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So all of these topics about stories from the glory days (before aging out) got me thinking about some fun stories, and one of the favorites that came to mind was all of the random food places I saw and ate at during free time. Does anyone have stories about funny places they ate at on tour? In 05 we were in Mississippi at a really nice community college in the middle of downtown wherever the heck we were. Anyways, we got done with rehearsal two hours before lights out, so we all went into the area for food. My friends and I found a Fried Chicken & Gasoline place across the street! This will forever remain in my head, though I wish I could remember the name. It was great chicken, and they had gatorade (cuz it was a gas station too), so it rocked, but watching/hearing the guy in front of me order "a 12 piece bucket of extra crispy, large side of mashed potatoes, two orders of biscuits and fill up on pump 3" is forever stuck in my mind as random. Anyone else?

At least in 04 and 05 you could get a copy of a quarters/semis performance at the show. I bought my semi's performance about half an hour after my performance and had it in my hands ten minutes later. I'm not sure if you can order them later on though... Finals they won't sell because then no one would wait for the DVDs. Well, some people would, but still....

Either James Earl Jones or the one guy from Saturday Night Live who was a Motivational Speaker

I loved the mello rip right before our "Russian Chorale" in the closer at BK 05. It was so exciting, but then again I am a little biased.

At the big impact point of the presentation, that is when you dim the lights and show the intro the 2004 DVDs. With the Big Fish music in the back, and the Glassmen in the rain, and the whole letter home thing...man, it makes me cry every time! I'm seriously in love with that intro! Best DVD intro ever!

Where are you staying? There's a bunch in town so I can get you to the closest one. If you're on the strip your best bet is to head south on Las Vegas BLVD (the strip), and turn right (west) on Tropicana. It's just past the I-15 entrance, maybe a mile from the strip. It'll be on your right. Wait, you're on DCP while you're on your honeymoon?

Does anyone know what Tsunami style at In N Out is? I read about it once, but couldn't find what it is...

I think I said this somewhere else, but looking at all of the evidence from it all, this is what I have come up with. George Hopkins saw a problem, thought about its context for the show and his kids, and did something about it. After reviewing the situation, he realized that his kids and every other kid on that field deserved hash marks that were not put there as was agreed upon. If he had seen it before Cavies went on, I think he still would have said something, so it's my opinion it wasn't just his kids he was thinking about...that's just when he saw the problem. That said, I think he handled the situation poorly and made a mistake. There were other, possibly more professional ways of fixing the problem that I personally feel he could have chosen instead, and he did not. Everything after that again could have been handled much more delicately, and he made a mistake. But he is man enough to admit that in his blog, and that is all I ask for. He knew he embarressed himself and what that meant for his kids, and acknowledged it. That's all we as humans can ask for. I am not a George Hopkins fan...I do not care for how he runs his corps, the decisions he has helped make for the future of drum corps, and I personally feel he is arrogant. But beyond that, the man knows what he is doing in his own right, and every year the Cadets are a wonderful group to watch and enjoy. In my opinion, George Hopkins is an adversary towards what I believe drum corps and DCI are all about, but he is still a successful music educator that consistently builds amazing things, and for that he does have my respect.

In N Out ROCKS! We have them in Vegas, and I will always love it. Animal style or flying dutchman, and a neopolitan shake and you're set. In California or Vegas, you get In N Out (or Tommys...just as good) In Texas it's Whattaburger On the east/middle it's Whitecastle. All three (four with Tommys) of those are my favorite regional fast food places in this country. In N Out for 07, and a hell of a lot of White Castle in 08!

Are we talking whole shows or can it be portions/movements?

I really liked the big diag in Blue Knight's ballad/drum break. That or the ripple pinwheels at SCV (that might be the helix you're talking about).

Phantom or SCV. Doesn't matter which, they were equally amazing. If there were someway to get an arrangement of Scherrazadde/Phantom of the Opera/Cannon/New World all crammed into one, and maybe throw in a little Clowns for icing, well, I would be happy. Someone should write that....I choose, um...you!

