POISON CIRCUS IS OUT NOW!
Whenever I tell someone the tale of the One (2) Day/Wheel Poison Circus Tour I find myself saying, "It smelled like an outhouse" a lot, which makes me think, maybe I should have called this the Long Walk to Squat Tour. No, I’m promoting the release of my POISON CIRCUS album the name will remain. Here is the tale.
Lake Merritt was hot for October. The fuzz were making their presence known on the west side and there was more trash than people. I think the city cut services due to coronavirus. It was 11:30 AM. I stretched, took on water, I was offered a knife but didn't take it—if things got dangerous on tour I could always swing my cowbell.
Before heading for Fremont I decided to circle the lake one time to warm up the limbs and lips before infecting International Boulevard. I passed one busker in route, more would wake up and go to work. After one turn around the lake and a number of shocked looks and mouthes agape, the Hiss was ready.
I did not hire a videographer to capture this tour. Who has money for that? Video duties were left to my little people and selfie stick, and posted to social media as live updates. Here they come.
International Blvd did not disappoint with its variety of smells and diverse populous. The touring spectacle mostly kept to the sidewalk, because if there was an inch of space I was going to take it, but if things got too crowded I would careen out into the street, then right back to the sidewalk where the most chaos could be conducted. This continued until I got to Fruitvale.
Fruitvale was a flurry of activity with a number of people on the sidewalk catching the bus, eating tamales, popping wheelies on motorcycles, preaching on the street corner; all the background noise needed for a lively tour. Even vote pushers were out. After a handful of street tacos I headed on to San Leandro which turned out taking longer than a full body shave.
After Fruitvale a most unbelievable thing happened. A white Jeep full of teenagers pulled over and tipped me. I said thank you and then blew my squeeze horn. A few more blocks into East Oakland the smell of overflowing porta potty had reached level red on the air quality index. Shanties started taking over the sidewalk forcing me onto the street. After a packed block of cheering people and cars and tents and dogs, I made way from the street back onto the sidewalk, over a pile of glass and … hisssssss. I ran over a nail. My tire flat. I started walking and so did my little person, whose legs are only 7 years long. 30 minutes later I was brought tools and a new tube, but I forgot hex wrenches, so we walked back a block to the AutoZone and got in line, you know, coronavirus.
In line a man asked me, “You ride on that one wheel?” I said, “Yeah, when it’s not flat.” He then offered to let me borrow his uncle’s hex wrenches by yelling to him out in the parking lot. Short of the long, I borrowed the wrenches, I changed the flat and then we were off, with great gratitude. San Leandro was close.
Downtown San Leandro was the new carpet of the tour so far. The streets were lined with trees, the sidewalks were clear, I could smell sweet air pollution, and my limbs were still pumping. After a quick break for soda and salted nuts we continued on toward Hayward. I was playing requests from my little person when my foot slipped, or I thought it did, until a girl behind me said, “Um excuse me, but you dropped this.” It was my pedal. Turns out, I had put my wheel on backwards after my flat tire and the pedal slowly unscrewed itself. There’s a way to screwing things. Now I would need hex wrenches again and a wrench to put my pedal back on. Why didn’t I bring tools? We were stuck, stores were closing and the hope of reaching Fremont in one day was slowly fading. We started walking again. Musically I was hitting my stride, improvising new music on the fly and creating new medleys of tunes from Poison Circus. Unicycally, I was in the ditch, with the hood up.
40 minutes later I caught a lift to the hardware store where I bought all the tools I needed, and fixed all my day’s mechanical errors in the parking lot. I went back to the skate park, ate sushi in the dark and resigned to the fact that the One Day/Wheel Poison Circus Tour was slipping away. I vowed to come back the next day and finish it.
A night of rest did nothing for me. I took the train to Hayward to resume where I had left off and the minute my butt hit the unicycle seat I knew this was going to be a grind. I started off this tour with musical hands and an iron girth, both were fine. My tailbone however was not, which brings me to a point I considered for many blocks of the tour: Why don’t we have tails?
In Hayward, International Blvd turns into Mission Blvd which leads straight to Central Park in Fremont. This stretch of road is quiet on Sundays except for people in line for brunch and buying cars. An hour into the second day of the touring show I stopped at an Afghan grocery store for kabobs. I ate in the parking lot, declined to buy a half empty bottle of liquor from a homeless man, and then took off full of foreign flavors.
Mission Blvd was extra dull, besides the looks I got from drivers for running stop lights. It was also hotter than a hooker. I bought one extra water bottle from the Afghan grocery store that was now running low, and my salted nuts supply was in short supply. Musically all my medleys from Poison Circus grew grating and all my favorite gaming music started to irritate me. I in turn started playing movie soundtracks. Mostly slow movements by Angelo Badalamenti with an occasional flurry of Danny Elfman to keep me on my toes or wheel I should say.
I passed the Welcome to Fremont sign and felt relief. I was close and it was still light outside, all my instruments were in working order, I didn’t have a flat tire and my pedal was still screwed on. I was going to make it soundly (no pun intended).
I made one final stop at 7 Eleven before the last push. I ate my Twix and drank my Gatorade in the parking lot. It smelled like sewer pipe.
The last two miles of the tour were a blur. I know I was musically exhausted so I stopped playing any instruments and just whistled and pumped the pedals. I carried my half-empty bottle of Gatorade in one hand and blew my squeeze horn in the other intermittently. I also remember taking more breaks and each time I stopped and jumped off my unicycle my legs almost gave out and blood would rush into my groin and tailbone tingling and warming everything at once making it feel like I peed myself. This musical unicycle tour was turning out to be wicked fun.
I was not riding my unicycle for this last video and I don’t think I need to explain why. Thank you everyone who came and supported me on this impossible tour, especially musical hands and iron girth. We did it. Yes, it took two days to complete, and I undoubtedly created this tour in a state of belligerence, but the measure of 25 miles and 13 hours of circus music on a unicycle still stands.
This tale always takes longer to tell than a house call. Thank you reader for reading this far. If you have any insight into why humans don’t have tails, please do tell in the comments.
The One (2) Day/Wheel Poison Circus Tour promoted the release of my POISON CIRCUS album, a musical tale of transmogrify. Freak out and get it now.
If you wish to support this tour postmortem or future tours, go here.
Thanks for your support and hex wrenches.
-Samson
