The Gay Blades Tour Logs by drummer Puppy Mills

[The Gay Blades Tour Log | MySpace.com/GayBlades]

Touring is great. Sleeping in a van with 3-8 dudes in Texas on a 95 degree humid day. Playing stages in hot rooms with bad sound. Carrying equipment. Arm wrestling bouncers. All of these are "part of the job" when it comes to touring... so when Mishmash Magazine asked me to do a blog reviewing all the crazy foods we could find on the road, I jumped at the chance. I mean, how often do you get to eat all the crappy, heart attack inducing food you can handle and actually have a legitimate reason for doing so (other than just "being an American")?

Cincinnati, OH - Skyline Chili:


Skyline chili is a small chain of Ohio chili restaurants originally opened by a Greek immigrant whose secret chili ingredients include chocolate and cinnamon. I ordered the 3-way chili which is spaghetti, chili, and cheese, and a "Coney" which is a mini hot dog, also smothered in chili and cheese. (The 4-way chili includes onions, which taste bad, and the 5-way chili has onions & kidney beans, which taste bad and are gross.) I also opted for the habanero cheese and a crap load of hot sauce on both dishes. Let me tell you something; if you play drums fairly violently in hot clubs for forty minutes at a time, and you want to be able to throw up a little bit in your mouth every couple of minutes during your set, just eat any greasy food smothered in hot sauce within the two hours before your set. Drinking warm beer during the set helps too. Eating Skyline chili and hot dogs with hot cheese and extra hot sauce not only lets you taste your food again while playing, it also makes people who clean bathrooms that band guys use hate god.


On the chili scale of "Hormel" to "Soylent Green", Skyline Chili gets a rating of "Cinnamon" - it's bittersweet and you don't want it in most foods.. including chili...