It's very dangerous at the gym. I can't run on a treadmill when there's music, because the speed of the treadmill is not what's going to determine my speed on that thing... I loved how he kept writing. I thought I said a lot, that's awesome! Every five sentences was "one more thing." But seriously, there's so many funny jokes/stories/lessons, I imagine we all could write that much. Ya know what I hate about coming back from tour? After half an hour on a couch, you realize "this is a lot nicer than being out in the sun," and you end up being on that couch way longer than half an hour. This is bad, or at least was for me, because even though my desire to go run for half the day was gone, my desire to eat everything (and we all know that when you are on tour, you can and will eat everything, including $20 of Whitecastle after the Indy show, and still be ready for dinner at the food truck) never went away. Man did I put on weight fast, and I lost 45 lbs my last year marching!

2004 SCV. Nothing says company front like a ripple through it with two people running towards eachother. Or Madison 97. But then again the dude had a huge sword, so the crowd may have gone nuts, since it's not cool to #### off a dude with a huge sword...

Hey, can someone PM me the article? The link won't take me there, and I'm really curious about this guy now.

Ha, my friends and I didn't want to get food and we were starving, so we each grabbed like three packs of the mentos! Our breath was amazing at the end of the show! But it was awesome cuz we kept making jokes, like George Hopkins was pulling his corps off the field to repaint, and everyone in the audience was like "WTF" and he pulled out the mentos and everyone would just smile and say ok. Or someone runs over a judge, and the judge gets angry and gives the corps Box 2, and the entire corps is like "WTF" but he pulls out the mentos and everyone's ok with it. We just kept coming up with them. Alright, I don't feel like starting a new topic for this...who else can come up with an amazing drum corps/mentos commercial?

Ha, some of the funniest things happen in the shower. There was one guy that would always pour shampoo on someone's head while they were rinsing. It was hilarious watching people rinse for two whole minutes before they would shout out "How much shampoo did I put in my hair?!"

I personally was pretty good about watching myself around parents. I definitly told some hilarious jokes/stories to my friends who couldn't believe some of the stuff I was talking about. Does anyone know the prank where you tell your friends you "sat in gum?" It's disgusting and I refuse to post it, but makes me laugh for an hour every time I think about how many times on tour I did it. My personal favorite stories are hearing about the kids going back to marching band. College isn't so bad, but watching a kid come to high school marching band wearing only a bathing suit and a pair of sneakers (guys and girls I've heard do this) dropping F-Bombs while standing at set and telling everyone not to F-ing move or he will S**t on their head while he's asleep, followed by a series of raunchy, ethnic, definitly over the line in normal conversation jokes to ease the tension and getting kicked out for it is truly hilarious. Yes, I've seen this happen. Also, in high school, apparently you're not supposed to get completely naked and change in the parking lot! I guess that's shunned upon in most school districts...

I personally did not care for the narration, and felt it took away from the show, but the show itself was absolutely intense and that's what matters to me. Judge what's being done well, and the stuff I like was done very well. That said, throughout the whole season I personally felt that if there had to be narration, then it was too negative. For one reason or another the Cadets staff seemed to agree with me, or at least just change things to something I'd appreciate more, and basically if there has to be narration, what they said on finals night was the best from all season. Everything was positive and upbeat, and I liked that much more. Again, the show was nuts and I liked watching them go nuts on the field. Great show Cadets! By the way, I was personally angry and embarressed for George Hopkins on quarter finals night (this is going somewhere..don't get mad yet). I understood getting mad that the hash marks wern't there, but the show coordinators and directors did agree on painting times and I was angry that he was making his own rules at the time. That said, I was wrong to jump the gun, and when they reveiwed the tape and saw that the hash marks were not repainted, I still felt he may have handled the situation a little differently that I felt it should have, but he took care of his kids and did what was right to put together an amazing show. So in the end, they did what they wanted, they did what they felt was right, they were able to have a sense of humor with everyone who didn't like it, and above all else whatever they did they did it to the absolute best it could be (or pretty close at least). I am not a Cadets fan, I am not a narration fan, but I am a drum corps fan and that's what the Cadets do well!

Ok, honestly when I heard that at quarters and again at finals, I thought they were talking about the guard. That's right at the part where they are working with the color guard, saying "let's work from A to B," etc. And I remember a lot of guards I've seen they do a bunch of runs counting out loud, and then finish with a few runs not counting out loud. When they said "lets try it again with no voice" I thought he meant "now let's do it without vocalizing the counts." Now, I understood why everyone in the audience clapped and cheered, but I thought they either misunderstood or just found it ironic, where as the Cadets staff really didn't get the joke. That's at least how I interpreted it.

