up, but I don’t know if I can think of enough facts. I’ll start with one, if I think of more I’ll post ’em.

Fact 8: I’ve been on tour with a band.

In June of 2000, me and about 16 other people got to go out on tour with Lonestar. They even rented an additional tour bus for us, so we could have the full experience of being out “on the road”. Most of us were fans who travelled for concerts anyway, so we were all used to traveling, but it is a different experience on a bus.

We started out in Nashville, meeting up at a parking lot where our bus picked us up and took us to the main bus lot to meet up with the guys. From there we were on the road. I spent a lot of time in the back of the bus with a few other people, playing card games. Haha. Our first city was Deerfield, Oh. It was a small outdoors show, and raining a little. They were supposed to be barbequeing up hot dogs and burgers for us – that still happened, only we had to have an umbrella held over the grill to keep the fire going. Hee. There was a couple that were getting married onstage pre-show, then they were going to come back out and have their first dance during “Amazed”. The bride came and sat on our bus for most of the day – she was just as intrigued by us touring with the band as we were by her getting married at a concert! haha.

After the show we had a quick stop back at the hotel to shower and use the restroom, then it was back on the bus. I’ve slept on moving vehicles before, but there’s something a little different about going to sleep on a tour bus and waking up in a different city. Maybe it’s because instead of being in a cramped seat in a plane/car/etc, you actually have your own bunk to lay down and stretch out in? The clearance is too low to sit up in the bunks, but with the curtain pulled, it was a nice bit of privacy. I just couldn’t see sleeping in essentially a small box with a privacy curtain on a regular basis though. And one thing we learned: you always sleep with your feet towards the front of the bus. That way, if something happens and the bus has to hit the breaks and you go sliding – it’s your feet that hit the wall, not your head.

Our second stop was Allegan, Mi, for a massive outdoors festival. Martina McBride was the headlining act, with Lonestar as #2. Also on the bill was Yankee Grey, Rascal Flatts, Anita Cochran, and Craig Morgan. Rascal Flatts was amazed that Lonestar had a busload of fans on the road with them. Gary and Jay raided our bus at one point, to verify that we were indeed a bus of fans. We had a good time talking with almost all the other artists, and getting to enjoy a phenomenal concert before it was time to load up and get back out on the road again. Nashville was the destination this time, the end of our journey. It might’ve only been a 2 city run that we got to do with Lonestar, but it was a unique experience and one I’ll never forget.

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