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What to bring for the summer? Give me some tips!


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I went with a bunch of bathing suits rather than shorts. It cut down on underwear majorly, which saved a lot of room.

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On a laundry day go to a liquor store (depending on your corps don't get any funny ideas) and see if they have empty cardboard boxes. If you find the right size, they work wonderfully as bus seat storage. And at the end of the summer you can just throw it away instead of figuring our how to mail a perfectly good plastic box home or throwing it away.

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You won't need more than three or four shirts for rehearsals.

Take lots of sunscreen--and make sure you reapply it every break, especially at the beginning of the season.

I recommend liquid soap and a loofah. Bar soap and washcloths just dont' dry out enough. Get some of the combined shampoo-conditioner stuff too.

For guys who have to have their hair styled (pit, guard, glassmen brass, etc) I recommend Got2b Glued. I've never had a hair gel hold as well as that, and one bottle should last you multiple seasons.

Other things you might not think of....(from three seasons of personal experience)

Take a pack of baby wipes or wet wipes. If you get your hands dirty on the bus or just before getting on the bus, these are absolute lifesavers so you don't have to wait until the next rest stop. They're really handy for pit, since loading the truck can get your hands really nasty.

Skip the shoe polish. Use Armor-All wipes (the yellow box) to shine your shoes. One wipe will do four shoes, so one box should be enough for two people for the season. Glassmen pit in 2004 just kept the shoes on the truck and used this stuff to shine them after we unloaded at shows.

Save at least one or two of your empty gatorade bottles. You never know when they'll come in handy. I'm not talking just about the obvious "can't make it to the next rest stop" handy--In 2004 the lid to my body wash bottle broke off, so rather than bum off people until the next wal-mart run, I just dumped the contents into a rinsed-out gatorade bottle and closed it up. Perfect. Gatorade bottles also come in handy when you get to that one school on tour where the water is just scalding-hot. Fill up the bottle halfway in the shower, then fill the rest in the sink or water fountain. Voila--perfect temperature. While everyone else is cowering near the floor trying to let the water cool off as much as possible on its way down, you're in good shape.

Get some of those Oral-B Brush-ups (I can't find anything on them on the web right now). They're basically little mint-flavored textured wipes that you mount on your finger and use to do a quick-and-dirty brushing. Works great for on the bus when you just can't stand to wait until the next stop, and you can just throw them away when you're done (apparently they're discontinued? if you can find them, they're great)

Pringles cans make good temporary trash bins.

Wheat thins and EZ-Cheez are the best bus snack ever.

Wear clean socks on the bus. Put your show socks away. The bus will smell awful anyway, but don't let it be your fault.

Keep a blanket on the bus. If your air conditioning works at all, it will probably get absolutely frigid on the bus at night. Along those lines, try to get a seat partner you can lean on/use as a pillow, and try to be one yourself. Sleeping on the bus can be terrible if you have a territorial seat partner.

If you take an air mattress (take a thermarest pad!), get a small patch repair kit and take it along. Your air mattress probably will get a leak at some point, and you don't want to wake up on the floor. It happened to me, and fortunately someone else had a patch kit.

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Gatorade bottles also come in handy when you get to that one school on tour where the water is just scalding-hot. Fill up the bottle halfway in the shower, then fill the rest in the sink or water fountain. Voila--perfect temperature. While everyone else is cowering near the floor trying to let the water cool off as much as possible on its way down, you're in good shape.

Its even better if youre a baritone player... Turn your horn upside down, fill it with water, let it cool, and the DUMP. Crazy enough to work indeed... :tongue:

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No one's mentioned this yet, so SHOWER SHOES!!!!! Very important, not just for sanitation but also for your sanity. You'll undoubtedly run into places that you just can't bear to step onto barefoot.

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I've seen a picture of a guy that used bungee cords stretched between the luggage racks to make a hammock. Would that fly by the staff? I doubt it...

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Its even better if youre a baritone player... Turn your horn upside down, fill it with water, let it cool, and the DUMP. Crazy enough to work indeed... :guinesssmilie:

haha, no question about that. Just make sure the horn polish is off first or polish the horn after you shower. :laugh:

If you can find them get about 4 or 5 swimmers towels. They take up less then half the space of a regular towel, dry much faster and can be reused more often without getting that "funky towel scent" between laundry days.

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I've seen a picture of a guy that used bungee cords stretched between the luggage racks to make a hammock. Would that fly by the staff? I doubt it...

Kyle-Suspendedbybungiees.jpg

Magic '04

On the return trip from Denver many members didn't want to take a 2-day bus ride but for the few of us that toughed it out we had a blast! Many members left belongings on the bus such as bungie cords and after rounding them all up our Horn Sergeant, Kyle, Made himself a little suspended cot and actually chilled up there for a little while.

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I went with a bunch of bathing suits rather than shorts. It cut down on underwear majorly, which saved a lot of room.

I pretty much eliminated underwear use without wearing bathing suits, along with pretty much everyone else in the corps.

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