The Song Fight Bulletin Board

Ooh, and I might have mentioned this before, can't remember, but if you can get your hands on a double-neck 6/12-string electric, or find a local shop that will rent me one for a few days, well, that would be awesome. I am looking forward to carting a suitcase of homemade electronic devices through airport security! Good thing I don't look at all suspicious.

Erin's got an accordion. So take that Spud! Seriously, though, I think we'll be happy to cart along some gear to contribute.

i'm bringing a skin flute. Who's bringing a rusty trombone? We need all the horn we can get.

/heh..heh..he..heh...

a theramin might be cool, if anyone's got one.

the ladies love the theramin

jack wrote:a theramin might be cool, if anyone's got one.

the ladies love the theramin

Okey. Remind me again on down the road, and I'll pack it.

Yikes, that was pushing work unsafe there. Doh!

jack wrote:the ladies love the theramin

Now those are what I call oscillators.

Rabid Garfunkel wrote:Somewhere in one of these threads I'd offered up a ride to anyone in the NW to at least the Bay Area (en route to Fresno--Albatross's turf), if they could get to Portland under their own steam. mkilly had expressed interest in that offer, so he's at the head of the line (I have a tiny hatchback, which with all the gear becomes for all intents and purposes, a two-seater).

Rough itinerary: Drive south on the weekend of the 12th (date undecided), head north on the 21st.

Daaaamn, nine days. We'll see how things coagulate over the next few months.

this place looks pretty sweet.

$300 a night, and you could easily sleep 5-6. 6 people, maybe a couple couples and it's $50 a night. for a freakin house blocks from the beach.

and it's 5 minutes from my house!

here's another sweet looking place

Someone asked about prices before; I understand a lot of it is relative to what you're willing to live with, how long you stay, when you commit, etc, but right now Tawny and I are seeing the cheapest "Flight + Hotel" packages from GRB to SJC, start in the $880-$1050 range for a low/okay-end package for two, for a week, taxes/parking/etc included.

Rental cars around $130/week incl. taxes/etc (except gas) in the SJC area (through National); $180 by SFO. Still investigating other prices.

Flights alone (non-package) from GRB to SFO seem to be about $100 less than GRB to SJC, however "Flight + Hotel" package prices seem to still be cheaper in SJC-land for whatever reason. Maybe SJC hotels are cheaper, and SFO flights are cheaper?

Priceline.com is showing the best package discounts for us so far. Hotwire.com is good to benchmark the flight/hotel prices.

Haven't committed yet; we'll probably end up staying in Mountain View despite the commute. There's a tempting Priceline.com package in the $950 range.

I have no idea what's reasonable yet (my first time pricing flight + hotel + car vacations) but that's the best I've found so far, for our situation.

We'll probably spend the $18 or less for an Entertainment book too, which should pay for itself in meal/event costs. Or we'll just jump on the free SBC online version, and print coupons off as we need them.

Wow, it's late, and I'm probably rambling. Hope this helps someone... I'm curious how close this is to what others are finding. Supposedly the price is best around 2 months before the event, but I'm afraid to wait that long.

It's hard to say for sure at this point, but there's a decent chance I will be there.

frankie big face wrote:It's hard to say for sure at this point, but there's a decent chance I will be there.

San Francisco Giants (games at ATT Park in San Francisco)
August 18: vs. LA Dodgers
August 19: vs. LA Dodgers
August 20: vs. LA Dodgers
August 21: vs. Arizona Diamondbacks
August 22: vs. Arizona Diamondbacks

added incentive.

Hey plat, you know you can forego the car rental if you are willing to just stay in SC for the entire time. It's a smallish place so you could probably get by just walking. Then you'd just have the one time fee of the shuttle to and from SJC. IIRC, it was 40 bucks one way. I'm telling you, it'd be a drag to have to drive from Mtn. View.

also, i may rent a van for a few days and could probably shuttle people to and from san jose airport to santa cruz, if people can coordinate times somewhat.

just ask future boy how reliable i am at picking folks up from the airport.

Future Boy wrote:I'm telling you, it'd be a drag to have to drive from Mtn. View.

Hmm! Well, if the cost is $40/person each way, then that's $160, which is about the cost of renting the car for a week, plus gas, assuming increasing plastic bag consumption doesn't cause the cost of petroleum to skyrocket. We're also planning on meandering in the San Jose area that week, so the car is probably closer to what we want. Cool idea though.

One thing I don't get, is how the drive from Mountain View to Santa Cruz will be so bad. Google Maps makes it look rather innocent (about 45 minutes each way). I suppose the terrain, frequency, red-eye travel or rush traffic could make this awful, but not having been there, I don't know what to think.

Is the Songfight stuff really just on the 18-19th, including practices? Or should I be planning to spend more than these two days with the SF crowd? Newbie questions, I suppose. That could be part of my misconception about how painful the commute would be.

Also, the Jack pseudo-shuttle would be excellent of course.

Thanks as always!

hey plat, i'd be happy to play shuttle for you all if it will save you $160

the drive that future boy refers to is the infamous highway 17, which goes through and over the santa cruz mountains. it's not much fun, especially if you don't drive it on a regular basis as it's very windy and people drive like 75 on it sometimes.

ask mountain view blue how much he likes driving over the hill

mountain view to santa cruz is about 30-40 minutes. but most of that is on 17.

Man, some of my happiest drives have been through there! Always at night, right around the witching hour... good fun driving road through the forests and hairpin turns, and quite the nice dessert after taking 41 west from I-5. Or am I mixing up my twisty Californian roads? It's been a while.

jack wrote: San Francisco Giants (games at ATT Park in San Francisco)
August 18: vs. LA Dodgers
August 19: vs. LA Dodgers
August 20: vs. LA Dodgers
August 21: vs. Arizona Diamondbacks
August 22: vs. Arizona Diamondbacks

added incentive.

Gotta love the targeted marketing, Jack. Excellent work.

The 17 is terrible!!! You, being from WI, might enjoy the novelty of it once or twice, but people really do drive 75 on that thing. I doubt, unless you have extensive mountain driving experience, you would want to drive it more than the SJ-SC and back again airport run. But, the scenery is absolutely gorgeous!

Just my 2 cents about my most hated CA highway! I think I'd rather drive to LAX in rush hour traffic on the 405 than commute on the 17!!!

GF and I are looking at coming. We can get a flight to SJC fairly cheaply on Southwest. There was talk on here about renting a house as a group. If anybody's doing that or interested in doing that, please PM me. We're looking at being there at least the 18th, 19th, and 20th and might stay a couple more days. I'm debating renting a car, but I'm not sure yet.

So, hey, if I manage to put together a KA band for the show, ya wanna help out on "So Long, Atticus" ????

Charles

king_arthur wrote:So, hey, if I manage to put together a KA band for the show, ya wanna help out on "So Long, Atticus" ????

That would, indeed, be quite cool. Absolutely.

By the way, if we can just all agree right now that it will be "Songfight Surfolicious," that'll make it easier for me to rewrite the lyrics to "WTF" to, y'know, open the show...

Charles