UPDATE

hey buddies,
just a quick update on things and how they're getting on!

last week, i was rexrayed and told (once again) that the surgeon had done an amazing job (thats 3 different people that have told me how good this guys surgery was). with any severe elbow injury, it's very important to get the damaged muscles moving as quickly as possible, so they've taken off the cast and given me a sling to hold my arm at a comfortable angle. the muscles were so damaged that i couldn't even move my fingers as well as my wrist, elbow and shoulder. at the moment, i've got my hand moving again, i can move my elbow about 30 degrees but i cant move my wrist at all yet. they thought i might have broken my wrist, but i haven't, but they still can't figure out exactly what's wrong with it yet, which is making me shit myself a little, but i guess we'll have to wait and see what happens.

reading/leeds & rock en seine!:
we are treating these shows as a test to see what i can do comfortably (not only the show but all the traveling etc etc). we don't want to cancel any more shows than we have to, but at the same time, we have to be careful not to push this fucking arm too hard, as that could be an even worse set back! weh!
for these 3 festivals (and probably more) our tour manager and drummer extraordinaire scott simpson will be helping out with extra drumming stuff (he does this for us sometimes anyway) so you guys out front will still have the DRUMPUMPS in yr lovely ears.

the irony is that i've dangled from 15 ft balconies, swung from lighting rigs and rafters (literally), beat ricky wilson at 'do something dangerous' every night for a month and generally been an absolute clown, throwing myself off anything i was able to climb - yet stepping off a 2 ft stage and catching my foot causes all this. fucking typical, eh?

i'd like to thank everyone who has sent me 'get wells' in the past few weeks, it really means a lot and it's made this much easier to deal with. thanks, i love you.

x jbj

JBJ Hospital Diary pt 2

Thursday 30/7/09

I was left overnight in this horrible place. Everyone went back to the hotel, I had 2 excruciating rounds of X-Rays and a C.T scan. In the morning the orthopaedic surgeon (Dr Waddell, he as it turns out, is the man) came round and gave me the grim news. I had snapped both bones that run from the wrist to the elbow. They had broken near the elbow and had sheered off a chunk of the humorous bone with them, which was now sitting in among my muscles somewhere, which was the cause of the agonising spasms. He said it was a bad and rare injury, my arm was literally in bits and I had to have emergency surgery to try and fix it.

Soon after, I called my mum and bawled my eyes out, this time over what was happening and how much I was shitting myself. I dunno how anyone with a good relationship with their mother can hear her upset without automatically crying as well, we trigged each other. I dare say being 12,000 miles away from home didn’t help either.

I was put on a fast while I was waiting to be taken for the operation, which was to be as soon as a space appeared, the rest of the band flew onto Melbourne and Colin stayed with me. I was moved to bed 27 in a ward with a beautiful view of the city. I heard of radio stations talking about me, which made me feel both loved and embarrassed.
Dew Process and Secret Sounds sent me a bag of presents and a Superman card, surely the nicest label ever? The ward had an old man coming off alcohol and he made my stay extremely stressful and give me a completely sleepless night. It shocked me how he treated the staff here too, anytime they’d try to do anything for him in the most sincere and patient way, he’d shout and swear at them. Old bastard.

I sent Colin back to the hotel to rest, he hadn’t been to sleep from dealing with cancellations, flight changes etc. and was hang about to make sure I was okay, bless him. That night I got to eat, the operation had been changed to the next day, in the morning, or whenever I could be fitted in, joy. I hadn’t eaten in 20 hours, I got some absolutely disgusting hospital-made chicken stew with potato and horrible brocolli – it was amazing, somehow.

Before I passed out with whatever glorious drugs they had given me I spoke to my only sister, I had to talk her out of flying to Sydney. I also spoke to my boyfriend for the first time since the accident, chilling him out since he hadn’t heard from me in 2 days, then freaking him out by telling him what was going on, and right before he went on holiday too. Started to feel like an international party-pooper of life.

PASSPORT CONTROL

If you're remotely interested in seeing John's passport photo, look no further:

MAE SHI

I LOVE THE MAE SHI AND I WANT TO TOUR WITH THEM

Mixtape no.2

here's our 2nd MUXTAPE for you to enjoy
Its all gold!

http://dananananaykroyd.muxtape.com/

listing:

ELO - Twilight
(this sounds like every great band of the 70s traveling through space together)

Cutting Pink with Knives - Hey, Cowboy
(my fav song by CPWK)

Mr OIZO - Patrick122
(really amazing odd spack up of a 70s song called 'do it at the disco' - watch out for the awesome wonky sax solo!)

Grauzone - Ich & Du
(straight outa 1980's berlin electro-clashy)

Dillinger Escape Plan - When Good Dogs do Bad Things
(with Mike Patton on vocals, Chris Pennie on drums- this song is unstoppable)

Siriusmo - Schreitmasch
(Siriusmo is one of my fav producers in the whole, this sounds like some spacky disco Modeselektor)

Rolling Stones - You Cant Always Get What You Want (Soulwax remix)
(you'd think it would be impossible to make this bland song good in a remix, but soulwax manage it!)

commentz plz
JBJ xx