A joyous stay in Monterey

I’m lucky to get to share with yall another one of my highlights of our trip so far. One of my best friends from college, and the guy who started “Big Talk Project” with me (a website/online community/newsletter to help encourage people to more easily incorporate the opposite of small talk into their lives) grew up in Monterey. This summer he’s living there with his family and we got the pleasure of staying with them.

It felt like home, and summer camp all at once. His family is big, consisting of Nick, two parents, two brothers, a sister, three dogs, some cats and a couple of chickens. Plus they have someone staying with them for the next two years, and Nick had two friends leave when we arrived and two more come that evening. All told there were 13 people sleeping in the house both nights we stayed there, and everyone was out to have a good time. I don’t even know how Nick managed to scrounge up beds for us all.

Everyone that was old enough to get into the club came out to see us that night. We played down on “Cannery Row,” site of the famous Steinbeck novel, with our friends Nada Rasta. It was the 3.5th (and last) show with them so of course we were able to sing along and pump each other up. We got Ruben on stage to do a song with us, and at the end of their set Hooch and I jammed out with them. The whole time Nick and family/friends danced like crazy and made the night a blast.

The big talk started early in the day, and continued throughout our stay. When we got back to the house the good time were still rolling. Even younger siblings Mitch and Carli were up and about and we awaited the dawn alternating between laughing, drinking scotch, and getting serious. We’d be talking about love and marriage while Ryan sang his improvised composition “Cats hate Goats.” And for once, I wasn’t the one who suggested we play “Truth!”

To top it all off, we ate like kings. We combined all the homegrown veggies from the Nada Rasta homestead with the freshly laid Hambley eggs and managed to actually eat three healthy meals a day.

All in all it was a wonderful part of our trip, combining some of my favorite aspects of life- Playing music and spending time dancing and big talking with close friends.