...With amazing artists Ragnar (left), Coop (front middle), Gris Grimly (right) and Bob Self - the Master of Ceremonies (back)!Or, here is Gris' version of how the trip went down. Yup, pretty accurate. I guess that's me on top, waving an American flag. Love this poster! It's a limited edition, and you can still get it from the Baby Tattoo Books, signed by all of us, of course. A few limited edition Enchanted Doll prints are left over too. I think you would like them, because they are beautiful.
Thanks for being nice to me, guys, I had a great time driving around America with you. Look forward to doing it again! And thanks for all the fans who came out to see us on the road. It was a blast!
America is beautiful! And huge. Here are my interstate highway impressions of each state we drove through. I loved them all. Even Wyoming, a little bit.
Wow, Los Angeles is...sprawl-y, and huge, but not very tall.
South California...after a few hours of this landscape, I began to think I was on Mars.
Nevada. Yup, must still be on Mars...with some space weeds.
Utah. Definitely Mars.
Wyoming. All...this...stark...emptiness....whoa...
Colorado. We circled all the mountains and the rest of it was like this. With the storm coming.
Kansas. Holly shit, we're driving straight into the first tornado that ravaged Oklahoma on May 19th. It crossed the highway just ahead of us. We didn't see it, but we felt its presence in the distance as our van shook with the force of wind and rain. We pulled over on the shoulder, not knowing what to do. There was nowhere to go but forward, into darkness. It crossed all of our minds that we could die. I've never seen anything like this before...and I was terrified.
Oklahoma. I've never seen a lightning storm like this before either. It happened in the wake of a tornado. The massive cloud above us seemed to have been filled with fireworks that went off every second or two, setting the whole sky alight. We drove under it for an hour. It was scary-beautiful. Awe-inspiring.
Texas. We raced out of Edmond, a suburb of Oklahoma-City the next morning with more tornado warnings on the way, and faced the placid skies of Texas, while it raged behind us. I couldn't believe what was happening just hours away as I stood in this field and stared out into the hazy-hot horizon of blue and brown. All I could think about, selfishly so, was what if the tornado had struck a bit earlier, back there...while we slept...
New Mexico. And we're back on Mars.
Arizona. In Sedona, I discovered a whole different kind of beauty to the lush, rainforest-covered mountains of the cool British Columbia. Much like that thunderstorm a day earlier, it was awe-striking. I tried a Rattlesnake for lunch (which tasted a bit like chicken), and couldn't stop smiling at the red rocky formations.
I must return there.
And we're back in California. What a trip. Loved every minute of it. Now I must draw a map.
Thank you, Baby Tattoo, for taking us there!