Three Stories

In my senior year of High School, all the guys went to El Gordo's Tacos after school one day. This day was a special day that we had talked about all year. T-Bear was to eat, not one, but TWO El Gordo borritos. And that he did. We were very proud. They took a Polaroid to put on the wall, but it didn't turn out so I grabbed it. They took another and put it up there with all the other heavy hitters. T-BEAR will forever be a legend.



Calibretto 13 (2 years before I joined the band) played the underground stage in 2000. There were thousands of people there, and they knew all the songs. The last song of set was High-Five as it always was. As soon as they started it, all our punk rock heroes came out on stage; the Squad 5-0 brothers, members of the Huntingtons, One-21, and Blaster the Rocketman. They used the T&N hands to high-five each other - they were hitting Joe on the head with them - stealing his mic - it was a riot. I was right in the front against the stage smiling from ear to ear. It was a huge moment for us all.



My buddy Nate worked in a factory at Chrysler in Kokomo. He worked all the time and hated it. He was miserable and depressed. The worst part of it was that he couldn't get off work to go to Cornerstone, which at that time (and only at that time), was the greatest place on Earth. We all felt SO bad for him.
About half way through the week, I was asleep early in the morning and heard someone yelling my name from far away. It was Nate. He had driven all night and knew I would be camped out in that general area so he was just yelling my name until I heard him. The story was that he had messed up on the assembly and ruined a whole days work for the factory. They suspended him for 2 weeks, so he drove straight to Cornerstone. He was SO happy! That night, I saw him in the pit at the Blaster the Rocket Man show at the Underground Stage. I have a forever-lasting picture in my mind. Blaster was his all-time favorite band and instead of working in the factory he was there; in a packed crowd, in a tent, drenched in sweat, with a huge smile, big black framed glasses falling off his face, with a pair of legs draped across his shoulders, turned sideways with his eyes clothes and his fists pumped straight in the air. I've never seen anyone so happy.