Saturday July 11, 2009 – The Gruene Music Ride

[snoof]

It was a good morning to wake up, even though I knew the heat would already be oppressive outside. I had no idea where RK would take me but I knew that it would get me there. And it did. From:

Austin to Buda to San Marcos to New Braunfels to Startzville to Cranes Mill to Sattler to Canyon Lake to San Marcos again to back home. 143 miles.

As I entered IH 35 heading south I wondered what the bike was thinking. The Interstate carries too much traffic and I didn’t want to swelter in gridlock. But I needn’t have worried as the Harley knew best. There was little traffic on the road and I quickly discerned that this route was intended to whisk me to the Cabela’s in Buda where I purchased the magical chilling bandanas. After soaking them in cold water in a zip lock freezer bag for five minutes (while I enjoyed a refreshing Diet Coke) I wrapped one around my neck and stayed as cool as a penguin on ice the rest of the day.

With now refrigerated blood flowing though my brain the decision to continue south through San Marcos, New Braunfels and into Gruene came easily. The pleasant and funky little burg with interesting shops, the Gristmill Restaurant, Gruene Hall, and the Guadalupe running threw it is always an enjoyable stop but I had another purpose today.

A good, albeit recent, musician friend performed at the hall some years ago. She told me that her picture rests on one of the walls of the dance place along with the likes of Willie Nelson, Aaron Neville, George Thorogood, Dr. John, Buddy Guy, Leon Russell, regional favorites Robert Earl Keene, Ray Wiley Hubbard, Joe Ely, Reckless Kelly, Jerry Jeff Walker, Billy Bacon and the Forbidden Pigs, and hundreds more. My mission was to seek out her picture.

Arriving in Gruene I found a shaded spot in a small parking lot not three hundred yards from Gruene Hall. I’ve seen bikers take liberties with where they park, either rationalizing that since the bike takes up little space they can park wherever they want or just because some are assholes. I’ve questioned whether I am just being a sucker because I don’t do the same. I was rewarded with the confirmation that my willingness to park appropriately was right when I saw a sheriff and constable directing a tow truck to remove a bike that had parked in a band-only parking space right in front of the hall.

In my humble opinion a major problem today is the rampant self-centeredness that manifests in people giving not a shit about anyone but themselves. It is displayed in people blocking isles in grocery stores oblivious that others need to get around them, yakking obnoxiously on cell phones while others are attempting to enjoy a restaurant meal, not using turn signals, driving too slow in passing lanes, as well as countless other ways.
Unfortunately bikers can be and sometimes are assholes too. Which can make the majority of us decent and good riders look bad. While I feel for the dude or dudette who had their bike impounded, maybe they’ll think about it next time.

Since it was not yet noon, music wasn’t spilling from the dancehall and I walked down to the river to see what was up and maybe find a place to pee. Shuttle buses where delivering throngs of mostly naked Toobers to the tube rental places. Thousands were seeking the cool waters in losing battles against the relentless sun. All ages, but mostly the young and stupid, guzzled their beer and strutted like studly roosters and seductive Greek Siren bird women in their attempts to attract the opposite sex.

I for one was glad I had no need for such antics. I was also thankful that I wouldn’t be waking tomorrow to the splitting, dehydrating headache, blackouts, embarrassment or worse, and sunburn that some of these people no doubt would.

I found no Porta-John or restroom so I headed back across the river noticing the diminished flow. It was hard to believe that almost two years ago heavy rains actually shut the river down to Toobers following a man getting trapped under the bridge in the rapid waters and drowning.

Entering a general store I asked where I might legally urinate and the kind young woman selling ice cream allowed me to use the stores facilities. In gratitude, after peeing, I bought a coon skin cap even though I don’t where them much anymore.

It was time to begin the exploration for my friend’s picture. But first I laid under the water tower for a few minutes to rest and get my head right. I would have probably dozed but unruly children poked me with sharp sticks and shot me with suction cup arrows that adhered to my forehead. I had no desire to play with them and cursed their parents for allowing this rudeness. When I threatened to eat their parents and make them orphans to be raised by witches and badgers they left crying and screaming.

Soon a group of their now concerned parents confronted me; the men spewing spittle, the mothers screeching like banshees, as they demanded to know what I had done to their kids, I told them that if I heard one more word I would enlist my high ups at Child Protective Service to ensure that they would once again be childless.

It was a bluff but it worked. The parents stormed off, hopefully to pay attention to the behavior of their young heathens. I was left in peace but the desire to nap under the water tower had gone and I walked the short distance into Gruene Hall.

Nostalgia overwhelmed me as I took in the faint scent of stale beer, cigarette smoke, and urine that permeated the building. It is the oldest hall in the state and its ghosts tangibly appeared to me. Scanning the walls of pictures kicked up further memories, mostly from the 70’s of good times. I wished that I could have remembered more of them but my time there was blurred by my days of excess alcohol and drug use. However, friends have told me that I had great times in Gruene.

