Today was election day in the United States.  A lot of people take for granted all of the lives that were given so that every citizen of America could have the right to vote.  It saddens me that America has so much freedom that people use their own freedoms against the machines that provided us with the current rights we have, just because we are citizens.  Television and radio are filled with ads that encourage people to vote.  This is so crazy to me because teenagers will run to the DMV the moment they are of age to obtain a driver’s license, the under-served will stand in lines for hours to receive financial assistance,  your average joe will spend his last dollar on a lotto ticket and the “chance” to win, but all of these people have to be encouraged to vote.  Is it that they don’t see the benefit of voting?  I don’t know.  I’m going to ponder this a little more, we must find a solution.

I was in the Netherlands this past weekend when I came across the magazine seen above.  The photograph and the caption truly caught me off guard, but when I really looked at it, I wondered why such a cover story was even possible?  I’ve seen first hand how the world truly watches every aspect of America and responds to the cues that we send out.  There are some special interest groups that are truly trying to discredit Obama in any way possible with overt and covert tactics that inadvertently cross the seas and influence the perception of America.  The recent, often childish nature of politics has created a very bad image of America, and all for seemingly for the personal gain of these special interest groups and not America as a whole.  Often when I travel I’m very proud to be an American, but I’m always cautious because I’m just not sure anyone else is happy to have me around.

I know this first pic seems kinda random, but this piece of paper has really come in handy.  I loose track of days so very easily because we’re constantly on the go!

This is a view of the area immediately outside of our hotel.  We heard that the city is pretty much a college town.  So there are primarily twenty-somethings that hang in the area.  Everything seems modern and hip with a flair of historic architecture.

It looked like the snow had just fallen the day before.  Most of the cars were just easing by and taking it easy.  Ironically, there were a lot of people out and about walking in the weather.  You know this is new to me!  In Atlanta, this much snow would shut the city down for days!!!!

This was all of the snow cleared from one corner of the street.   See how tall it is?! Ha!

There was a church there that I could see from my hotel room.  If you look closely, you can see the top of it.

I took a walk in search of this church and found this little gem:

I finally made it to the church, or as close as I could get without skis:

Here’s a few pics of the venue.  It was a pretty dope place:

The sound was incredible and the people were great.  There were a couple of incredible singers in the house that night to0.  Angie passed them the mic, and they killed it.  We later found out that one of them was a finalist on Swedish Idol!

I love my job!

There are about 18 shows in all and this is where it all begins.  We had to make an hour’s drive to Lund from Copenhagen, Denmark.  I like having the opportunity to ride around in new places because it always helps me to get more acquainted with the land and helps maps make more sense to me.  I never knew much about Europe but it appears that all of the countries in the EU are “islands” connected by bridges and tunnels.

Imagine driving over a 12 mile bridge in -1 degree Celsius temperature, high above what seems to be a large semi-frozen lake.  Kinda made me a little nervous…

Lund appears to be somewhat of a quiet town.  There are cobblestone streets mixed in with regular asphalt streets.  I used to hate walking on cobblestone, until I realized how it keeps me from busting my butt walking through snow and thin layers of ice!

I’m not sure how this actually works, but it appeared that bikers, pedestrians, cars and buses all shared the road.  You would think that this would cause chaos all over the place, but everyone seemed to be respectful of each other and everything worked out.  And now that I think about it, I don’t remember seeing any stop signs… I’ll have to check into that for sure.

…and try to say this three times fast:

I know I can’t!!!

The show was a cool show.  You know how the first one’s are… you get to work out all the kinks that you didn’t know you had.  The people seemed to have enjoyed themselves!!

This is my first time getting anywhere near London so I was uber excited to see this sign.  We were only passing through, but I’ll be back next week for three shows.  We had a two hour lay-over and I decided to just kinda walk around the airport….

Okay so at this point I’m like… yo, maybe this is just Baller’s Ave…..maybe I’m on the wrong side of the airport….

Yeah, but Baller’s Ave never ended… Tiffany, Coach and many others just kicking it at the airport.  I’m telling you, the airport in London puts any mall I’ve been to around the world to shame.  Can a brother just find a Duty Free Shop?  This was just an introduction to how London is on top of her style game.  I gotta get my bread up before my next layover….

Finally make it to Copenhagen and stepped outside to see SNOW.  I had planned for it to be kinda cool outside, but I wasn’t prepared for the bone chill factor!!!  I’m not used to this kind of air back in Atlanta!

The pic above is the view from my hotel room.  There was a lake behind our hotel and as you can see it was practically frozen.  This is stuff ya boy usually only sees on TV, so I was pretty intrigued.

We battled the winds and walked to the mall.  Ended up eating at a Mexican buffet that seemed to have everything but mexican food (i.e. pasta, french fries, curry chicken…)  I couldn’t figure that one out, but the food was great.  Wait, maybe I was hungry…

When we left the mall, a fresh snow had fallen over the lake…

It was tempting to walk over, but something told me that I probably shouldn’t… lol.

So there ends the first couple of days on tour.  Our first show was actually today in Lund, Sweden.   I’ll have more pics and stories about everything in the next post!!  Holla!

I recently traveled to Poland and I’ll be sharing those experiences retrospectively within the next couple of weeks. Keep coming back for updates, or subscribe to my RSS feed.

•  The Keating 5?  Questions abound about his judgement concerning economic matters.  Maybe this is why he’s trying very hard to distract America away from questions about the economy.
• The Huffington Post states that “Since Sunday, Democrats have been buzzing about the re-revelation that during the 1980s, Sen. John McCain served on the board of a far-right conservative organization that had supplied arms and funds to paramilitary organizations in Latin America.” – A radical group that has become “has increasingly become a gathering place, a forum, a point of contact for extremists, racists and anti-Semites”.
• And Poor Palin keeps calling Obama a terrorist when she actively participated in events held by an Alaskan secessionist union – could that be considered elitist?  Un-Patriotic? Borderline terrorism?  Check out the video:

(picture from TheYBF.com)

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!!  This is toooooooooooooooooo funny!!!  The website PopCrunch writes from a Star magazine article:

Celebrity spies claim Rihanna was “mortified” when a crowd of excited fans addressed her as the “Purple One” as she walked through a London airport late last month.

“Some fans screamed out ‘Prince’ when they saw her,” one witness whispers. “But when they got close enough to ask for an autograph, they realized he was she.”

“She didn’t know what to say.”

Hilarious.  I have no other words for that!!!!

Even worse is that McCain suggested that Barack Obama do the same thing and in addition, cancel the presidential debate this week and the vice presidential debates next week.  This is all BS and I truly hope that you guys aren’t falling for the “Maverick becomes economic leader” trick.  McCain’s efforts are purely political.  Obama responded this way:

“With respect to the debates it is my belief that this is exactly the time when the American people need to hear from the person who in roughly 40 days will be responsible for this mess,” he said. “I think it is going to be part of the president’s job to deal with more than one thing at once. I don’t see why we can’t be constructive in helping with this problem.”

I totally agree with Obama.  If he can’t successfully multi-task, then we definitely need a leader that could be more productive.  Everything McCain is doing as of recent is confirming the type of President he would make.

McCain canceled an appearance on The David Letterman Show because he had suspended his campaign and had to “rush back to Washington” to help solve the economic crisis.  It turns out that McCain ditched the Letterman show and did an interview with Katie Couric – but wait, isn’t his campaign supposed to be suspended?  Anyways.  Dave wasn’t having it.  Watch: