We pulled into the Los Angeles area about 7:00 in the evening and headed directly for Sean Argent's studio to see whatever special effects they had whipped up for our music videos. We'd called ahead so we knew Sean was still at work in the studio after an all-nighter, recording yet another band. They'd just finished the last take for the day as we arrived, a commercial for organic shampoo. Sean does a lot of commercials-- it's actually his mainstay, rather than hopeful young bands who want to get onto YouTube. Personally, Sean was a lot more interested in doing stuff like our videos, but he also had to earn a living. Our three videos weren't finished yet, still needed to be synced with the music and clip-clip-clipped into a final edit, but we could see the general story lines. So Long Babylon looked amazing, like a 3-minute blockbuster movie. Sasquatch Moon looked unreal and dreamy, like on mushrooms. Actually, I wondered if we weren't revealing too much about the kha-rat, which could be risky, but all of the studio guys saw it as high-level fantasy, nobody once asked "Hey, is this shit for REAL?" So then we went over to Bo Wassabi's studio to see how his videos were coming along. It was 9:00 at night by then but they were also still working, seems everybody works long days in the video industry. Four out of five of our videos were finished, The One I Can't Forget was still waiting on some CGI. But we got to see our fine-polished videos for the first time. Masnia and Magga giggled like crazy all the way through the first screening of Hamm-kro yøramma, their big vocal & dance number. We hadn't really counted on it to be commercially usable, foreign language and all, considering it more as an in-joke for our band. But it sounded terrific and the "naked" squatchettes looked really HOT, although it was tastefully done (still got ME horny, tho). (Maki noticed, even in the dark screening room, and stuck her hand in my pants to hold me beside her, I guess.) But I Like to Run, the original version of the same song, was hot too-- same musical tracks, just Adam singing in English. Images mostly of Adam and Magga running, but cleverly clipped to look like a car-chase scene in some action movie. Spectacular leaps, speed-blurred trees, kinda exciting, really. Tho for us it was funny: knowing how it had really been a long slow day of filming short sequences that Bo had now strung together to give them a rapid-fire effect. And Mean to Me had us all laughing so hard we were falling down: Adam and Liss in High School (filmed in the same school building in Torrence once used for the old Buffy TV series). Adam in a sports jock's letter-jacket way too small and Liss in really tight cheerleader outfit, her being mean, him being a pathetic loser, following her around the halls to be humiliated again and again. There are some pretty funny gags. Melly and Maki and I were in the crowd of school kids in the background (even though Maki hadn't gone to High School with us). It ends with Adam freaking out and ripping his jacket apart, tossing Liss over his hairy shoulder and running off into the woods-- last shot Liss smiling wickedly because she's about to get ravished, which is obviously what she wanted all along. Mike got to be the onscreen guitar hero/loser in Lonelyman although Adam did the vocals. It was a pretty simple video, mostly mood and lighting, but really effective and all the girls went on about how much Miguel deSanto looked like some kinda new James Dean. Maki gushed a bit too much, but I had to admit Mike looked good on screen. Maybe I should be jealous of the bastard after all, but shit, I like him too much for that. By then it was getting late, so we all went to eat at our favorite veggie restaurant in Venice Beach. After that we took Mike home, planning on spending our last night in LA there. Mike had called the other guys in his own band, you know, Chrome Pie, and they were going to meet us at his place the next day around noon. After that we'd have to start heading north back to our own Hacienda in Monroe. Mike lives out in Topanga Canyon, where he has an awesomely big old four-story house tucked in the woods at the end of a just barely paved road far out of the suburbs. The house used to belong to some silent-films Hollywood star-- that woman with the spiral snakes bra, Theda Bara or something like that. It was a bit beat-up and old-fashioned, but very cool. The ceiling was high enough that Adam didn't even have to bend over. The sunken amphitheater in front of a great big fireplace was plush with pillows and super cozy, a really boss sound-system played audio MP3s we'd gotten from the studios so that we could check out our studio productions again. All the recordings we'd made sounded great. But we all felt kind of happy/sad because we'd be leaving Mike behind when we drove away tomorrow. Not that it was goodbye forever, but we'd all become close and it was going to be weird without him. Mostly for him. "Mierda, hope I don't go into withdrawal," he said, "I'm totally addicted to getting laid five times a day with you wonderful girls." "You know lots of other girls here in Los Angeles, you’ll be all right" Masnia reminded him. She's a nice lover, but not very romantic. "Yeah, but not lots of girls I love— all of them are right here. But gone tomorrow. Pobre mio." "Poor Miguel deSanto, rock star, super-stud," Liss said, "shall we all give you a pity fuck each?" "No, thanks. Friendly fucks preferred." We'd planned to sleep in the bus, but ended up in the sunken pit with a fire to keep us warm, being naked and all. Mike had some Viagra-- gave me some too --so we wouldn't fail our five wonderful girls. I hadn't ever tried it before, found it second rate to shyøma, but we both did perform well that night. No one knows if Viagra would work on Adam, but he doesn't seem to need it anyway. He was taking it easy-- he's got to with human women --at least until he got together with Magga and then they went outside into the night rather than break Mike's house. I couldn't help watching Mike and Maki making love in the firelight. They looked so beautiful, red-golden. As usual, Maki sounded like she was either really digging it or suffering in pain, whimpering and sobbing hysterically. Seems to be a Japanese-girl thing, cultural maybe, I don't know why. She does that with me too, even though she clearly likes us to have sex pretty often, so I'd guess it