I quickly found my friend’s picture and snapped it with my camera. As I continued to admire the artists that had played the hall a gray haired, pony-tailed fellow walked up beside me.

“You remember these old-timers don’t you?” He asked.

“Sure” I said, “I haven’t listened seriously to much of the music made after the 70’s.”

“Me either. Would you like to see the really neat stuff? My personal collection?”

He seemed like a nice enough guy so I followed him outside, past the Gristmill Restaurant and into what appeared to be a small abandoned storefront. He unlocked the door and we went inside.

“Before we continue” he said, “I need your promise that you will tell no one about what you’re about to see. Some of my collection was acquired by less than scrupulous methods. I’ve devoted the last forty-five years of my life and millions of dollars obtaining these items. Other than me, only nineteen others have seen my collection and I had to have the four that betrayed my confidence killed. I will have you killed if you disclose to anyone that this museum exists.”

“It is not that important to me; at least not so important that I would risk my life looking at your pictures of musicians. Maybe I’ll just leave.”

“Too late” he said. “You already know too much and it’s not just pictures you will see.”

Now he had my curiosity. I wanted to see what he had to show me so I agreed and even signed a contract stating that I wouldn’t tell of his collection.

Satisfied that he could trust me, he pulled aside a rug and opened the concealed trapdoor. We began a twenty minute journey down many limestone steps. The steps spiraled downward and the temperature dropped as we descended into the earth. Seven times heavy wooden doors which he unlocked blocked our way.

Candles in holders mounted on the stone walls provided the only illumination. I was really enjoying the trek. It was like entering catacombs or something.

Finally he opened the last of the doors and we entered a long, narrow room. Along the length of the walls, on both sides, were cuts in the walls that formed the areas where he displayed his collection. Just above each item was a picture of the related musician.

“Welcome to my remembrances of my favorite musicians who died in the 70’s!”

He was delighted with himself to the point of my questioning his sanity. I walked on to observe his legacy.

In each hole in the wall resided a body part of a dead musician with accompanying picture above and small speakers which emitted the work of the artist. Some of the parts were in formaldehyde in jars, some preserved in glass cases, and some seemingly unpreserved, but natural looking. It was weird and eerie, but fascinating at the same time.

The first display contained the left leg, severed slightly above the knee of The Grateful Dead’s Pigpen McKernan along with written information on his 1973 date of death along with the cause - cirrhosis of the liver. Dark Star blared through the speakers.

I was hooked as I spent the next two hours surrounded by all of the music and partial remains of legendary musicians. I got to see:

Jim Morrison’s cock
Mama Cass’ intestines
Elvis Presley’s pelvic bones
Gram Parsons’ eye
Duane Allman’s fingers (four of them)
Jim Croce’s lip and mustache
Florence Ballard’s left tit
Jimi Hendrix’s big right hand
George Lowell’s nose
Sid Vicious’ foot with a syringe stuck between the toes
Keith Moon’s balls
Janis Joplin’s ass
Freddie King’s dick which was bigger than Morrison’s
Ronnie VanZant’s two bare feet
And body parts, both internal and external from a lot of other folks I didn’t know.

It was morbid, interesting and educational. I learned of electrocutions on stage and in a bathtub. There were OD’s, suicides, shootings, heart attacks and arrests, and much much more.

I told my guide that he had a gold mine there and could make a mint going public with the museum but he said it was mainly for his own edification and he didn’t want to disrespect the dead by commercializing on their demise and the remains they’d left behind. I could understand his point of view and respected it to the point of honoring the place’s secrecy as well as his anonymity. He had even planned for the perpetual care and upkeep of the collection at the time of his own death.

We bid our farewells. It was only after I was well on the road toward Canyon Lake that it dawned on me that maybe those weren’t the actual parts from the stated musicians. Maybe they were parts that he’d bought or taken from ordinary people like me. Maybe he even killed them himself and performed his own dissecting. Maybe I’d just spent time with a sick and twisted serial killer. Maybe I’d just narrowly avoided my own murder. I shuddered.

But not for long because of the heat. I rode through Startzville to Comal Park where only puddles remained of the usually deep lake now decimated by the drought. After chatting with the Vietnam Vet would attended the admission station I continued on to Crane’s Mill Park where the lady attendant let me ride through the park for no charge. Hardly anyone was there and even though there was more water, the drought had likewise taken its toll here.

After stops to replenish water and Diet Cokes I meandered into San Marcos where I stopped by the river to watch more mostly naked people in the cool shade of the cypress, pecan and oak trees.

