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Eight rolls of film. 34 days on the road. Ed's camera. I should've known better. Here it is: The Tour In Pictures. Brace yourselves.

As per tradition, we start off with the official photo of the BFD touring unit, backstage at the Strand Theater in Providence, RI. Just for the record, from left to right: Ed Lucas, me, Mike Keneally, and Toss Panos.

Here we have the Steve Vai tour bus (2nd edition), the Steve Vai gear truck, and Beer For Dolphins' beloved Mitsubishi Expo, parked outside First Avenue in Minneapolis. We got better gas mileage than they did.

Backstage at the Fox Theatre in Boulder, CO. Toss and I were on our way to being drunk enough to miss Vai's invitation to travel on the bus with them to Oklahoma City, a trip that turned out to be somewhat less than pleasant. You see, beer is good.

Here are some pix of folks from the Vai entourage that you haven't met yet. The fellow in the black shirt is Mike Mangini.

Holding up the guitar is Roger Bell (Vai's guitar tech/stage manager).

Nick Tongue has his guitar strapped on (practicing "The Attitude song, no doubt),

and standing by the wardrobe case is Dick Flynt-- er, uh, I mean Rich Pike, Vai's personal assistant. Cool dudes, all.

Mike, in his "Vai clothes", bending over backwards for us onstage at The Diamond Ballroom in Oklahoma City. What a ham.

At The Diamond Ballroom, you'd better check your weapon at the door, or there's gonna be some trouble, pardner. Y'hear?

Keneally's charbroiled Converse sneakers, just after barely surviving the bus fire. These shoes have now been painted by both Vivian Keneally and God.

Toss, his lovely girlfriend Kiki, and the infamous "drug dealer mode" black briefcase, all co-existing peacefully by a table at The Bayou in Washington, D.C.

Oh boy. From left to right: me, Jerry Gaskill (the drummer for King's X!!), Mike Mangini, and Phil Bynoe, backstage at Cardie's in Houston, TX. Meeting Jerry Gaskill was quite a thrill for me, but apparently Mangini just couldn't contain himself.

Celebrity lookalikes--Mike Keneally and Ed Lucas. Remarkable, isn't it?

The amazing Joe Travers, who was spending some time home for the holidays in Erie, PA, was kind enough to grace us with his presence at the Cleveland show, where he sat in for "Inca Roads". That's him to the right of me.

Beer For Dolphins at The House Of Blues in New Orleans, LA. Note the cow.

Ed Lucas and Bryan Beller. Sometimes, a picture really does say a thousand words. Brad Dahl took this shot of the two of us at our Motel 6 in Las Vegas.

On the morning of Monday, December 9, in St. Louis, MO, in the parking garage of the Ramada At The Arch, this is what I saw. The inside of the Expo was smothered in broken glass. We didn't fully recover from this for days.

Ah, New York City. This show was memorable for two reasons: one, it was Mr. Keneally's birthday; two, I wore the red dress. First, we have the girls who helped me assemble my outfit. From the left: Marcy Beller (yes, that's my sister...hands off, you hear me?), me, Kiki. Thanks for the help, girls.

Steve Vai conducts the band onstage at Irving Plaza in NYC. In the background, you can see Phil and myself, in all of my glory, following his lead.

There's a close-up for you. Usually, a large stick bag containing many spare drumsticks would be hanging off of the timbales. Of course, on this night, there were none, and sure enough, my stick breaks. The other bag of spare sticks is all the way on the other side of the stage. Do I try and run over there and grab another stick? Of course not--I was in high heels, and I wasn't about to try my luck. Note the left index finger placement.

Just your average suburban family portrait, that's all. From the left: my brother Lawrence, Mom, some guy in a dress, sister Marcy, and The Executive Producer himself--Robert Beller. Mom's an E.P. too, I shouldn't forget that. I'm lucky to have such understanding, open-minded parents, don't you think?

And then, of course, Keneally the birthday boy gets doused with Silly String at the end of the Vai show. Rich Pike made sure that we all had plenty to hit him with. The original idea was to break out the pies on his ass, but once Gungi learned that there were no showers at this venue, he went to plan B. Now that's an experienced tour manager for you.

OK, wait just a minute here...who let McGee pick out Keneally's birthday cake?

Hey Ed--don't think about pink elephants! We found this at a gas station on the way from Minneapolis to Milwaukee. Those wacky Northerners.

Hey Ed--at least ONE hand on the wheel, OK?

We absolutely loved Louisiana, making multiple stops along the road on the way into New Orleans. Nice socks, Bryan.

Keneally, Vai and Mangini all lit up these huge stogies after Thanksgiving dinner was over. I don't know about you, but it makes me think of that Pink Floyd song. "Come in here, dear boy..."

If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Phil Bynoe and I make nice in Washington, D.C.

Obviously, this picture wasn't taken in Pittsburgh, where Toss and I practically took the roof of our hotel off with a verbal brawl for the ages. Nevertheless, when all was said and done, we kissed and made up. And, more than that, we became better friends. Even after a whole month on the road with him, his talent still astounded me.

Beer For Dolphins poses for the "end of the tour" shot, taken backstage in Washington, D.C., just moments before I left the entourage for good and the bus dropped everyone off at the airport. We did it, guys, we fucking did it. For various reasons, none of us will ever forget this tour.

So, there you have it. You'll have to forgive me for the lack of good performance shots--ours didn't come out real well, and since the Chicago House Of Blues Spy-Cam worked so well, I just figured I'd concentrate on the behind-the-scenes activity. Hope you didn't mind.

You want to know what I think about all of this? Is that what you want? I think I could use a little bit of literary closure as well. How can we finally put this behemoth Act to bed? Hmm...wait! I've got it! An EPILOGUE! Don't worry...we're talking maybe three paragraphs at the most here. But, for some reason, I feel like it should have its own separate, special little part. So, follow me, boys and girls, to the land of feel-good endings and looks toward the future..................................................B.B.