No biting, small story interruption

A few Sundays ago I packed up my car and strapped the cats into the backseat and started the verbal “Did you forget anything” check with my mother, just like I always do when I leave their house. The last time I was there I left several vital hair-fixing accoutrements on the bathroom counter, like, just in the middle of the counter. I even looked in the bathroom before I left. Twice. Did I see the giant dryer sitting there on the yellow tile? No.

So my mother is going through our traditional ritual and it suddenly hits me that I’ve left my cell phone and blackberry chargers in my old room and my mother, being helpful, dashes inside to get them. She’s gone longer than I expect and I almost get out of the car to see if she’s gotten distracted by one of the stray mini-lizards that Jack, their cat, likes to bring in for play pretties. Like the rest of the family, he gets bored easily and is too much of a pussy to go in for the bloody kill; therefore he leaves their maimed and sometimes legless bodies to hobble and dart around the house. Kind of disgusting when you think about it, so don’t.

Just as I’m about to unbuckle, she comes out of the house carrying my laptop case, the laptop, the laptop charger and, oh yeah, the two things I remembered forgetting. Those two things in comparison to the laptop are worthless. Imagine me, rolling into work on Monday, looking at my desk and going WHAT THE FUCK, SOMEONE STOLE MY LAPTOP. But I’ve got my cell phone charger, so no worries!

I’d like to say I never forget things but that would be lying and liars go to hell. Probably less of a hell than child molesters but it’s hell nonetheless. And sadly, I can’t say this is an abnormal reaction, the panicking and tearing up of the purse and then coming to the (ridiculous) conclusion that the item(s) in question have been yanked by the Thief Fairy. Just last week I was getting ready for a business trip and was packing up my two laptops when I realized that I couldn’t find my aircard. It had been in my laptop case the week before, where was it now? STOLEN, THAT’S WHERE. So I walk down to my boss’s office and give him my nervous smile, which indicates it’s possible I’ve done something bad. Like letting my aircard get snatched. He comes over to my desk and, while I’m rifling through laptop case number one, he sticks his hand in laptop case number two, coming up with, guess what? An aircard! Voila, its is magic!

I’m quite glad that the aircard wasn’t stolen because as it turns out, that trip was canceled twelve hours before my flight, which means I was already packed when my mother called on Tuesday night to tell me my grandmother had gone into renal failure. Now, I’m not going to spend much time on all that because it’s a bit of a downer (Grandmother is dying! Come quick!) and because as it turns out she didn’t die (Grandmother’s not dying! Come quick!) and she’s currently holed up in rehab where her roommate wears socks with ready-made blue holes in the bottom. This is ultimately perplexing to me and I just can’t move on from the scary blue hole socks. If her feet were Mormon, this would make sense. But I didn’t sense any Mormon-ness in her, so, yeah, I don’t really know what to tell you. Grandma’s fine so stop crying.

The aircard was obviously useful because it was how I beamed magic internet particles into my laptop and “worked from home”- if “home” is really 240 miles away. I was working because as it turns out, my vacation hours sit steadily below the USELESS line (less than 10 hours but greater than 3 hours). This was all due to the week-long hospital stay back in August and the ensuing hilarity that made me wish for a bottle of Jack and a straight razor. (note: I THOUGHT I was getting credit for working while my grandmother lay in ICU but as it turns out, I was not. Cruel joke. If you feel like campaigning on my behalf, you can email Bossman@whogivesafuck.com).

Take those old records off the shelf

In less than 36 hours I will be headed out of a town on an east bound train.
Only the train is my car and the beverage cart is my cooler full of Diet
Pepsi and grapes.

Its been nearly seven years since I took a proper road trip and just as long
since I took a proper vacation.  Technically I took a trip to Mexico three
years ago with two guys, which theoretically fits the Vacation description
(no work, abundant beer). However,I don't feel its a vacation if you spend the
majority of your time ducking the pussy being thrown in the vicinity of your
hotel room. I'm not sure if my friends were really that hot or if the equatorial
sun plays tricks on the eyes, but the naked girls that paraded in and out of that
room were enough to force me into a temporary Lysol high. Thus voiding my
vacation experience.

Long story short, I am seriously in need of a change of scenery.

I'm going to be driving with my friend Kasi to visit our friend Becca in
Ashvegas(Asheville), North Carolina. I've yet to figure out why its referred to
as Ashvegas because from what I understand, this is the place where granola comes
to die.

Even though Becca was born and raised in Little Rock, she could not have found
another city so closely matched to her patchouli-wearing lifestyle. For example:
The first time I met her she was wearing a blue potato sack dress, Birkenstocks
and a jingle bell  anklet. Those Birkenstocks nearly had to be pried from her
cold dead feet, but Kasi and I put our manicured feet down when Becca considered
fixing the broken straps with duct tape. As someone who takes an inordinate amount
of pride in her shoes, this was just anunacceptable answer to the broken strap
problem. The acceptable answer,obviously, was to buy new shoes.

Later Becca moved on to the closed-toe Birk. I didn't really find this a step up
in shoecouture, however. Just think- instead of letting the foot smell waft around
and dissipate, the closed-toe version was merely bottling it up inside its leather
confines, waiting for an unsuspecting roommate to pick them up and die from
olfactory overload.

I'm picking on Becca's not-so-latent hippie tendencies, just as she would pick on
me formy shoe elitism and heathenistic tendencies. Notice, please, that I said
HEATHENistic and not HEDONistic. I am much to preppy to, you know, act all
hedon-y.

My only goal for the next week is to drive on the Blue Ridge Parkway, a road that
took fifty years to build. Last week I watched a special on mountain roads, and the
Blue Ridge Parkway was a main feature on the program. Though the scenes involving
over-the-cliff shots freaked me out, I'm open to stopping and taking some pictures.
Assuming my friends sign a no-pushing contract and I am guaranteed at least fifteen
feet between me and the railing. Those railings are never near high enough for my
paranoid sensibilitites.

Other than avoiding a rocky death, I plan on sleeping late and eating lots of organic
free range chicken with gluten and dairy-free mashed potatoes. I'm only assuming
that this is what granola people eat. Here's hoping its more than just granola because
this kid needs her daily dose of non-vegan entrees.

We plan on having a photo journal of sorts, which will not be near as artistic as the
name implies. I would wager that most of the shots will be coming from the inside of
a moving vehicle. I may or may not post them throughout the week because HELLO,
this is a vacation. But this is 2007, not 1999. I will be traveling with my digital
camera, cell phone, blackberry and laptop. These items are just as necessary as
toothpaste and razors.