Far Out Son of Lung...

The Road Trip

"Are you sure you can't make it home for Christmas?"
"Yes Mom, I can't get off work, I'm sorry."
"Well, ok. It'd be so nice to have you home..."

That was back in October. Every week since then I've had the same weekly conversation with my Mom, Dad and Sister about my desire to not be home for Christmas with my family. I don't like Christmas. Bah humbug. My family has a retail store here in Huntersville and the Christmas season, my vacation, ends up with me working in the store, or hanging out in the store for days on end. As you can imagine, this is an amazing amount of fun and results in some wonderful Christmas memories... Right. Add to that all the traffic, the rushing around and our complete inability to do anything as a family

Despite all the strikes against any vacation time being spent in Charlotte, I made the deiciosn to drive home for Christmans and be with my family. I also decided to take them completely by surprise.

I had been planning to leave Dallas Wednesday morning and arrive Thursday evening. My sister would then be in town Friday afternoon, we'd do Christmas and then I'd drive back to Dallas on Monday/Tuesday. As it was, I got bored in Dallas and decided to leave a day early. So, Monday night I packed my bag (after seeing Girl Friday at the Galeria), packed the car with essentials like cases of CDs, a small cooler and some food and headed out at 10AM Tuesday morning.

My goal for the day was Birmingham, Alabama and a visit to the Barber Motorsports Museum on Wednesday morning before completing my drive to Charlotte. Everything went great on Tuesday and I arove in Birmingham around 8PM. Upon reaching Birmingham I thought it'd be cool to explore the area. I exited the highway and aimed for a large statue on a hillside some miles away. Bad idea. I put myself directly into a very not-whiteboy friendly portion of town. No worries, I'll just get back on the highway and into a better area of... Hm. No entrance ramp. No signs for I-20. Hm.

My adventure was brief as adventures go, but it took me through some rather interesting bits of homelessness as well as a tour of their hospital complex where I attempted to poach internet, with little success. Eventually I found myself back on I-20, but not until after I'd invented a few new cuss words and driven 10 miles more than necessary if I'd just seen the signs sooner... No worries.

Wednesday morning I willed myself from bed and headed for Babrer. Apparently, Birmingham has a "Birmingham Race Course" the exit prior to Barber Motorsports Park and does not feel the need to mark either exit with appropriate signage about the two seperate yet curiously similarly named complexes. I followed signs for Birmingham Race Course. Another mistake. The road snaked, turned and wound its way for miles until I found myself... back in town. Huh? I followed the signs (saw lots of them) but never found the track. The Race Course is, in fact, a dog track. Jerks.

After stopping for fuel and directions I made my way to Barber and the Motorsport Museum.

Wow.

Five floors of motorcycles, a few F1 cars and a variety of classic machinery I've never even dreamed of seeing before. From the earliest days of bicycles with engines to the most amazingly high-tech motorcycles ever created, rare examples and popular trend setters... it was all there. I'll post more when I have pictures developed.

I parted company with the motor-mecha a little after noon, completely brain fried and entirely overwhelmed with information. Truly, I'll post more when I have pictures and more time to rewalk the place in my mind.

So my trip continued down I-20 toward Atlanta. All was well, nothing to worry about and certainly no problems with the mighty little Sentra. I hit Atlanta around 3:30PM, and my trip came to a sudden and rather explitive filled crawl. Five lanes fo traffic. Five lanes of solid, creeping traffic. I'm sure Los Angeles is worse, but this was pretty shitty. I lost at least an hour, maybe more. No worries though, I settled into a lane and just trucked it out with everyone else.

Out of Atlanta but still far from home I got CT on the phone. She's great for burning time because the woman loves to talk, always has something going on worth talking about and doesn't require much advice, just a good ear for listening and a desire to laugh. My trip sped along nicely and I reached Charlotte just as we were parting company on the phone. I had not had the chance to talk about any of my current situation with Girl Friday, Rock Gal or Pierced but I figured it could wait until another day. Most of the time I'm on the phone with people (ie- women) they're doing all the talking, but I was going to need some womanly advice on this one so I knew I'd be calling her back on my drive home.

I buzzed my folks' cell phone to determine their location. I was able to excuse myself quickly as they'd just sat down for dinner. I told them I'd call back later and completed my drive into the city. I navigated to the house, was careful to turn out the lights as I went up the driveway, quietly got my coat from the car and closed the doors and went up to the front door.
"Who the fuck is that?"
There's a little kid sitting in the front room on a computer. He doesn't see me. I slip back to the car and drive next door- to the correct house. Repeat process.

I stood right up against the front door and rang the bell. I could tell my Dad was looking out the windows but couldn't see me. I waited. He cracked the door open and... Viola! Needless to say, they were quite surprised.

posted by GreSam @ 23:01