At the pad.


Packing the ship. And not a moment too soon, I might add. Anyone seen my slipper socks? Ah, yes. Thank you kindly. Can't go to Neptune without those.

Well, we've attempted to do everything that needed to be done in preparation for our trip to the stars - readying Big Green for our upcoming interstellar tour ENTER THE MIND 2010: THE ULTIMATE BIG GREEN EXPERIENCE. We've dotted every "t" and crossed every "i" (or every eye, perhaps). So many details to be considered. Much of it, on this type of outing, is best left to the scientists. Questions like, "There's no air in space. How do we breathe?" Not sure we've got that little detail worked out yet, but sometimes you can't solve every problem prior to lift off. Sure, I'd like everything to be perfect and set out in a straight line. But that's not always possible, my friends. Sometimes, good enough has to be good enough. Good enough?

Right. How do we know we're in "Go" condition? Complicated formula. Once again, the scientists... they have to earn their keep. But to give a rough idea, I fed the question to Marvin (my personal robot assistant), and he came up with the following criteria:

  • ITEM: Sandwiches. Space is a very inhospitable environment, full of hostile creatures, obstinate club owners (same thing), and the total lack of sandwiches. That's right - Space is chock full of no sandwiches whatsoever, so you better just pack yourself some... and pronto.

  • ITEM: Rubber souls. No, not the Beatles album, though it's a personal favorite. I'm talking shoes here, people. (Hence my obsession with slipper socks earlier.) There's questionable gravity out yonder; in some venues, virtually no gravity at all. We need extra traction to keep our feet on that stage. (Can't tell you how many horn players we've lost to unaccommodating footwear choices.)

  • ITEM: Robot polish. I ask you, how is a band going to keep its brass plated robot shining like the sun if... if... HEY... HOW DID THAT GET IN THERE? MARVIN!!!


Okay, so it's not a perfect list. As I said before, if we were to wait for things to be perfect, we would be waiting our whole lives through. So... we're past perfect.

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