There was trouble right away the first day of the Lydia Favors Beholden Riverwash Film ’n Theater Festival. Protesters ringed the town and were blocking entrance roads. Sheriff Stern was looking for David Twist and Marc Chute with a warrant to search their mobile command center trailer. Rock star PR1ckè® was threatening not to perform unless his contract rider specifying three changes of underwear for every crew member was verified and certified by the Board of Rock Tour Laundry Inspectors and a signed original of the certificate was delivered to him personally. Lydia had awakened from a dream and decided to change the name of the musical from “Riverwash: The Musical” to “Oh My God I Think I Was Tricked!“ The truck carrying the entire Riverwash® wardrobe for the 12 vestal virgins who were to play the topless washerwomen had been hijacked by a feminist biker gang just outside Turlock. An unseasonal lightning storm was coming in off the coast. David had gone off his meds again and was on the up-cycle of an epic bipolar swing unlike anything Marc Chute had yet witnessed in all his eleven years as David’s constant companion, business partner and medical power of attorney/pill dispenser, meaning that after an unauthorized late-night taxi ride into San Francisco, David had apparently completed the purchase of a dolphin named Edgar Allen Poe and was anxiously awaiting delivery. Meanwhile, a protester had chained shut all the doors of the Beholden Regional Theater and super-glued their locks. And due to poor planning, opening day of the Film Festival coincided with opening day at the Sears Point Raceway and so the north-south road into town was blocked with fifty or so race car transport trucks, complete with accompanying diesel bunkhouse pushers. It was a mess and from the ground all you could feel was massive grumbling, fear and outrage among all the bearded testosterone-driven detail-oriented logistics men. They were all men, incidentally, and they were all bearded.
