12:43 p.m. // 24 February 2004

Saturday night Jackson 8 drove up to Norman to play at Blue Fish Companion, which one of the members of Forty Minutes of Hell started as a house party that's now outgrown its house. The rented venue, I think it was the Red Room, was nice, and load-in was the easiest ever. One reason to like Norman: You don't have to pay for parking.

The place already had a lot of people by the time we got there at 10. The first band was finishing up as we got there; the second band, from Austin, was very rock. I think their name is Salvinia Divinorum, but I can't be sure. Nazli asked one of the members where it came from, and he said, "I smoked it once."

I think it was the biggest crowd I've played in front of. It was a good show -- too bad the people were being a little standoffish down in front. But we could see a handful of people tapping their feet and bobbing their heads. Good enough for me. One girl said to me afterwards: "You guys were so cute! Oh wait, you probably don't like being called cute. You were tough!" I said, "We're both." They got really excited whenever Nazli sang.

They showed a short film, "Have You Seen Axl Rose," right before we went on. We should totally have that film open for us at every show.

Josh, Dwayne and I were right in front for 00:40's set. Mid-song, the singer threw a mic stand up and off the stage; Dwayne, Josh and this other guy caught it and guided it away from the crowd. It crashed onto a monitor that scratched Dwayne's shin. Josh also caught a perfectly good drumstick mid-air. I also saw a guy using a filtered cigarette butt as an earplug. Those are the three amazing things I saw during the Forty Minutes of Hell set.

We got paid handsomely (for us, anyway) and splurged it all on Denny's, a motel (apparently the only one with vacancy), Krispy Kremes and gas.

We forgot to bring a radio in the van so eventually I ran out of songs to sing.

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