Wednesday, September 22

5:30 pm

Mexico City

Back in the land of Don’t Drink The Water.  Stayed up way late last night to try to get body back on Vampire Time.  Gets harder and harder to wake up by noon.  Had to have Dean give me an adjustment.  Back still hurts, between sitting on plane yesterday and weekend’s “activities.”

Decided to come check out the venue though there’s not much for me to do.  Just keep getting shuffled out of the way by roadies and techies.  Bare-bones setup, no pit/circle ramp.  Security is crazy, worried things will get out of hand.  They don’t want me surrounded by fans or in a place where they can’t haul me offstage if they need to.  Chief wasn’t amused when I pointed out I’m like a moving target in a shooting gallery when I’m onstage anyway.  Ping! Ping! Ping!  Try to hit the bouncing bulls-eye.  

Cate probably wouldn’t find that funny either.

We can’t even go out in the city and sightsee, security team is so paranoid.  With all the drug cartels fighting for control down here the city is like war zone – kidnapping, assaults, murders.  Even in the nicer parts of town. The government is crooked, the cops are corrupt.  Can’t imagine what it must be like for the poor who have to live in the middle of all this mayhem.  Especially the kids.  Unimaginable.  No wonder so many want to emigrate to America, legally or otherwise.  Reminds me again of how lucky Americans are, even in the worst of circumstances.  But we still have a lot of work to do in our own backyard.

Cate’s glad I’m not giving the security team any shit. I can tell she’s worried about me – about all of us.  She sees a lot of stuff at work that she can’t tell me, especially about what’s going on in this region.  Since she started working on that task force she pays pretty close attention to the news about what’s going on down here.  I know she’s watching to see what the press knows, because if it’s on TV the bad guys know it too.  She made it a point to have me read an article about the cartel violence in Washington Post magazine before I left.  Scary shit.  Her way of reminding me not to take any chances.

Sometimes I really hate her job.  I know she loves it and I admire the hell out of her for what she does.  But it takes her away from me and it puts her in danger, though she doesn’t see it that way.  Cate worries about ME being in danger as I sit here surrounded in a fucking luxury fortress and get driven around with a police escort, when she’s the one who carries a gun and hunts down bad guys.  Talk about a matter of perspective.

Think it’s officially time to head back to the hotel – Richie is wandering around backstage wearing a serape and a sombrero, playing his Martin, demanding somebody bring him his burro.  Funny shit.  Have a bunch of prep to do for GH promo and enough paperwork to choke Richie’s burro (maybe that’s where it went?)  Tomorrow’s a long day of press calls, radio station event, reception, etc.  No time for anything but work.

Looks like room service tonight, call kids & wife, gym, maybe in-room movie.  Good porn here South of the Border, ha ha.  Then again, maybe not.  Gonna be a long 2 weeks away from Cate – no need to make it worse.  I’m too fucking old to be jacking off in my hotel room.

Glamorous fucking rock star life.