2 days from 5-12.

Officially in a "caretaker personality."

Non verbal me is actually quite nice, kind to people, hard working.

Had a flashback to waking up with a 2 foot long dildo wrapped in barbed wire and slathered in a mixture of lime jello and blood in my trunk.

Specifically that one.

So it's just like, cool and fun, you know, remembering shit I can't post on traditional media even though it really happened.

This is why I hate nostalgia.

It's not just the bad shit, it's the good shit too. So many extremes, nothing really fits together into an articulable narrative.

I was never okay, and I'm not going to get better.

At best I can accept how fucked up things are.

And no, I've never worked up the balls to tell my therapist I worked in Deathmatch as a ring announcer for three years.

I'm sure that'll go over fucking great.

I got exactly one blurry picture of Tetanus Fest.

We fucking murdered it.

The venue is some place way out in the boonies of Horton AR where a guy owns a little half pipe and a shed with a stage in it. It was a bunch of people, I didn't really count.

It was a hardcore skate thrash crowd, and we are not a hardcore band by any stretch of the imagination, but I played just enough double bass riffs on the house kit to get their respect even though we're kind of a soft touchy feely vocal band.

tons of people came back to the merch booth to buy stuff and chat.I saw a bunch of bad ass bands.

I think we got a better booking slot because I requested a house kit, lol. They put all the bands using the same kit in a row, and put us smack in the middle. You could tell we were everybody's girlfriend's favorite band, lol.

It was a four hour drive out, but the low for the night was 42f and even though it's a camping festival it didn't make sense gear wise to carrying a full camping rig for three people and sleeping in the miserable ass cold, so we decided to "professional it" and drive home that night.

I owned the car and the insurance, so I decided to do all the driving for legal reasons.

Around 5 AM it starts raining, and my fucking windshield wiper falls off right after I get back into town. Luckily I'm home 30 min later.

A friend of mine got in a wreck coming back from a gig that night, so I guess I got off easy.

Fucking wild night. Hopefully more video will come out later.

I have to put words in here too, apparently.

https://www.facebook.com/events/1180530842579389/permalink/1234541020511704/

Gonna be playing a moderately sized music festival this weekend with my band Stay Fashionable.

Gonna be one of the first fests I play with SF post pandemic.

I'm trying not to play more than once every two weeks because it's exhausting.

I know the dudes in Big Gaping Holes and No Asylum, so hopefully it won't be too awkward.

It's a camping fest, so I'm debating whether I'm gonna grind down there and party and camp out, or just pull a "professional" and drive all day and night so I can get home ASAP.

No Asylum has Billy Reeves from Random Conflict in it, and their drummer is gonna let me use his kit to reduce how much gear we all have to carry. I gotta shove three people and full playout bass and guitar rigs in a kia sportage and although I might possibly could fit a stripped down kit in there if I russian dolled it, it's gonna be a lot more comfy with no drums.

Do I "PARTY" party or do I just run in, play, and run out? I feel like I should try to socialize and "network" or whatever because playing festivals is one of my favorite types of gig.

I'm well into "crazy season" and we're only three weeks away from the anniversary date, so I'm gonna be good and dissociated for this whole experience. I'm the one with the car and the insurance too so I'll be the one driving most if not all of the time.

There's a lot to worry about, but there's also nothing worrying will do. You just kind of have to keep your eyes open and pay attention for opportunities. It'll either be one of the best nights of my life or a soulcrushing nightmare.

It might end up being so surreal it registers in my mind as a dream, even though it's really happening.

My gf won't be there to take pics so I might have to document it myself.

I got back into therapy friday before last.

My history with therapy has been really rough.

Over a period of 5 years seeking therapy, my first three therapists didn't do shit for me.

#1: threatened to call the cops on me preemptively before she told me she was declining me within 30 min of the session. I never so much as raised my voice, let alone did anything threatening or disrespectful. Gave me a list of referrals that wouldn't take me and ghosted me unethically.

#2: Had to be forced by my insurance to take me. Kept me during the pandemic and then dumped me to a referral claiming I could get EMDR from a different therapist, even though she was certified to do it. New therapist never gave me a single session of EMDR.

#3: Was referred to give me EMDR. First tried to dump me by moving out of state, then set an appointment for my trauma date and cancelled at the last minute. Tried to have me hospitalized and referred me to Lakeside when I didn't "get the hint" she was trying to unethically abandon me. Eventually I got her to give me a referral to an office based therapist.

#4 (current) Former fucking prison guard. Talked about having my head xrayed for brain damage on the first session. First therapist that seemed to know what to do when I dissociated in session. Is supposed to be therapy only, but told me the second session would be in a new location that appears to be psychiatry (drugs) based.

Doing my second visit with 4 friday, and between last session and this one of the other people who was "there" got hospitalized and had to do a fundraiser. I'm worried he's just gonna waste my time slow walking me to a hospitalization knowing I have a 7k$ deductible and would be better off going to actual fucking jail for the weekend on a criminal charge.

