After meeting Joe and Bill in 2003, they invited us to join them for Bear Week in Provincetown in 2004. Jack didn't want to fly, and he had a whole month sabbatical to take, so he took the train (see pictures of his trip here) to Albany, while Steve flew out directly to Albany a few days later. After seeing some of Jack's family in upstate New York, we drove out to Boston to stay with Bill and Joe, and meet various other friends, like Live Journal friend Pete Chvany. For Bear Week itself, we drove out with Bill and Joe and shared a house with them and their friend David.

We had a fabulous time, despite my tripping at the A-House and spraining an ankle for a few days. Jack and I ate a ton of seafood, swam at the Boat Slip, threw an awesome house party, and had the best day on the beach ever. Bill and I also hit the local record shop hard, although it has since been turned into a boutique or something, the bastards.

Music trivia: Some of these songs I never would have heard if it weren't for our friend Bill, the "Steve of the east coast." So thanks are due to him for introducing me to Tube and Berger, the Royal Gigolos, Satin and Circuits, and (eek) the Vengaboys, which we knew best as an amusement park commercial jingle. And another song that was new to me, "Born to Be Alive" by Patrick Hernandez, I managed to dance to on the event's classic disco dance floor, despite my ankle, and it was one of the best moments on a dance floor I've ever had ... surrounded by friends, music pumping, living in the moment, and grooving on the sentiment of the song.

The title: I think one of the seafood restaurants we went to advertised a giant fried seafood bonanza, which included scallops, shrimp, clams (complete with bellies, as is the Cape Cod way), fish and fries. These seafood platters are plentiful on the east coast but scarce on the west, so we always try to have one we're back east. And "clam bellies" and "lobster rolls" were a running joke among Jack, me, Joe and Bill.

By this time I was foresighted enough to know I was going to be making a commemorative CD to mark our Provincetown vacation, but a dilemma faced me: was I going to hear enough interesting music to fill out the CD? So I decided to make a CD to listen to in the rental house with some cool instrumentals, and since I heard them there, they were fair game for inclusion on my official souvenir CD ... although these CDs are really just for me and there's no one judging me, I did feel I had to play fair and only include music that I heard on the vacation. (I gave up on that rule at some point.)

So, anyway, I picked out a bunch of favorite instrumentals and burned a CD out of them. I think we played it in the rental house (where we also had another awesome party, this one Hawaiian-themed) and also in the car as Jack and I were driving around the northeast. Didn't notice until much later that I had repeated "Bowie Low Song" from the previous compilation. Some of the other songs (Sandals, E-Smoove, Pierre Henry, etc.) were also used by me in other homemade CDs from around that period.

The title: Could it be any more self-explanatory?

And here's the actual CD that was the souvenir from our trip. This was a big trip -- we went to Provincetown for Bear Week with Bill and Joe and Dave, saw Jack's relatives back in Albany, and also trekked down to Washington, D.C., for the wedding of my college friend Chris. So, I made three separate covers, one for each leg of our trip. (The Ptown cover shows us playing mini-golf, which was a tradition after Bear Week until the course was torn down. The Albany cover obviously shows Jack's relatives, and the DC cover shows wedding guests.)

Music trivia: In addition to five songs from the instrumental CD, this includes one by Sissy Spacek from a compilation of Beatle-themed novelty songs, seeing as how Bill is even more of a Beatles fan than I am. Picked up the Buzzin' Fly dance compilation in Provincetown, probably one of the last CDs I bought at that little CD store before it was turned into a boutique or something, the bastards.

The title: From the Sissy Spacek song, recalling how John Lennon gave her so much pleasure with his music, until he changed and started protesting the war, showing himself off naked, supporting Bagism, or whatever it was that disappointed her. Fickle girl.

Newly unemployed, I joined my friend Ray in a drive across the country, scattering the ashes of his recently-departed husband Jim. I flew to Boston and accompanied Bill and Joe out to Provincetown, and Ray joined us a few days into the week.

As usual, Provincetown was a lot of fun, and afterwards we spent a full day in Boston sightseeing. I remember passing a colonial-era graveyard and Ray remarking, "That sure is a lot of graves," to which Bill responded, "Well .... shit happens." We were also in an Italian section of the old town when we got caught up in a street fair, which was like something right out of a movie.

After Boston, Ray and I hit the road and drove north into Canada, over to the upper peninsula of Michigan, then down to the Minneapolis area for a full day of sightseeing (and so Ray could catch up with friends from when he lived there in Minnesota). From there, up to North Dakota, down to the Black Hills, Mount Rushmore, Whistling Cave, then over Wyoming to Yellowstone (where we stayed in the Old Faithful Lodge, the ur-Lodge for all giant log Disneylandesque lodges ever since), then on to Portland and back down to San Francisco, where Ray dropped me off before continuing down to Los Angeles. (And with the Dakotas and Minnesota down, I was that much closer to being in all 50 states. At the time, I only had Washington state and Hawaii left.)

One special memory: wandering outside at night when we were staying at the Old Faithful Lodge. I had been worried about losing my job a few months prior, but then I looked upwards and the stars seemed so reassuring, like they were telling me, "In the grand scheme of things, this unemployment thing is nothing. You'll do fine."

Music trivia: Ray's influence is evident choices by the Puppini Sisters, Feist, Dido and the Pet Shop Boys. The Dandy Warhols song repeats from an earlier compilation because Bill showed us Dig, a documentary on the band and its rivalry with the Brian Jonestown Massacre. The Western themes I packed away to listen to as we were touring the Badlands and other cinematically classic locations of the Old West.

The title: While eating at a giant steakhouse north of Boston, Joe mentioned how he didn't like tater tots, because they were made from "the worst part of the potato." The rest of us found this hilarious, since aren't potatoes pretty much the same all the way through?

Another Bear Week in P-town with Bill and Joe, with Ken and Jon sharing the house with us instead of David. And at one point, when Bill and I were playing music in the living room of the rental house, Ken asked, "Don't you have any music from this century?" Point taken, and this CD set has more up-to-date music than usual, courtesy of Bill (Calvin Harris, Metric, Icona Pop, Carly Rae Jepsen, etc.).

Our old beloved CD shop gone, the bastards, music-loving Bill and I had to resort (as I did in 2008) with a tiny little CD shop that specialized in dance music. Back in 2008 I'd picked up some 12-inch mixes of '80s songs, but this time I picked up some ridiculously disco-ey mixes of James Bond and Lawrence Welk themes, like I picked up ridiculously disco-ey "Sound of Music" remixes in 2008.

Another highlight of the trip was meeting or re-meeting a few people who have become better friends, like Steve Butterman, Noel Hannan, Dave Woolery, etc. We had a really good time in Provincetown, as we always did, and it's surprising we haven't been back to the town since then.

Music trivia: I think by this point I was putting songs on these souvenir CDs just because I liked them, and not because I necessarily overheard them on the trip. Also, "The Guitar" gets picked up from 2006's instrumental CD.

The title: The Pilgrim Tower looms large over Provincetown, but I have yet to climb it and see the view from the top. The CD subtitles are running jokes (as they always are) based on two things Bill said over the weekend. "Bougie Bougie Boo" is what you say when you talk to your cat, "and the other title is what Bill said when some attractive bears walked in front of our car.