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August 12, 2003

Tonight I left the Internet café at 10:45 for my hotel which is about a five minute drive away. I got to my hotel at 1:00 AM. Two hours of just driving around totally lost in this God forsaken crazy fucking city. 
Mom called tonight while I was lost. About midnight. On my cell phone. Seriously. I’m on a motorcycle miles and miles from my hotel, totally lost at one o’clock in the morning on some desolate street in Rome. And I’m having a fucking nervous breakdown. And my cell phone rings and its my mom calling from America. Thank God for this miracle. This is what I mean by angels or spirits that help us out. “Honey are you sleeping? I just had a feeling I should call you…” “No I’m not sleeping mom.” “wahts wrong with you? You sound upset honey.” “I’m fucking lost. I have no idea where I am and I’ve been driving for two hours.” “Honey why are you always lost? Everytime I talk to you, you are lost. Even in Miami…” “I don’t know. I just don’t like driving. I hate driving. Its so boring. I can’t believe I don’t have someone to drive me around everywhere all the time….” “Well you don’t right now. so you are going to have to discreate this belief of yours that you can’t drive and that you get lost all the time. you can’t go around your whole life getting lost.” “Mom. I know that. fuck. God. I am just so fucking lost. I hate this.” “Well don’t you see any police men you can ask for directions?” “mom this is Rome. Its one o’clock in the morning. There are no police officers. The streets are empty. I’m going to have to sleep in the street here. I’m just going to lie and down and sleep. And get run over in the morning.” “Fishy you’re so dramatic. Now c’mon pick yourself up and go find someone to ask for directions.” “I hate asking people for directions.” “Well you may want to discreate that too. then maybe you wouldn’t be getting lsot so much. Now c’mon, don’t make me worry like this. go find someone to help you and I will stay on the phone…” I was literally on the verge of total panic being lost for almost two hours at that point. When she called I was just sitting on my bike on a corner pissed off, not knowing where I was. I could not find my way home. I was miles and miles from my hotel, even though where I started from was only a few blocks away. and here my mom calls… things like this…. just make you believe….
Rome sucks in this respect. Their streets aren’t marked. Their highways aren’t marked. They seriously don’t have highway or street signs like we do in the states. Every now and then you will see a tiny sign on a the side of a building to tell you what street you are on but not often. You can get to an intersection in this town and look at all four corners and not see one sign to indicate where you are. Half the time I throw my hands up in the air and scream. Can you just give me one fucking sign per intersection?! That would be a good start to join the rest of civilization people. the other thing is the way they have it mapped out here where every street is a one way. so you may want to go five yards ahead of you but you cannot because the street won’t let you. so you have to go around. And then around and then around and on and on. One minute you are driving one direction on a street and the next minute the street has big do not enter signs on it even though you are driving that direction. The street just literally dead ends into another street that is headed in the opposite direction. All of this with almost no stop lights. So you have to turn off the street you are on and turn onto some other street. But of course they don’t have any signs on that street so you don’t know where you just turned onto and then all the streets might be one way for two or three streets in a row so by the time you make the turn you think you need to you could be in an entirely different neighborhood and of course you are totally lost. They have highways that come out of nowhere with no exits for miles. So you get stuck on these highways and you end up all the way across town. Two hours of this. maddening. I felt as though I was going crazy. I have never seen city streets so completely without order or sense or logic. And I’m comparing this city to Sao Paulo or Rio or New York. Much bigger cities. But at least in Sao Paulo the streets make sense. (of course the people there drive worse than any city in the world—so at least give Rome this much—they drive better here) Here it is just tons of curves and twists and turns everywhere. Next time I am just going to drive the wrong way down the one way if I have to. Again, if you are here to be a tourist and walk around just in the historic center and see the sites, it is very romantic and beautiful, and more than that, it is very interesting. After all it is Rome. But if you are here to live and work and drive around like in any other city it is a little confusing at first. I have been assured that I will get used to it. and also advised that most newcomers don’t start out by renting a motorbike their first week. they usually learn the city first. So I know that this is some of my own doing.  
All of this could be due to the general stress I am experiencing now. Sometimes I think I am becoming malnourished from living here. I don’t get enough vegetables, that’s for sure. All I eat is pizza and pasta and cheese and tomatoes. I think that’s all they have. A major transition obviously, and often times they are difficult for us—these ‘what now?’ moments. I miss Cleo very much. I have never been on my own before. I have always had girlfriends. I have always had a staff to do everything, at least since my adult years. I am learning so much from being on my own and not being around her or having her call me ten times a day. I hate this actually. I find it very difficult to be without her to advise me what to do about things. I hate being away from her and I hate not having her to ask for advice. Having no girlfriend. No job. Not enough money from my music. When will we ever stop being a local band. If I fucking hear that again I’m going to punch the person in the face and break their nose. We’ve been working so hard for so long. No major record label. No big deal. I figure if you can’t make it on your own you have no business making it anyway. But it’s the no assistant right now that makes me feel totally lost—I just can’t handle it. and no income, barely a band because they are all so busy with a hundred other projects. It is just a complete start over for me. What am I doing riding around Europe on a motorbike attending a school every day to learn Italian? seriously what the fuck am I doing? Who the hell knows. Welcome to my world. Actually I think it is good. I think it helps me get much needed separation from Cleo and my house and the business and the staff and everything I had going there. I was floundering.

