tales from the road

day 1

we were supposed to leave in the morning on friday. well, actually the original departure date was set for tuesday, but because i do not have any talent in regards to managing time, or packing for that matter, the day got pushed forward, and pushed forward, as boxes spread out before me like injured soldiers waiting for their bandages. bit by bit they got put together, and stacked, but then there was artemis. my motorcycle was not 100 percent this summer. procrastination ruling, i decided the clutch and drive chain needed redoing before i left and lost my most valuable resource, byke guru jamie. the clutch job went smoothly in two hours. the chain didn't fit. i returned it to the shop on wednesday to be broken. of course i measured incorrectly and it was still too long. at this point james realized the dremel can get said job done and he hopped to it, blowing off work on thursday so the byke can get done and get on the damn truck first, other various and sundry belongings following in its wake.

ahhhh, so friday the truck was packed with most of my crap, minus bunny, bed, and last minute items. the u-haul (a 17 foot behemoth of a truck with a trailer attached for benny the benz, which from here on shall be referred to as 'the beast') was at phil's being loaded with his shit. the dismantling of the bed and desk was yet to happen. i had a killer headache and my spine was threatening mutiny. the revolt was completed after moving the futon and glass desktop teamstrap sandwich with team-straps. my left hip said 'fuck you, christine', pinched my sciatic nerve, and stood back on its heels, arms folded. i said 'fuck you, i'm moving, break later' and kept going. the couch was not as bad as i thought. thank christ i've been a landscaper all summer.

we finished loading at 3:30 and sped off to the farmhouse for the mattress.

we left my headboard on his front lawn in newmarket. fie.

okay so plan b - load my mattress and last minute gear, including the 750 ml bottle of vodka cordial i made up with honey, lemon and ginger, and the 16 or so bottles left of my homebrew ipa. this is to be a well-lubricated road trip, mind you. then go to spew-haul and attach the dolly apparatus and benny. then we split up - i to my house to get my car to make a trip to walmart for an ethernet cable so we can be wired up with my laptop in hotels that have internet access so you can read these installments in stages like they're meant for. meanwhile, phil will be going back to newmarket for the head board, and we'll rendezvous at the liquor store in the traffic circle, where he'll then follow me to nana's house in arlington, ma where my car will be dropped off. then the real trip will begin.

phil drops me off at my house. i prepare the bunny and place him in my car. it's 6 pm. i have no keys. they are in the beast which is currently en-route to newmarket. fie! i call his mom and let her know phil's got the keys to my car in his possession and he needs to come back here. i then pour myself a well-deserved beer, gazing out into the stone room as i do so and i notice........half of phil's PA sitting there, forlorn and forgotten. two speakers and a board. oh, and my lamp. everything happens for a reason.

he gets to my house at 7:30. we say fuck walmart and drive to nana's, an interesting experience. i'm not used to having to worry about people following me, especially trucks with trailers. the merge onto 93 south was an experience. i thought phil was going to kill me.

8:30 we get to nana's. she is in true freak show form, trying to make me take five grocery bags of crap she's prepared for me. i said "there is no room in the truck" maybe 12 times. high strung, she feeds us coffee and runs around the house trying to give me things. 'no' is the word of the day. if you know my grandmother, you will realize it is a great feat to defy her will. italian-born catholic taurus, she is more stubborn than a drunken tourist at last call. finally manage to pacify her by taking the gallon of water she is offering. and the 50 bucks, that doesn't take up much space. she makes phil promise to make me call her, after sufficiently embarrassing me by asking him for his parents phone number so 'in case anything happens' the chain of communication from california to home will be complete. he bears it well. she cries three times, i shove down the wellspring of guilt, and escape at 9:30.

alright so we're exhausted and stressed, caffeinated and nicotined, driving through the whole east coast in the middle of the night. massachusetts, connecticut, new york, new jersey, basically everything i don't need to see int he light of day. phil refuses to rest his head on a pillow located anywhere in new jersey, and i can't say i blame him. we push through to pennsylvania. the first hotel where you have to walk by the front desk to get to your room doesn't accept bunnies. at the second hotel i don't bother asking. i cover his 1' x 2' x 2' pet carrier with my jacket, barely, and walk on in. of course while i am being oh-so-slick the counter girl walks by me and says,

"you better hide that on your way out."

i still don't know if she was talking about the bunny or the machete half hanging out of my army pack.

we went upstairs and passed out at 5 am.

day 2

wake at 12:30. shower. i am seriously lamenting that my flexerils are packed in a box in the belly of the beast. my back hurts so bad i can barely put my socks on. there's a coffee maker that produces a meager 6 oz per person. it's better than nana's chock full o' nuts, though. 60 dollars of gas to fill the beast. breakfast at the starlight diner across the street, garish in its neon and chrome. the waitress is tired, probably nearing the end of her double, but is pleasant enough. we plot our course, definite as far as knoxville, variable after that, depending on whether we decide to make a huge detour down into n'awlins. let's try to explain that one on the expense report, shall we?. on the road again at 4:40 - something.

the squeezable burping pig is for good cop chi. the squeezable cartman with a drink umbrella is for good tire chi. there are innumerable cops and blown out tires in pennsylvania.

hershey, pennsylvania, going south on 81
"warning, the bridge may be icy"
in october, when it's 70?

