…and that other bandmate was John Foxworth. My long term friend (since Houston in the 70s) and CERTAINLY the only person I know who still actually has the same address and phone number of ANY of the people I lived with and roomed with in this blog series.
Which is coming to an end fairly shortly.
Which is a good thing, since I recently realized it has been TWO YEARS since I last did one of these bike ride blog entries. What started as a motivation to do something during COVID has metamorphosed into something I actually need to motivate myself to do, which has become increasingly difficult in the bleak, blank hellscape we call reality…
Been still biking around a fair amount (library/post office/mailbox/CVS etc) but have been uninspired to do much creative work lately. Call it the State of the Nation…
ANYWAY, finally got the time, energy and motivation together a coupla weeks ago and biked up to Johnny’s house in West Campus.
The most striking thing for me on this ride was that I STILL do not have the Austin hike and bike trail system down. Kept making wrong turns and having to double back. Trail up off Shoal Creek by 24th-29th now even worse than before, completely blocked with a wall of mud, had to go back and around.
Was a nice ride though – the weather was beautiful and I enjoyed it, though these big long rides have become more arduous as my advancing age shows no signs of stopping…kinda dreading going all the way up to Vanderbilt but that will be the finale…later…!
Got on to the main trail OK and did well but kept screwing up how to cross over to the Shoal Creek trail up to West Campus…found myself here:
The Missing Monument!
Here in front of ACC Rio Grande. I was puzzled by its absence…a quick google revealed that the monument has been moved to another ACC location but that it commemorated (commemorates?) the 18 poor kids, students at Austin High (the original building, now in use as an ACC campus), who died in WW I, the stupidest and most fucked up war ever.
The trail of course is still, in many places, a lovely thing to behold.
Got a lovely view of the Jenga building…keep wanting to play Giant Jenga at the Mirador condos less than a block from the house but feel…ummm…like it would be an intrusion? They have one set up in the front courtyard area, obviously for residents only….
Yeah, I know I’m not much of a photographer, but a man’s gotta try…!
Finally made it up to the Foxhole (aka John’s house on Pearl) where I lived for a while, and where many of my formative musical activities happened (the Elegant Doormats recorded stuff here, many of the Ignatius Telles sessions that resulted in ST 37, and the early ST 37 rehearsals and our first promo photo all happened here…`
ST 37 in the front room at 2837 Pearl in 1987, our first band photo
So anyway, yeah, I finally made it up there…John was unfortunately not at home…
It’s kind of amazing that John, of all the people/places I’ve visited on this here journey, still lives in the same spot, with the same phone number etc etc….his parents, in a genius move, bought the house in 1981 as an investment, and what a good investment it was, it’s now worth many times what they paid for it, and John will be able to pass it on to his heirs…he also has the most amazing light display every holiday season, worth a side trip if you’re already in the area for the 37th St. lights…(lol, ST 37)…he has these fantastic big glass tubes from his long career as a supervisor for the kids at UT Student Publications which he fills with colors…
The ride home was mostly uneventful, though I did pass by the site of La Zona Rosa – wonder what they do in there now?
Sooooo, it was really cool of John to put up with me and shelter me through this time period… the first few issues of Fatalist Monthly were created here, I was living here when I met my first wife June…it was this relationship which finally made me move on, and June and I soon got an apartment further north at 5101 Evans St, then and still now known as the Redwood North apartment complex, close to 51st and Duval…that will be my next destination…
st37.com 