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August 11, 2003
Lunch with one of the Germans. He is about 60 or so. A wealthy retired attorney for some large company there. he knows all these senators in the states. Speaks a few languages. Well spoken man. Interesting. He shared much with me. told me not to wait too long to get married, that the longer you wait, the more faults you find in the person, and the pickier you are, and the less you are willing or able to change of yourself. I thought this was interesting. He thinks it is really awesome what I am doing all on my own going to all these different towns where my family is from and hanging out there. I told him I could feel the places, as if I had a memory in my body of being there before. He said he agreed. It is possible. Probably DNA in our bodies that we share with our grandparents etc. Told me not to forget to go their graves to see them. A good idea. I really like the German people. They are always very nice and intelligent.  
In our afternoon conversation class we have five students. A Korean nun, a Brasilian nun, the retired German lawyer, a Ukrainian college student, a French student, and of course me, an American dilitant. It is so amazing to sit in this class and watch and listen to all of us from such different countries and backgrounds speak a new language. It is frustrating because no one can speak the other person’s native language, so this is rather difficult. We can only speak the Italian. but we find other creative ways of communicating. For example I may know some of the words in Portuguese that I can then tell the teacher what the Brasilian nun is talking about, because she uses like half Italian and half Portuguese when she speaks because they are so similar and it sounds very confusing. Or I can tell the German guy something in English and he can tell the teacher what I am trying to say because he speaks a little English etc. although we are all so different, we are all the same when we are in this class speaking Italian. it is a truly amazing experience to realize. How similar we are. Tomorrow I will talk to the Korean nun about eating cats. I would like to try cat one day.
Difficult day today. total funk kind of after speaking with Cleopatra last night and just realizing how much I am still dependent on her for things. Sometimes I sit in the shower and let the water run on me and pretend I’m dead. Then I snap out of it and pump myself back up. but it is interesting to see how sad or immobile one can get just from not hanging out with another person. But I must find ME. who am I? Without anyone else. who am I? I feel like I have spent so much of my life pretending to be something I am not. I just want to find ME. and depend on ME. and be in love with ME.
On the screen: my big fat Greek wedding. But it was in Italian. so maybe I got about a third of it. cute movie. 

