happy birthday to us…

yesterday, dave and i turned four..(that is, on January 21st 2001, dave and i met and played guitar for the first time.. it was in my dorm room at pomona college (smiley 210).. we played some of our old stuff for each other (pocketful of quarters, madeleine albright), and then started working on songs in progress (anodyne was our first collaboration). at the end of the night we traded our old demo cd’s, and the next day (today, four years ago), we named the band.

it’s a momentous birthday, because politically, it signifies the start of our second term.. so last night we threw ourselves a big inaugural/birthday party at our house in portland.

we went to pick up the keg in the early afternoon (Henry’s private reserve), and as we strained to bring it up our porch stairs, we realized that men this skinny weren’t meant to throw parties this phat. after the keg excursion, we cleaned up the house and reminisced about great band memories.. we found and listened to a tape of our first show ever (january 25th 2001), pinpointed the show when we started playing guitar while standing (RPI, spring 2002), etc etc.

the event was semi formal. dave looked smashing in a trim blazer and i was decked out in all black with a checkered pink and black tie. people started showing up around 8:30p.m…. we played a short set in the practice space in the basement later in the evening.. most of the guests were out of the house by 4:30a.m.

this morning dave and i are both a little slow going about our business.. we both agreed, just two minutes ago, that it would have been nice to share the night with more of our “down from day one, or relatively close to day one” fans.. hopefully we’ll see you all very soon.