I have two personal opinions about their show. I enjoyed it very much by the way, but... As much as I love their new uniforms, and I really do enjoy them a lot, I felt that their individual marching was too exposed because of them, and as a result scores a little lower than if they had had the old uniforms. On that note, while a lot of parts in the show were designed wonderfully to incorporate the uniform, a lot of parts seemed to forget how the uniform was going to look, and a result felt like it took away from the show. (They did, however, do an amazing job of fixing a lot of those spots over the course of the season) Second, I believe it to be the curse of the Firebird. Simply put, the firebird does not do well for drum corps, and the more of it you play the worse you're going to be. Has nothing to do with how well you perform it, just simply that you do. Phantom took fourth this year, and I believe that was just a "small tumor" from the Firebird, while Blue Stars who played it out right took 14th, the full blown malignant show. Cavies 97, same thing. Firebird is cursed! I'm calling it now, cursed!

Not if there's a tie for 6th.... But that's me trying to start a fight, and I realize now I probably shouldn't do that...sorry Anyways, a part of me is excited about the overall situation. Highest 7th EVER, a higher score than last year, and the top 7 were seperated by less than 4 points...truly amazing, and says absolutely posivitve things about Bluecoats. That said, I do have some complaints about the situation. Personally, I was just a little sad, because to me it seemd like they peaked early. Their show was a little too easy, I thought, and while they rocked the absolute hell out of it, about three weeks ago I realized this show was not designed to win anymore. I am by no means saying that it was an easy show, please do not confuse me, but it was designed too differently from the past years, which is why you get them beating BD and Cavies early on and dropping to 7th at the end. And I really wanted to see Bluecoats in 3rd this year, because seeing them in 5th and 4th was like being back in old school drum corps. Honestly, the Madison Scouts are not in the race for first at the moment (that is at the moment. Things WILL change, and they will be back, but at the moment they are fighting for things that are not a ring), which says that there are 5 champions still marching that are still fighting for a ring. I liked Bluecoats being up there because that meant there were corps that had never won that were getting closer and closer in placement each year. I probably wouldn't be as upset about it right now if Crown had taken 5th instead, but looking at how it went, we basically just went back to the five champions are at the top, and everyone kind of falls below them. I just really like there being corps who have never won a championship in the real mix, scrapping for the top, and despite the Bluecoats amazing improvements from last season, looking just at places they and Crown now have to leap from over every champion left on the field (except for Madison) to get to the top. I don't follow football and basketball as much as I could, but as far as who's going to win each year, it seems like the winner could be ANYONE, not one of the past champions, of which there are only a few. That's what drum corps is turning into, and I just really want corps that have rings and corps that don't to be duking it out a little bit more. Bluecoats I thought were going to be that corps (I had them winning in 09 personally....7,6,5,4...etc.) I might be rambling, I'm sick. Still, amazing production this year and I loved the show. And a lot of my friends and I agree, the drum corps "moment of the year" goes to "Anything you play can and will be used against you"

First off, that would be the GREATEST Holiday Inn Express commercial. I would love to see a bunch of random people just put on uniforms and wail out some amazing drum corps show that's all jazz runs, double C's and some 3D drill that involves jetpacks and flying, and getting a 100. And out of nowhere they would come, and Brant Crocker would just scratch his head and say on the mic "These guys must be the greatest drum corps ever and practiced for years for that one single performance." And then the drum major would just turn around and say "No, but we did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night." Second...I know from personal experience there are a gazillion (or possibly a real number that's almost a gazillion) high school within 50 miles of Pasadena. I have family all over the place, I marched Pacific Crest and I've competed in marching band shows there, and NEVER have I been to the same high schol twice (except at a few PC rehearsals), nor do any of my family who usually WALK to eachother's houses go to the same high schools, nor do I even know anyone from PC that knew more than one person at any of those high schools nor went to the same high school. And on that note, I know a ton of corps that share housing sites all the time! How the HECK are there corps that couldn't get a housing site?! Dropping the ball DCI, just saying.

Clearly they were contras.... Oh, wait, they might have been flugels...

Does anyone think they are going to start it in the same set as they ended the show this year? It seemed to me that when they announced the three shows, they meant that they were supposed to fit together. I think Crossmen did the same thing for three years somewhere in the 90s, where the last page of drill from one year was the first page of the next, so you could watch the three shows in order as one long amazing show.