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August 10, 2003

Woke up this morning at 8:03 what a glorious morning. Stayed in bed the sun pouring in slowly in this meditation. Recanting over and over again in and out of a soft sleep, “I am at one with God. I am at one with myself.” This is how I felt this morning upon awakening. The sun shining through the window and the smell of fresh sea air. 
This is nicest hotel I have stayed at yet. Not the fanciest for surely the one in Venice was that. all marble and … but the nicest, the coziest the warmest. I just feel so at home. 
One thing I will miss very much is that there is a bar in every corner and in every business etc.
But one thing I will not miss is the complete lack of bathtubs. I have not seen one bath tub in the country yet. I still sit down every morning as if I were taking a bath and just let the shower fall one me. for some reason this is an important ritual I have been doing since I was born I think. it is a meditative time for me first thing in the morning to just sit with the water running on my head and think and plan and sort of just be me. I wish I could find a bath tub. In the strange ladies house in Rome I cannot sit down because the shower is so dirty so I think that is part of what is throwing me off in Rome too. it is just so gross. 
It is 10 o’clock at night. I am so stressed. What a day. traveling all day by scooter. Then the bus and then the train to back Rome and then a long hike through the streets with my luggage trying to find the scooter place again. crazy. five hours of just traveling from one city to another which is only an hour away. would have been better if I would have rented a car. Now I am back in Rome at the strange lady’s house. Why the fuck I am here I do not know. driving here is treacherous. I have to drive up and down all these super busy highways on this little scooter. I had two big bags with me from my trip to the sea. And trying to drive with them on a scooter is stupid but I did it anyway. and this place is so far away from fucking Rome. I don’t care what they say. If its off the map, which it is—I need two maps to get here every day, then its not in Rome. So that sucks that I don’t get the Rome experience from driving to and from school every day and the worst part is that it is just so dirty and three there is all this stuff every where of this whole family that I don’t even know. their toys and their pictures and their vhs tapes etc. its really weird.

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May 31, 2003

In the studio today working on the new new album, temporarily and affectionately nicknamed Slept with you, the Bastard little step brother of Sleep with you. The joke being that Sleep with you hasn’t even come out yet, and fuck who knows if it ever will. (ps—to all of our fans who expected to buy the album on its “official” release date of March 1st, then April 1st, may 1st, and then June 1st, our apologies. We seriously and sincerely hope along with you that it WILL be out by July 1st.) But we are so far gone from that project now. We are holed up in Vancouver’s home studio madly passionately insanely and around the clock cutting tracks to this new new album. we have been waiting so fucking long for the new album to get the artwork done and come out so we can start playing and promoting that I think that we were all just going stir crazy creatively and we are so happy and excited to be playing together right now, you know, we’re like little kids, cause we all have the same influences and inspirations so we didn’t even plan this. We just started writing in rehearsal and Vancouver was like “hey why don’t we go record at my house?” and we were like “what? No producer? No real studio?” and so we did it. And then well then, we’re going to post a song on the site for you to check out, cause we are making the sickest album. So now the thing is we’re just lofi-ing this thing and doing whatever we want, all on our own. A few rules we’ve come up with so far: no real studio. No producer. No engineer. No worrying about what is commercial or sellable right now. no thinking about hits or singles. Do whatever songs we want. Don’t worry about beginnings or endings, etc. So we cut our own version of tomorrow, 
The McCartney and wings song, and we’re gonna do a Sinatra song. And just write and record day to day, choosing songs as we go.  
Right now the Piano Man is recording his keyboard parts while Vancouver attempts to engineer him. Father Bloopy is passed out on the couch. I’m typing, and Vancouver is screaming “this is so exciting. Holy shit. Dudes!” we’re all high-fiving. Because I think for the first time we are actually making real music. 
I know for me there was a moment when we were creating this intro to tomorrow that we wrote, that as I was singing, between takes I think, I put my head down and started to cry, kind of more like weeping, only for a few seconds, because it sounded so beautiful, and I was so happy to be making that. no one saw me and I don’t care if they would have. I just feel now that I have all of a sudden started becoming so much me now, so much who I really am, that I am filled with joy all the time. Especially with music, or with who I am as a musician. It just made me cry, cause I’m finally making music the way I always wanted to, the way I always knew I could, its starting to come out sounding like it always has in my head. So it’s a really wonderful thing.
And it’s fun to share that with the other guys. Cause they are so much younger than me some of them and its cool to be with them and to show them that we can just make our music however we want and really go for the FEELING rather than the HITS or the COMMERCIAL appeal, which is what most people do and now after all these years of going through that when I was a really young musician, I think that is what ruins your music. Who knows, that could be what stops people from being really successful or popular at music, cause they’re always trying to fit in with what’s popular or commercial at the time or what some suit and tie is telling them. 

