Are We There Yet?!

When I first read the topic, the only road trip I could think of were the ones I took with my family, but those were long ago, and I couldn't remember much. Never fear - I thought about all the other trips I've taken. I, like Jane, have travelled quite a bit (though not nearly as much as she). Anyway, I've had quite a few mishaps, so go get some snacks, maybe use the bathroom, and then get comfortable, because this might take awhile.

The first one is the only one that can truly be classified as a road trip. It wasn't very far - just from Orlando to Miami, but my god. Little hint: taking a road trip with people you don't know very well isn't always the best way to start out. It was me, my roommate Lindsey, and Chris and Nathan from College Dems. This was during the governor's race before this last one - Lindsey had pulled some strings and we were going down to volunteer at a McBride event that Bill Clinton was supposed to come to, and on the way we were to stop and volunteer for some local campaign in Ft. Lauderdale. We get to Ft. Lauderdale and call the campaign manager to get directions - we follow them best we can and still can't find the place, so we called her back and she had left a major street out of the directions! Ok - so we get to the headquarters and they gave us shirts to wear. The guys took them and went to change, while Linds and I declined, and when they came out the manager, after giving us the fliers and assignment, said "Oh be sure to bring those back - we have to wash them so other volunteers can wear them". Communal shirts - fun. Then it turned out the neighborhood she sent us to had signs up all over the place saying "No Soliciting", so we did a few houses anyways, said "Fuck it" and went and grabbed lunch.

After lunch we headed to Miami. (Keep in mind I drove and Chris and Lindsey babbled about everything under the sun THE WHOLE TIME). We got to South Beach, kinda got the runaround, but finally found the woman organizing the event, who said that the volunteer passes weren't ready yet, and anyways they were clearing the area to have a team come and search for bombs and whatnot. So we stood off to the side, and this is when Nathan starts talking about bombs and Chris was giving him the death stare until he finally yelled "Will you shut up? I don't want to get kicked out because you keep talking about this shit!". Needless to say, that put Nathan in his place for awhile. So we go up to the woman again, and she doesn't recognize us - it's only been 10 minutes - and they still don't have the passes. Once we finally see someone give them to her, we swooped in, got the passes, and went inside. Once inside, we were still pretty pissed because the woman was pretty snotty, so when she came around looking for volunteers, we hid the passes and avoided eye contact. The rally was cool, and I got to shake Bill Clinton's hand. The way home was more of the same - constant chatter that was beginning to drive me crazy, not to mention it was like midnight and I was delirious.(I made everyone get out and take a pic at Yeehaw Junction - if I hadn't met Bill Clinton, that would've been the higlight of the day.) Coming back into Orlando there was construction, and we went about 2 miles in 1/2 hour. By the end of the night, morning by this point actually, I wished I had a gun, so I could shoot everyone in the car and then kill myself.

I guess I'm going chronological, so the second story is from Switzerland. I was there about this time last year visiting Caitlin, and one of the first days I was there we ventured over to French Switzerland - Gruyeres, Lausanne. The night before Caitlin, Sean, Sean's roommate Tavis and I got pretty drunk, so Caitlin was hungover and a bit grumpy the next day. Anyways, we went to the HR Gieger museum (which was really quite pornographic and disturbing - I can only imagine what Caitlin's friend Emma thought about me), and then went to Lausanne where we were to meet this guy Aidan and have dinner with him. We were waiting for him at the train station, when I decided to go look at the vending machine. (They don't have separate ones like we do - Pepsi, Coke, Lance - it's called Selectall, and you can get condoms, cigarettes, sodas, gum - all from the same machine). We we're gathered around this machine, when this guy about our age (and not bad looking from what I remember) comes up and starts babbling in german. Everyone else was ignoring him, so once he went away I was like "WTF?", Caitlin goes - "Oh he said something about the beast - the end of the world coming" or something like that, and then "You don't think about young people being crazy". I said that it was my fault, that I attract random, and usually crazy people. (As is evidence constantly at the library). Aidan finally came, and we started out trek up what I dubbed "The Hill of Doom" It was about a mile up this steep hill, and it being my second day in the country, almost killed me - but we had a nice dinner, and upon out trek down, Emma and Sean got ahead, leaving Caitlin and I lagging. We were talking, and out of the corner of my eye, I noticed someone keeping pace with us. I continued conversing, and said something like "Yeah, cool", which my shadow decided to echo, (My shadow turning out to be a 6'5" skinny black guy) He said "You speak English". Yes. "I love English!". He proceeded to tell us about how he wanted to come to the US and teach African dance (he was from Africa) - we shook him off at the bottom of the hill by saying we were going in the opposite direction.

The next day we were walking down the Hill of Doom (no - we did NOT walk up again earlier), when a car came down the road, everyone went to the right, and I went left because I was closer to that side of the road. Well apparently some guy thought this was the perfect time to chat me up, however there was a bit of a language barrier. I speak french, but it's a whole different ballgame when it's with a native speaker. He asked if I spoke german, I asked if he spoke english, so we were kinda stuck with french, but he was undeterred. I finally communicated that I was from the US, and he asked me which one, I said Florida, and he had no idea where that was. I figure that if anything most foreigners would know New York, California, Texas, and Florida. Finallly Caitlin came up to pull me away, and he saw I was with other people and backed off. She turned to Sean and said "You can't leave her alone like that! Random people just come up and talk to her." I guess I look really friendly or something - stupid library made me personable. It wasn't really a problem once we were back in the german speaking part, except when 2 girls literally chased me down to ask about my Jack Skellington bag. They were going on and on, and Caitlin just stood there, but after a minute jumped in once she remembered I don't speak german. Caitlin and I also got pretty drunk in a nice restaurant in Paris, and later, my last night in Switzerland, I got to try absinthe. Good trip.

The final bit is about New York. I wish I could say something spectacular happened within the last 24 hrs, but nothing really has. Laurie and I met some of her friends for drinks last night, and ths morning at 3 am she left for a meeting in Denver. My original plan for today was to try to get airtime on the Today show - I had the perfect sign to get attention - "I just flew in from FL last night, and today my friend abandoned me". As it was, I slept in til about 9, didn't leave her apartment til 10:30, so I just went to the Guggenheim and Natural History Museum (whose Mineral Hall kicks the butt of the one we went to in Paris, Caitlin). Ah, but the people here. On my way into Manhattan this morning, the guy behind me picked his nose for like 5 minutes, and then fell asleep standing up. (I caught all this in the reflection of the window - I got from out in front of him ASAP.) On my way through Central Park, I was looking at a map, when a woman came up and offered to help me with directions - thank god she did - I don't know that I would've come out where I wanted to if she hadn't. I guess that's the most interesting thing so far. I'm tired, my feet hurt, and I'm sick of typing now.

P.S. My apologies if the spelling or typing is atrocious - I'm on a laptop, which I'm not used to, and I can't get the spellcheck to work.