Day 8: Top of the Hill

0 Comments:

Driving Cross Country - August 29th to September 6th
From: Atlanta, GA
To: Chapel Hill, NC

Three States Traveled:
Georgia
South Carolina
North Carolina

Total mileage: 382 miles
Total mileage to date: 3,403 miles

I wake up at about 10:30 AM because the hotel broadcasts a loud alert in the hallways. They're testing their fire alarm annunciator system and letting guests know that they don't need to leave the hotel. Thank you. I'm almost back to sleep when the whooping commences. For the next sixty seconds, it's "Whoop! Whoop! Please do not use the elevators and exit via the stairways, Whoop! Whoop!" At the first siren blast, Bug shouts "Battle Stations!" Hee hee. A little humor to dilute a really annoying coincidence. When the racket dies away, I struggle to return to REM phase, but just as I'm dropping off to sleep, the darn hotel broadcasts a loud thank you to the guests. You're welcome. Now shut up! Snooze.

An hour later, I wake up enough to start the coffee brewing and head downstairs to cadge a morning paper and watch a few minutes of CNN. By the time I get back upstairs, we're running a bit late and pushing the check-out time. While we take turns for morning ablutions, we pack and watch the War Channel, which is otherwise known as the History Channel to non-connoisseurs. Ah. "Japanese Infantry Weapons of World War II." Ah. Life is good. So packing to leave is interspersed with muttered comments from LJ about the idiotic behavior of the Japanese military during their attempt to create a "Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere." He's basically saying that the low tinker-toy quality of their small arms is exactly what they get for trying to enslave the entire Pacific rim. I'm rolling on the floor laughing at his commentary.

Time to leave Atlanta, home of more universities than you can shake a 21.2 centimeter stick at. Argh. Awful grammar in that last sentence but it flows better when spoken aloud. Now we're back on the road and trying to decide whether to stop in Charlotte or to continue on north to Chapel Hill and the Raleigh-Durham area. It's two more hours of driving today but tomorrow's final leg will be shortened by the same amount, which would be a good thing. Additionally, there's not too much to do in Charlotte. It's a big blob on the map but there's not many universities there. During this trip, we've been trying to stay in large university towns because there's more to do in the evening when we arrive at night. Also on the negative side for Charlotte, it's the home of Central Piedmont Community College, a Blackboard client. One of their system administrators threatened to come up to D.C. with an Uzi once during a conference call. We were messing with the "wrong people". Sounds like a charming village. I must remember to never visit this little burg unless I'm wearing kevlar and sporting a 9 mm attitude.

Leaving Atlanta, we hit the first real traffic congestion that we've encountered since Las Vegas. We're definitely back on the East Coast. Truck traffic has been increasing steadily since Shreveport, LA and there's more and more imported vehicles. Crossing Lake Hartwell, we cross into South Carolina where the speed limit drops to 65 mph. Just into the state, there's a huge sign for a fireworks warehouse called Shelton Fireworks that boasts "millions and millions of fireworks." It's a huge red building about a 100 yards off the highway. There's also a large "No smoking" sign outside of it. Duh. Even better yet, we pass an exit for "Townville, SC." Um. Yeah. They must have large rice paddies, famous salsa sauce, and other things which involve redundant terms. Dolts. I can hear the echo echo of their deserted main street (which is probably named "Mt. Hill") from here.

Time to pull over for lunch and punch South Carolina off the beer list. We pull off the highway near Anderson, SC and stroll into Hooters, that classic Southern institution. I've never been inside one before. It's definitely different. There's "meant-to-be-amusing" signs all over the place warning about high hydrogen peroxide content in the air. The hostess is inflating helium balloons and dropping two off at each table --- she's inordinately proud of her color schemes. She's also sporting a huge bandaid on the left side of her cleavage. There's a story there somewhere.

After lunch, we're back on the road. There's a smiley face mowed into the grass by the highway outside Greenvile, SC. Cute. We pass Cowpens Battlefield just northeast of Spartanburg, SC, where General Francis "The Swamp Fox" Marion won a pivotal battle that swept the British and their German mercenaries out of the South, thus clearing the way for French troops to land and help secure Yorktown. There's battlefields all over the South, mostly from the Civil War. I was reading "Confederates in the Attic" earlier this month by an international correspondent who traced the entire path of the Civil War from Sumter to Appomattox.

One of these days, I might do the same -- in a really fast car. If I develop a terminal disease and have a month left to live, I want to either (A) put on black pajamas and a backpack with a big string hanging out and run into a South Carolina Veterans of Foreign Wars outpost screaming in fake Vietnamese while tugging on the string (I figure I'll make it three steps in the door before some mountain man pegs me to the door with a 13" bowie knife; or (B) pull into a backwoods Alabama town in front of the local bar, roll down the window of a rented McLaren F1, and yell "Where your white women at?" before peeling out of town. I figure that I should be pulling a train of at least thirty pick-up trucks before they shoot out my tires, drag me to a tree, and turn me into a "Made in Korea" christmas tree ornament.

Ok, I know it's morbid, but at least I have a plan. We should all maximize our usage of our great nation's bountiful resources. And people are our greatest resource. Especially, the xenophobic, gun-toting, self-styled patriots who actually believe in existence of an international Jewish conspiracy and are willing to sacrifice anybody else's life to prove their point. As one of the nation's six Korean Quaker Jews, I take great offense. I write to Senator Obadiah Goldsmith-Lee all the time, urging him to take greater action but I never get a response.

Enough babbling. We're in North Carolina now. Land of cigarette warehouses and fireworks stands. Separated by at least a thousand yards, that is. The road glare is pretty intense and the temperature is... hmm... let's use a new word. Torpid. Yeah, that's the ticket. Time to turn on the comedy channel. Argh. Despite the comedy stylings on the radio, I conked out for an hour. My left thumb and pointer finger fell asleep. Weird. I'm not only narcoleptic now, but I have Parkinsons.

We pull into Chapel Hill and end up driving in loops because of highway construction detours. Angered and disoriented by the circular detours, we grab the first hotel off the highway that we can find which turns out to be a Holiday Inn Express. After lying down and going brain-dead for a half hour, we pile back into the Tahoe to go pick up Leslie, a recent transplant from DC who just recently moved here for school. But we're arrogant fools who think that just because we've driven several thousand miles without asking for directions once, we can find Leslie's house without any assistance. Who knew that she lives in the "Brigadoon" apartment complex on Peachtree Boulevard which is the first left after hell freezes over and the messiah returns. . After getting turned around five or six times and losing cell connections with Leslie, we finally pull up to her apartment. By now, I'm so hungry that the weeds by the side of the road are starting to look tasty. A little butter and some bread and I could pretend it's a watercress sandwich.

We drive a short way into downtown Chapel Hill, find some handy parking, and go to the "Top of the Hill", a local microbrewery and restaurant. It is on the top rise of the main street and the third story balcony seating provides a welcome and gracious night breeze. Jenny, another transplant from DC, met us there with one of her friends and a good time was had by all. They had a surprisingly good menu. They also had a great selection of locally brewed beers (I highly recommend the "Swim Test"), which turned out to be a good thing because we shut the place down. Then, these three little piggies went groan groan groan and rolled all the way home to the hotel.

Sleepy time. Bring on the dream where I'm a sun god standing on top of a mayan temple in front of thousands of screaming women throwing small pickles at me. Am I the only person who has that dream? (Fans of "Real Genius" will get this reference. Everybody else will think I'm a freak).

 

Show all posts