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May 30, 2003

Went to the Turkish baths today for massage and steam and salt water Jacuzzis. Ooo yeah. 
Then we went to the clubs tonight. Not rock clubs, or cool clubs or scene clubs, but regular clubs, dance clubs, mainstreamers’ clubs. Top 40 music type places. The kinds of places where you see the people standing in line in the front waiting to get in. I always wondered why those people stood there like that just to get into a club, and who would want to get into a club that didn’t want them in there, you know, if they’re not smiling from ear to ear at the door and shaking your hand because they are happy to see you like is the case in the kind of clubs me and my boys have been going to for years, then why would you possibly want to go in? Well I wanted to check it out. 
Pretty wild and crazy. This is where all the short-hairs hang out. All the guidos, and the chicks with the short dresses and low cut jeans and the ‘you’re not going to fuck me” frowns on their faces. Every one is dancing like crazy and getting drunk. Total hedonism. Fun stuff. if you can bear being in this kind of crowd for long. And not actually talking about anything important or intelligent. And of course the music is dreadful. Combination top forty mixed with dance. They’re just dancing and drinking and trying to pick each other up. Again, just a totally different trip than when you go to more of a scene type of place where people are listening to more underground stuff and talking about this or that, politics, what documentaries they are working on or whatever. Just a very different crowd of people. These crowds are just dancing to the latest “50 Cent” tune or whatever dance song is happening in the moment.  
So less than an hour into it, I find myself on the dance floor just totally making out with this chick from Spain. And my friend comes over to me and he’s like “dude, now do you see why we come to these clubs?!” and he high fives me. and I’m like “dude!” 
Yea and then like three hours later we see her making out with some other guy on the dance floor. And I’m like “o.k. so about this whole “free love” ideal I have. Its not so easy as I thought. 
But then we’re whizzing down the highway at 5 am in the morning listening to Dean Martin sing us home. And all was well.  
Current Spin: Dean Martin, the capital years. 

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May 28, 2003

A lot of the pain over the last two years since I’ve been single—the trail of broken hearts as my friends tease me about, its just because you know when people are single, as I’ve been learning they really are looking for someone, really hoping to find a Mr. or Mrs. Right. And when you meet someone and you have this amazing time with them and everything seems great, but then maybe that person calls it off, it does hurt. And the tendency is to blame that person for hurting you. But deeper than that, its that we just feel so goddamn upset that they don’t like us. So we get mad. Its like this what the fuck is wrong with me thing. And you know I never meant to hurt anyone. And I know that no one meant to hurt me. That one time the first girl I dated once me and Cleopatra broke up Kelli, and we went out for a while and then I find out one night she’s seeing her boss out on a date with this guy. And I was surprised you know. I told my boys. Man I’m so hurt I say. And they say get used to it. Welcome to being single bro. You’ll bounce back. but I never faulted kell, cause she obviously liked this guy more than me even though we really hit it off. Six months later they were married. So who’s to say? She and I became friends pretty soon after that night. I started giving her tips how to play it with the guy you know. I couldn’t really be mad. I mean who’s to fucking say who someone is going to like. Its just a roll of the dice. Or more than that, its some kind of destiny. You can’t blame someone for not liking you and vice versa. I hate when girls get mad at me for not liking them. and I’m sure they feel the same way about guys, when guys won’t stop calling them. I understand their pain, cause I’ve felt it, but it still hurts when they blame you for something you really can’t help. Cause after I am with a girl I want to keep knowing them and hanging with them anyway. I hate that whole attitude ‘well if we’re not going to go out then I don’t care if were friends or not.’ That’s a great way to know that you made the right decision when you break up with a girl, if she gives you that line.
Last Movie:  looking for an echo. This was a great movie. I think I’m going to get into doo wop now after seeing this movie.
Current Spin: alanis morrisette, supposed infatuation…

