We arrived in the Glasgow area this morning; gray, cool,
rainy. The green rolling meadows of Scotland are stitched with stone
walls that someone laid rock by rock. The sheep look like styrofoam
packing pellets (ghost poop) that have been blown across the fields by
the wind.
I rose from the bunk before the rest, pulled up the
shades and watched the landscape go by. The first sign I saw said that
Glasgow was 40 km away, not far, within striking distance.
(now a short comment before I go on with this
morning's commentary... as we pieced together a few short runs into an
18 day tour, we had 2 different busses for spans of three days apiece.
With so many bands over here and some of them doing month and multiple
month tours, they tend to get the pick of the best drivers and busses.
For a short run band like ourselves, we get the leftovers. In Germany
we were lucky to get an Austrian bus from Beat The Street, the company
over here that is closest to US busses for comfort, well thought out
space use and working air conditioning. The UK bus we got was...
well... I'm having trouble standing up straight today. Bad bedding,
broken lighting, no supplies, no keys for the door and the driver...)
Eight km from the city the bus began to slow... a
service area. If you're not informed about EU driving regulations, it
goes something like this: they are very regulated. They have
tachographs that record all the operational information of the bus
(speed, active time, idle time, etc.) and that information can be
surrendered at any time to any cop for no reason. After two hours of
driving they are required to take a five minute break, after four hours
a fifteen minute break and after eight a thirty minute break. If they
accumulate too many hours within an allotted time they are required to
not drive for twenty four hours. The kind of drives we do in the states
would be highly illegal here.
SO... eight km from our hotel, our driver pulls over
to rest and fuel... but not at the same time. As we were leaving the
bus FOREVER in about five minutes, it seemed odd to us that he wouldn't
proceed and remove us from his life. Yes, he probably thought very
little of us as we thought very little of his bus and his brake-based
driving style that may have been learned in the poultry cartage
industry. But if I was in his place, I would have rid myself of the
stinky Americans (and two Brits) ASAP.
No.
Well, now it's raining and we're in the hotel, clear
of the ghetto bus. Yay. I'm gonna try to stretch the extreme lack of
foam nap in my buck out of my back now and get on with my day. More
later once I can reach my shoes without a bellman...
12:19:27 PM 
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