We left Tuesday morning. It was raining at Sea-Tac. It was the boy's first plane ride (that he'll remember) and I was ready with the sickness bags in case he took after his old man. Every time I flew before the age of 20 I would throw up on take off and again upon landing.

Evidently the kid has his mother's stomach. He was all good.

We flew into Long Beach airport and a gorgeous sunny day.  We picked up the rental car - which happened to be a new Dodge Charger (silver)- and called my good buddy Lyle, who led us to his home, five minutes away. We hung out with Lyle all day, went to dinner, came back to the house - and called it a night. This is when I remembered my column was due the next day - so I went out to the couch in the living room and got it done. 

We woke to (another) amazing sunny morning. When I came out of the shower, Lyle and my son were out in the front yard playing. I could hear amazed giggling. When I poked my head out and asked what was with all the chortles, Lyle said, "Take a picture of this, you ready?"  I pulled out my phone as Lyle explained that the boy had asked him what that black spot on the ground that kept following him around was - Coleman (the boy) pointing to his shadow. The boy then laughed at his own feet and the black spot being cast by his body like a new best friend was tickling him. It was the first of many moments that had me thinking it may be getting time to move back to the sun. 

Lyle had work to do (as we would find many did that Wednesday), so we packed up our stuff and headed up to the City of Angels. When we arrived in the 323 is when we found most of our friends were going to be tied up until at least the late afternoon. It was a little cold for the beach, so we parked on Melrose and I went to work on finding us a swimming pool - my phone coming in handy. I searched 'Hollywood hotels' and the first listing would have been my first choice, The Hollywood Roosevelt. I called, finding out they had a Cabana room available for $329 a night. After quietly throwing up a little in my mouth, I thanked them and hung up. Going back onto the inter-web, I was able to get the same room through hotels.com for about $200 less, including immediate check-in. No we cookin' wit gas

The Hollywood Roosevelt was the first hotel I stayed in on a major label's dime. Green Apple Quick Step was holed up there twice in the late summer of ‘97. Then New American Shame virtually relocated there in the summer of 1999 - the Cult tour we were on ended with something like seven sold out shows in nine nights at the House of Blues Hollywood. It seemed like we were at The Hollywood Roosevelt for months. The rooms in the hotel tower are said to be haunted - and known to be small and stale. The cabana rooms, on the other hand, are in the two-story structure surrounding the pool and are the only place to be. If you've seen the Spielberg movie Catch Me If You Can, when Tom Hanks first runs into Leo DiCaprio's character in Hollywood, that whole scene was shot at the pool and the cabana rooms at the Roosevelt. 

So there we are, me and the boy, chillin' at the pool all day.  He did his first (requested) fully submerged dips, and had an all-around glorious time riding his papa around the pool like his own personal Jonny Quest dolphin.

The next morning, after hooking up with the boy's Godmother Shelly (where we would be staying for the duration of our Hollywood nights), the only thing on the "Have To Do List' was to meet up with Mark Lanegan. He would be leaving the next day for a tour of Spain or Kazakhstan or some damn place, so this would be our only chance for a hang. We drove out to the valley and Mark took us to the most amazing chilidog place ever. It's been around since the ‘60s and it was obvious why. We each had two full dogs. The boy included. It was some tasty, tasty viddles. We got to catch up about our home lives, good and bad - not to mention our music ups and downs. It seems anybody who makes it passed 40 still playing music has some sort of health issue or another and we talked about that. And then it was time to go. It was a great hang. I suppose it always will be. 

The next day, we woke at Shelly's and swimming was again on the agenda - after we walked up to Barney's Beanery for lunch. That evening, Shelly had rented out a few lanes at the Lucky Strike Bowling alley in the Highland and Hollywood mall for her son's 17th birthday party. Besides Coleman, there was only one other kid, but the two of them had an amazing time. Coleman's newest friend, Olivia, had her own connections to the music world. Her daddy is the bass player for Foreigner. After it came up over dinner at Shabu Shabu that I had met Shelly while I was in New American Shame through her friends in the Cult, the little girl's mother said, "I loved New American Shame! I worked on that record at Atlantic."

We had met years before. It's such a small world when you start boiling it all down...

There was one more thing I had to do before Friday could be put in the books. My good friend Channing was having a birthday party as well. It would be a later affair than the bowling gig, and while I had initially planned on taking the boy, the hour had become too late. So Shelly watched the kid, and I was out on my own. 

Just before the beginning of our trip, I had a moment of clarity about life, friends and family. I asked Channing to be Coleman's Godfather. Chan and I have always been close. Even the last five years with minimal in person contact hasn't dimmed our respect or fondness for each other. It has been like this from the word go. I suppose it always will be. Chan is of Mexican decent, and it turns out Godfathering is a HUGE deal. We are now "Compadres." We are family. It's an amazing thing. 

I got to Channing's house after 11 p.m. and things were winding down. But it didn't matter.  He and his amazing wife, Leticia, took me around, introducing me to everyone who was still there as his Godson's father.

Chan is also a member of a motorcycle club.  A while back when a co-worker of mine was reading a book about an FBI agent who had infiltrated Chan's club, I called him up to ask him about it - wanting to know whether the book was on the level. He said there was a bit of exaggeration, but for the most part it was fairly accurate.

Jokingly, I asked him if this meant I have "people"?

"Yeah, man. You got people."

And that was before we were Compadres.... 

Drummer Geoff Reading - who writes a bi-weekly online column (Fridays) for the Weekly Volcano called "Holding Down the 253" in addition to his weekly Wednesday music column - has played music in tons of Northwest bands - Green Apple Quick Step, New American Shame, Top Heavy Crush and most recently Duff McKagan's LOADED - to name but a few. He's toured the world several times over, sharing stages with the likes of Slipknot, The Cult, Buckcherry, Korn, Journey, The Sex Pistols, Nine Inch Nails and on and on. He has called Tacoma home since 2005, and lives in the North End with his wife and son.