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May 27, 2003

Went to the Road to see Jim Camacho play. Amazing show!!! This guy is on fire right now. He is just perfect. Spent a lot of time talking to Enzu and other guys in the scene about making a documentary about the Miami music scene. Meeting on Sunday to put a plan together. 
Thought you’ve seen it all? Bush and Blair now nominated for the Nobel Prize! This is really funny! Its not a joke. Reject this nomination by signing this petition. Please forward this email to others you believe share your concern. To view additional petitions, please click here: http://www.thePetitionSite.com 
Last Movie:  Rufus wainright video for April fools day

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May 26, 2003

Worked every day this weekend. Most days till 9 or 9:03 at night. No day off yet. But in the end, it will be worth it. Momentum trails all around me. Just huge leaps and bounds. That book peak evolution should be mandatory reading for everyone. Before you get your driver’s license or something. Like a bible, but better. 
As soon as I start thinking of something, I see it start to manifest around me. Getting good at noticing optimizers, blocks and flows. Investment bank contacted us about buying or investing in AF. This could be a great thing, an amazing thing. Cleopatra and I have worked together for too long. Time to let go completely. Big sighs of relief and cries of release the last two weeks realizing it and letting it all go—you can literally feel chunks of reality lift off of your body when you discreate or let go of things—you feel lighter, more free—this is how we explain miraculous healings of physical ailments or sickness or disease when someone heals something mentally or emotionally. You can actually feel it physically. Spent the last week cleaning and organizing my office and my hard drives. Deleting entire folders filled with years’ worth of files. Just letting this whole aspect of my life go. Filling garbage bags with years worth of folders and documents. Jumping up and down–celebrating the end of an era. And the beginning of a new one.
On the smoking front. The worst part is over. But there is something worse than the worst part when it comes to not smoking. The weight gain. You just tend to eat more. Its fucking crazy. I’ve gained 4.5 pounds. I swear to God I would rather die at 40 skinny than live till 70 fat. 
Last Movie:  Secretary. O.k. so what was that? Francis  recommended it. now I’m worried about Francis .  
Current Spin: Travis, the man who.  What an amazing album. amazing. this is like a Beatles album. every song is as good as the next. Its just beautiful.  

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May 25, 2003

Thinking about…. can we become our own guru? Imagine that. become your own guru. 
Also starting to realize more and more that I/we need to be less “planny” and more “do-y” How do you write it? Plan less, and do more. Stay watchful of each moment and look for the optimizers and wham strike hard and fast like a snake does. Rather than plan every move. I mean, the truth is, we already know what were doing. We already know what we want. Our big picture most of the time has been playing in our heads for years, since we were kids. We just have to go for it. stop thinking about it. take more action. 
Current Spin: Muse: Origin of Symmetry. This is THE FUCKING BAND. My God. How does a band like this get away from us? from total world domination. And yet Justin, Britney, J Lo, Nelly, etc. are just everywhere??? How does this happen? I really don’t get it. I just don’t get it. what is wrong with the fucking picture? Now you get a better understanding of why someone like woody Allen or Picasso was so revered. Because they were good AND popular, whereas a lot of times, people who are popular with the masses are just so NOT good. popular or not, Muse is great. Check ‘em out. 