As RK and I traveled back north on the Interstate I prayed my prayers of gratitude. I received a call yesterday from Dr. Hiney’s office telling me that the biopsy taken during last Monday’s endoscopy came out clear and clean. No cancer. Just take the Protonix to control the acid indefinitely as a preventive measure and they’ll see me in ten years. I got similar good results on the colonoscopy. It was a relief and although I worried needlessly I was glad that I hadn’t worried more.

The whole thing had actually been not that bad. Last Sunday was probably the worse having to consume a mild Drano-like substance mixed with gallons of Gatorade. I shat like a goose (who makes up these animal references? I’ve never seen a goose shit. Is it intense?) clearing out my innards so the good Doc could do his work.

My wife accompanied me to the place where it all happened. I waited then signed reams of releases and acknowledgements and then I waited some more. They took me back to the factory where they perform these butt checks. I put on the stupid robe that ties in the back, exposing my ass. After all isn’t that why I was there?

Two different nurses attended to me. Both made sure that I knew who I was and knew why I was there. The second one stuck an IV in my hand so I could watch the saline drip from the plastic bag. Something to distract me from the atrocities they were about to inflict upon my arse, throat and guts.

Finally I was wheeled away from my wife into a dark room. The door was shut behind me and I thought I had been left alone to wait and ponder my sinful existence. But soon the lighting increased revealing that I was surrounded by seven beautiful women’s bodies, They were identical in every respect with full breasts and tight asses. It would have been a major turn-on were it not for the also identical Alfred E Neuman masks that covered their faces.

In unison they too cheerily shouted “Welcome Snoof. We’re here to help you. Doctor Hiney is running late but fret not.”

They began running their hands all over me checking parts that I didn’t know were involved in the procedure including my weenie and my ears in which they stuck their tongues. Overall it was quite pleasant except when they jacked the gurney up to the ceiling cramming me between the bed and a large metal plate protruding from the ceiling. Just as I though the pressure would kill me, the girls, again in unison asked “Did we squeeze any shit out of you Snoof?”

“I don’t think so” I replied.

“Good. You did your prep well then. Doctor Hiney is on his way.”

As I was lowered to the ground the good Doctor came bounding in wearing clown-like colorful polka dotted scrubs.

“I lied to you about that miniaturization businesses a couple of weeks ago. We don’t really shrink ourselves and travel up your ass. That was bullshit. We have the latest medical tools.”

With that he showed me a long, skinny metal tube with a tiny blinking human eye attached to the front of it. Light so bright I had to turn my head was emitted from the eye. So the little yes with its yards of fiber optics would travel through my innards relaying what it saw back to a monitor.

“That’s how we see what you have in you. But what makes me the best choice you can make as a doctor is this little baby.” He tore open his scrub top and opened a zipper sewed into his bare chest. Out of the uncovered hole in his breastbone emerged a tiny, slithering snake-like creature with snapping, razor sharp teeth.

“Gilbert, here, will take care of any nasty polyps we find. Then he’ll bite off the necessary tissue we need for the upper GI biopsy.”

As I started to protest, Dr.Hiney shushed me and motioned for one of the naked ladies to start the sedation. I heard him say, “It’s better this way” as he put on his own Alfred E. Neuman mask.

The next thing I knew I was waking up to my wife and a third nurse. Maybe one the naked seven? I couldn’t tell with her unmasked and dressed in her scrubs. Although I was a little fucked in the head I recovered quickly and was at work on Tuesday morning.

After getting the news of the good results I wondered why I had delayed this procedure for five years. It won’t happen again. If they remind me in ten years.

As I cruised into Austin with Harley performing flawlessly I wished that I could keep on riding. Heat and all. I thought of us venturing north in search of cold, but mostly just to keep riding.

We’ll just have to pick up where we left off next weekend. Good day. Good ride.

[snoof]

pix

[FATboy05]

I whole-heartedly agree with this Howard..."In my humble opinion a major problem today is the rampant self-centeredness that manifests in people giving not a shit about anyone but themselves. It is displayed in people blocking isles in grocery stores oblivious that others need to get around them, yakking obnoxiously on cell phones while others are attempting to enjoy a restaurant meal, not using turn signals, driving too slow in passing lanes, as well as countless other ways."
and about the Colonoscopy/Endoscopy.....they didn't show me the "tools" I didn't ask to see them either :wink:
We all were down there whe the River was flooded, ate lunch at one of Red's Friends place.....had to have a guide to float.
Sounds like a fun day........question, do you always go on these trips solo?

[snoof]

Hey Mike

Actually the only times I've ridden with anyone else has been with you and the folks last October in Bandera and this past ROT.

Other than that all the rides have been by myself. My wife is busy with her schoolwork so my riding works out fine with her.

Hope you guys are getting to ride and staying cool as possible

[FATboy05]

I feel privileged to have been on all your "group" rides. Keep ridin'and postin' I really enjoy the stories of the road