Vignettes from the Road (Part I)

UPDATED!!! Now With Even MORE Photo-y Goodness!!!!

The Fuji Blimp, which entertained us over Norman Oklahoma. Julian's first blimp.



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It starts fairly predictably. Wednesday the night before we leave, and here’s Julian at 8:00 pm – “Oh, I just I have one more load of Delicates to Wash . . . “ Now, only My Son Julian has any “Delicates” to wash. (My clothing has two settings – lights and darks. Julian – he follows the clothing wash instruction tags religiously.

So, in other words, he’s not packed, and has no possibility of being packed until at least 10:pm. Our wake-up call is 4am, with departure at 5am to beat the Austin Rush hour traffic.

So it was just a complete surprise at 4am when he was already up, dressed, and ready to go by 5am. I swear, I was seriously contemplating leaving him home if he wasn’t ready.

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Pulling up to a Burger King, 5:53am to get some Road Food breakfast;

“Welcome to Burger King, can I take your Order?”

“Are you open for breakfast?”

(Slight Pause) “No sir, we don’t have breakfast until 6am.”

Julian and I look at each other and just laugh. We weren’t laughing ten minutes and three Burger Kings later.

McDonalds was just fine, Thank you very much. Haven’t had a Sausage McMuffin with egg in years.

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While we’re at McDonald’s I got my first Legion of Super Heroes action figure – Lightning Lad. (Our budget is so tight, it may be the only souvenir I get.) Pretty nice workmanship, nice detail. We stopped to deposit our debris in a garbage container. I pull up right next to one, but Julian sees the garbage can clear across the parking lot and makes a beeline for it.

This is how he earned his first Legionnaire nickname: “Incredibly Complicated Teenaged Sapien Lad.

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Driving down the road, about 6:45am. I see the morning star and point it out. “There’s Venus.”

“Where?”

“Right there.” (Points to the morning star, up and to the right.)

“Oh. (Pause.) “Where’s Earth?”

He says he was kidding.

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Have I ever mentioned the “Station Wagon Full of Nuns” theory? It’s a title taken from an old “All in the Family” episode where Archie Bunker hits a car and it was witnessed by a station wagon full of nuns. The punch line is “In a court of law, you can’t beat a station wagon full of nuns.”

My theory is this: If two cars are driving down the road the same direction at approximately the same speed, and one car is going 0.5 mph faster, that second car will automatically speed up. It doesn’t matter if the second car is a station wagon full of nuns with the Mother Superior herself driving, it’s an automatic human reflex.

We picked up a silver Chrysler “gangster-mobile” (I honestly don’t know what these things are called – Ariane calls them that, and they look like a ’34 Ford coupe) about the Nacogdoches exit of FM 1604 in San Antonio and that guy raced us all the way to the Central District of Austin.

Julian thinks that he was doing it on purpose. Man, you give them a driver's license, and suddenly he's a psychologist . . . .

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I’m blogging this section from the world-famous Blue Star Café, which I’ve blogged about before. I knew I was going to like this place when they had about a dozen different types of burgers (hamburgers, chesseburgers, baconburgers, mushroom burgers, and every combination thereof) as well as Chicken Fried Steak sandwiches As Rachel Ray says, “Yumm-O!”

The people are friendly, the cooking is down-home and reasonably priced (Julian & I ate well for under $20.00), and they bring your food right to the table. Plus the Ice Tea is the best I’ve ever had – not too sweet, just right.

And two TVs to watch whilst you eat – just like home! I’m watching Paul Schaffer humiliate himself on Jeopardy as I write.

Mention Texas Fred as you leave and watch their faces light up.

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Interesting fact from Oklahoma; the Indian nations issue their own license plates! This (very blurry) example is from the Cherokee Nation.


And here's one from the Muscogee Nation.







Weird, but true.

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Got to the Missouri/ Oklahoma border about 3pm, and of course the place we had to stop was -- the Petro Truck Stop!

The WHERE!?!??

If you've ever seen the CMT reality series "Trick My Truck", you know it's a country version of MTV's "Pimp My Ride" or ABC TVs "Extreme home Makeover." They take a deserving trucker down on his luck and completely overhaul his truck complete with custom paint, interior, and pretty much make it a new truck.

The character of "CB" is my favorite, because they always send him down to the Petro to lie in wait for the unsuspecting trucker. I believe this is because CB knows these guys are NUTS, and can't wait to get out of the shop for a sanity break.

So we cruised the Petro, and no sign of CB. Got pictures of us there, though.

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Into St. Robert MO at 10pm, and Julian wants to check his e-mail, so I'd better go. More tomorrow.

~~JD~~