6:23 pm - we cross into maryland, and shortly thereafter, west virginia, (yes jamie, west virginia) where we stop at, would you believe it, a wal-mart to get an ethernet cable. geeks on the road have their priorities. in order to have palatable tunes on the way, we've hooked up my laptop to the dc inverter and got the computer speakers bouncing around the cab. this is cumbersome. we need duct tape. with speakers sufficiently strapped down to the middle seat's backrest above the bunny, we be wired.

7:46 - we cross into virginia. we're gonna be in this state for a while. i roll a joint for the first time in years. we crash at a days inn in roanoke, order pizza, drink homebrew, and watch bad movies on hbo. fun times.

day 3

my back sucks in the am. i'm gonna try and find a chiropractor tomorrow wherever we may be, cause there ain't no way i'm riding a mule to the bottom of the grand canyon with this spine. we're back on the road at 12:30. in tennessee by mid-afternoon. we start listening to neal stephenson's 'snow crash' on mp3. phil is amused.

there are three huge crosses on a hill near christiansburg.

we decide the third engineer, the silicon graphics systems squeezy penguin with the tacks in his head serving as antennae is slacking. he needs a job. i duct tape the st. christopher's medal given to me by miss deb murray to his front. thusly the sgi penguin is now for general good travel chi.

i drive the monstrosity for a while in between knoxville and memphis. i do ok but my spine doesn't like it. we stop at about 10:30 at a hampton inn and are relegated to eating dinner at an ihop - it's the only thing open. we have to start stopping for supper earlier. i git a hankerin' for real southern barbecue.

day 4

we've passed over the wolf river where jeff buckley drowned but i don't realize it until i'm poring over the map later as we're crossing the great brown mississippi. we didn't have the time to stop anyways - got a late start today at about 2:30 pm. it's alright, i'll be back this way someday. arkansas is pretty, but very flat. reminds me of the sod fields in berwick maine, but browner.

in kentucky you can buy handguns in convenience stores.
in arkansas you can buy big cheap taiwanese knives at the gas station.

4:26 pm - the double trailer truck in front of us just blew one of his tires. i squeeze cartman frantically.

some crazy dude in a bimbobox just turned around on the highway by pulling a u-turn right over the grassy, ditchy median. arkansasians are nutty.

5:05 pm - sudden stoppage on 40 west. repaving roads.

arkansas was fucking boring. i can't tell if oklahoma is any better cause it's dark now. so this is where my ancestors that were forced to leave the beauty of the great smokey mountains ended up. i would have cried too. the cherokee that are left in north carolina are the ones that ran into the hills and mountains to hide, instead of embarking on the trail of tears. from speaking with them when i was there a few years back, i got the impression they don't hold their oklahoma brethren in very high esteem - that they think they should not have left their land.

dinner at a diner cause there's nothing else but mcdonalds and hardees out here. we are sick of road food. i would give anything for a goddamn health food store.

an old, maybe in his 50's, disheveled guy in leathers and a do-rag sits next to us. i instantaneously recognize him as a biker. he's got that weathered, covered in road grime look about him, which means my age judgment could be way off. exposing yourself to the elements like a rider does gives you an aged look, so he could be anywhere from 35 to 60 for all i know. by way of a greeting he asks us if we're riding. i say not today. he tells me a story about how he was at a bike rally in memphis (damn i missed it) and he's on his way to some place near dallas. his bike broke down a ways back and it cost him over 100 bucks to fix it. he blew a gasket and his chopper 's spewing oil. he shows me his oil-splattered left boot. he's out of gas money. it'll take him at least 20 bucks to make it home. i believe him and give him two bucks. maybe it's cause he reminds me of what jamie would look like in 19 or 15 years and had a southern accent.

there's a town called gore, oklahoma.

i dunno where the hell we stayed that night. somewhere in oklahoma not too far from texas. the only available room in the best western was a two bedroom suite. it was like staying in an apartment. the bunny kept going after my bourbon. i think he's a drunk.

day 5

oklahomans have a staring problem.

the purple stuffed puppy engineer finally has a job now as well. he is for good roadkill chi, i.e., no roadkill. we saw some unidentified furry thing on the side of the road.

i drive today. texas is flat, brown, red, and green. i mean flat. i could see cows and sky. great big sky. it's cloudy and threatening rain. we stop at dyer's bbq in amarillo and have the first semblance of a real meal in days. the sky is ominous and beautiful. it starts spitting at us a few hours into the drive. phil passes out before we hit new mexico and misses the great thunderstorm. i've never seen lightning this huge. it fills me with awe and makes me feel very small.

it's night now and the road has begun to vertically undulate. i have a feeling i'm missing some beautiful landscape in the dark.