doesn't really hurt. I could see that Mike had learned to accept (or ignore) her squeaks and moans-- since they'd had sex together at least 25 times on this trip, almost once every day. One might wonder why I didn't feel jealous, but I was deep inside Lissandra at the moment, which always means a lot to me, and Maki was not jealous about that. She knows I love Liss too (and Melly) but she also knows I love Maki most. I was also aware of feeling nothing but affection for my friend Mike and how happy I was for him that he was enjoying my girl friend and her him. Then I really really really came into Liss, making just as much noise as Maki, and we all four laughed together. I had nothing to complain about Tuesday 25 November -- Late in the morning Mike and I went shopping in the one and only Topanga supermarket to buy (organic) ingredients for a brunch planned for noon. The other guys in Chrome Pie would be coming and the plan was to discuss a maybe two-band tour together. They all showed up, the four other musicians in Chrome Pie along with two wives/girlfriends and two kids. The house suddenly filled up with people. We'd all gotten properly dressed and helped clean up the house for guests, wouldn't want to shock any innocent members of a rock & roll band. Most of us had met before at the Seattle concert, so introductions didn't take long. Scott Richter, the band's lead singer, introduced his wife Shirley and their two pre-teen kids, Billy and Sandi. I bumped fists with Benny Joe, a fellow drummer, whom I'd hit it off with playing together last time. At that time I'd also sorta met Charley Madison, their bass player and Lee Springer, keyboard genius. I hadn't really gotten to know them, but they seemed like good guys. Most of them were at least ten years older than us (altho Lee was in his early 20's like all of us in S&F) but rock & rollers tend to keep on acting young. Or trying to. Lee had his girl friend Bunny along. She actually was young, maybe 17, bit of an airhead but a beautiful redhead and sexy as hell. I remembered Mike's stories about groupies and got the impression that she'd been one that Lee had decided to keep. Mike and I couldn't help checking each other out and wiggling our eyebrows in appreciation of Bunny, then shared a grin at what greedy bastards we were. I mean, how many girls are enough? Mike didn't have a table big enough for so many people, so we ate brunch scattered around the amphitheater. It was squatch-friendly, mostly veggies but with scrambled eggs and bacon for the rock & roll carnivores in Chrome Pie. They had brought beer along, but were aware that most of us in S&F didn't drink alcohol so they were polite enough not to insist that we drink it. Actually, since we were gathered to talk about going on tour together, alcohol and diet were the sort of things we had to address so that we wouldn't end up in conflicts and disagreements. The Chrome Pie lifestyle was sex, drugs and rock & roll before & after concerts (ours was sex, sex & sex, but we didn't mention that). But everybody figured that as long as each band lived in their own bus it shouldn't be a problem. Besides, nobody was about to pick on three humongous squatches for not drinking. So what we had to discuss was the musical chores we'd share: what songs? Where should the tour go? How far and for how long? Should we play as two separate bands or all play together? If so we could call ourselves Chrome Squatch. It was suggested that we just repeat what we'd done it in Seattle: S&F doing warm-up to CP, then we all jam together for a finale. Nothing was decided, we were still just brainstorming so far. Except that we'd keep in touch and make a decision before early Spring, when the tours should begin. Mike was our contact person. We came away from that meeting with a positive feeling that most of the guys in Chrome Pie were responsible adults rather than rock & roll freakos. They'd already lived the wild life and were finally professional musicians, especially Scott, who was married. Plus we all liked each other, which was important. Although our girls were unanimous about one thing: "What we have in S&F is a group love story-- but we just can't include everybody. So we're not going to have sex with every guy we play music with. Just thought we should mention that." Mike said no one was expecting that because he'd not told anyone about what went on during our bus ride. It meant too much to him not to keep it private. Then it was time to go. We wanted to get to Monroe for Thanksgiving in two days. There was no last-minute sex, since Mike's band was still at the house, although he got lots of hugs and kisses. Then it was adios.
It was early Tuesday evening by the time we got on the road, Adam driving. We wanted to be in Monroe for Thanksgiving on Thursday. Los Angeles to Seattle is normally about a 30-hour drive non-stop, so we could make it if we didn't mess around. Elaine had called to promise us turkey dinner with all the trimmings if we would only show up in time, so we were motivated. So, now stuck in a bus for many boring hours I nudged Maki and wiggled my eyebrows in the direction of the bunk beds. But she surprised me by saying, "Not now, please. I don't feel like it." Surprised me because she NEVER says that. Of course, I understood why: she was sad about Mike not being with us. I began to wonder if she and I had a problem. She sensed what I was thinking, said, "Don't worry, I'll get over it. But just now I want to feel sad for a while, if that's OK? Hey, you can ask Liss." But I didn't want to do that, not just then. Neither did Liss, I could tell. "Naw, if you're going to feel sad then I want to feel sad too. Like you said, for a while." She kissed me on the cheek. "We feel sad too," Melly said-- not much privacy on that bus-- and Liss nodded. Then we were all clumped together on the sofa, holding and comforting each other. As friends, more than lovers. Magga and Masnia didn't look sad, but were also being quiet. There didn't seem to be any horniness going on in our bus, for maybe the first time. Actually, it was kind of peaceful. It stayed that way all the way home, as California, Oregon and Washington slid on by outside our rolling nunnery. Snow started showing up about half way through Oregon and got thicker and deeper the furthur North we drove. Looked like a White Thanksgiving ahead of us.
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