It's bad, the whole thing is bad. I'm wired tight as fuck not knowing how it's gonna go. Like, physical symptoms, can't sleep more than 4 hours a night, and that in shifts, can't hold down food. It's bad.

I know I'm gonna lose the ability to be verbal, and I'm getting worse at a rapid pace as the anniversary date approaches.

Did 3 shows in the past three weeks, somehow, so I'm still gigging and working my day job and all that.

But fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. There was JUST a mass shooting in my state, and they are gonna crack down on the crazies, ie, me.

Anniversay date is a month and a half away, and mentally I'm already gone, and it's gonna get a lot worse. Over the past 6 years from 5-12-2017 I get worse for two months before, and stay fucked up for 2 months after (4 months total).

Shit is bad bad bad.

Got a musical festival I want to go to this weekend.

Hopefully I'll stay outside and be able to go to it.

So the guy who did the Negro Terror documentary showed up to my show with Stay Fashionable last night and filmed us, included @sweat_rockers and Little Baby Tendencies at the Hi-Tone small room.

Am I gonna be in a documentary about local memphis female fronted bands? I dunno. Maybe. Every band in the lineup had a female lead.

I'm apparently still severely mentally ill, and I become more aware of it the more I recover.

I have seen so much fucked up shit. Playing shows totally sets off my PTSD. Keep in mind the trauma that sent me to therapy happened at a show. yet somehow I've consistently played shows, even during the pandemic, the entire time since.

Having super bad anhedonia and dissociation. I'm basically halfway there during a show, using all my energy to rest and hold still, which seems like a paradox. Like going to the bathroom and just shaking after I get set up. It's a lot of pressure, performing for a crowd when you haven't really practiced in a month, being permanently recorded, just playing shows every week or two, doing all your playing on stage.

Like, how crazy do I sound talking about this stuff? I work a boring ass office job all day, then I play a show that's shockingly well attended for a wednesday night during a fucking thunderstorm.

And what do I do? I give the touring band a sack of mushrooms after the show.

Bruh, I am a 41 year old morbidly obese man, getter balder everyday with a corkscrew of hair for a combover wearing a japanese FMW Leather Face Tony Myers shirt based off a Super Mario 3 logo.

At what point does it become so ridiculous even I don't believe myself? I wouldn't believe myself if I met me.

But there's pictures. There's video. Factually, I KNOW it happened.

The sticker on that bass drum is the inverse of the tattoo on my chest, and also my first album cover, and there's John Rash's camera.

I'm thinking about going back into therapy next month, but definitely well before 5-12.

What am I gonna tell the guy?

"Hi, I'm FUNKbrs, and the past 3 therapists I've had have dumped me for being too crazy, 2 of which tried to have me hospitalized and the other one wanted me medicated before even bringing up hospitalization, you're #4 and I need you to tell me I'm fine and nothing was ever wrong with me despite my ridiculous trauma history"

But like, I'M NOT HERE. Like the whole show I'm just watching my hands play all the songs on autopilot. Hard shit. Technical shit. Some part of my brain is doing it, and its not the part that uses my eyes. I couldn't even list off the names of all the songs if you paid me $20, but I can play them all well enough for a dude to want to film it for a documentary about music.

Like for real, the guy who used to live in this head DIED 5 and a half years ago, and I just kinda woke up in his life. I won't recognize people I've known for YEARS in a crowd. It's all just a narrative. I have all these terrible memories but they can't all be true. Nobody could be that fucked up. I'll have a flashback and a whole period of several years, like a whole band I was in, recorded with, and played shows with, that I'd completely forgotten about.

The band Who Shot John? for example. I don't remember ANY of that, but yet I recorded lead vocal of that band with a song I wrote. Like, it's posted on NG.

I don't know, this is a long ramble I guess. You're the one reading my newspost, so I guess you're the weird one for reading it, not me. I lived it. I'm allowed to write about it.

Fuck man I smell blood and kerosene.

There's no reason for me to be this out of it. The anniversary won't be for MONTHS.

But the show went well, fuck.

I better shut up before I say something dumb.

Spotify – Stay Fashionable EP

Am I famous now? I feel famous.

Fame is when you get to eat bicuits with neckbone gravy for breakfast, right?

Because that's the life I'm living now.

I have no idea who took this video, but this time it wasn't my girlfriend, I promise.

Wait for 2:54 to see one of my infamous "walk arounds" were I literally play a solo while walking around the kit. I also used the forbidden technique called a "bodhran roll" where I play one handed with both sides of the stick.

Or don't, I don't know. Life is confusing and Jerry Lee Lewis didn't die, even though everyone thinks he died forever ago.

Mangos are tasty.

I played two shows last weekend, but I only uploaded video from one of them.

This is my band Stay Fashionable performing the original song "I understand."

Also, my uncle died yesterday.

It's a solo acoustic version of this song I did like a decade ago:

I am not a hollow shell of a man trying to relive the old days that were objectively bad and only seem good through the lens of nostalgia.