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May 24, 2003

Extreme Fetish party. Picked up a few others on the way there. Girl says to me from the backseat, “you don’t smoke pot, do you?” I think to myself, eyebrows raised, as I give her a glance in the rearview, “hhhmmm, when did I turn into someone who looks like they ‘don’t smoke pot do you?” The irony. I spend ten years unequivocally looking like someone who “definitely smokes pot don’t you?” and now… life is funny. Our constant transformation…
And so off we drove, by now a little past 1:03 in the morning, four strangers in a car, because none of us know each other—I was picking people up randomly who looked like they were going to the fetish party and giving them lifts. So four strangers flying down the highway. Introducing themselves, sharing where they were born, where they grew up, how they ended up in Miami, and even more telling, how they ended up in my car on their way to am extreme fetish party at one-thirty in the morning. 
We get there. By now we’re all best friends of course, having known each other for a good half hour at least. Walk in. Sex everywhere. Massive perversion. Deviance like nothing you’ve ever seen before. A human circus. Man plays the animal. Hungry desperate faces roaming aimlessly with the ‘can I play?’ look in their eye. Really just a massive orgy amongst not very good looking people. But adventurous nonetheless. A feast for the eyes and body if you dare partake. But over all, not much like the normal festivities, which are usually filled with fun frolicking fashion freaks and thrill seekers. This was just an excuse for total perverts and deviants to get in a room and freak out together, suck each other’s big toes, hang Baskets of eggs from their nut sacks, and walk around in diapers. Too many men. Too many older people. And too many uglies. A big thumbs down. 
Free love, just pure unadulterated free sex and passion, lust, and love amongst consenting adults is one thing. That whole Roman Greek Hollywood orgy thing is fascinating to me. But fetish isn’t it. Fetish is a whole different thing. The fashion is cool. But its not what I’m looking for. That whole Playboy Mansion thing though is another story. Hugh Heffner in the hot tub with ten girls. [reminds me of this one time in school—I went to a “Christian” high school-and they would always have these speakers come to talk to us—and they were always these “reformed” types—they live these supposedly crazy awful lifestyles and THEN they find “God” or “Christianity” and you know then they drive around the country making money from telling people about it. so this couple comes in and tells us about their “horrible lifestyle” where they were always involved in all these orgies all the time in the sixties and seventies before they found God. And me and my friends who were 16 year old high school guys were looking at each other like “O.k.???? what’s so bad about that????” Seriously though, this is really something that we need to research from a socio-psychological perspective and heal our whole speices—well maybe its just the Americans that need the healing, cause the French and Italians certainly don’t seem to have these sex hang-ups. 
What is this trauma/phobia that religious people have with sex? What is their hang up? And why do they equate it with being so sinful? Its like they gasp. “Aaahhh! Sex! No!” but in their entertainment they’re so “ahhh, sex! Yes!!” I wonder what that is. I wonder if it is the old “what gives pleasure is wrong and if I avoid or give up seeking pleasure or things that give me pleasure then I will be enlightened/saved/good/pure/God-like/whatever.” That whole idea of us being born guilty and we need to be saved or forgiven our sins. We need something outside of ourselves to heal us or save us. the older I get the more I see that it is just a crock. I’m not saying we’re not born feeling bad inside. You know, it does kind of seem like we are. Or maybe we aren’t, but by the time we hit maybe ten years old we start feeling kind of weird about ourselves—so that explains the ridiculous but understandable from a caveman-like mentality of “original sin”—and so yea that temptation to look to something outside of ourselves to get healed, saved, or forgiven is an easy play, especially if its brought to young people by people who are older than us. ‘look to this and you will be healed for your sins.” I think its important to keep it in perspective that we all feel that way—its not really a personal thing—we all have that weird feeling inside, like maybe there’s something wrong, maybe I did something wrong. and no I don’t think we should call it original sin or take on any of that bullshit about Adam and Eve or “accept that we are all sinners” or any of that crap. its just a sham. Look at these big fucking churches that are perpetrating these myths. These places are huge with these huge stone columns and high ceilings, like castles or something. You want to help heal the world? Stop telling us all this shit. I don’t think it has to be through anything outside of ourselves. I think its just us accepting ourselves and forgiving ourselves and moving on. [I remember my uncle once telling me “Eddie, you don’t know man, I’ve done some really bad things in my life.” and I was like “uncle don’t worry about it, we all have. That’s no reason to beat yourself about it for years and years. just let it go man. We’ve all done shit that haunts us. I mean, that’s one thing you can be sure of. Everyone has. You have to let it go. love yourself that much that you can forgive yourself.] And within us all is the power to heal and save and forgive ourselves. And then we can start forgiving others. Yea.      
Celebrating a lot this last week. Feels like a party inside.  
Current Spin: Bee gees, main course. Researching the bee gees now. Checking out all their other stuff besides the sat night fever album. 
That sound man.