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Suzie and I wanted to meet Mike and Kacey in Orlando for dinner but the roads were moving slower than we wished so where I could I drove quickly.  About 110 miles out, I was pulled over for speeding.

Officer: Why were you going so fast?
Me: We’re trying to make a friend’s Masters dissertation in Orlando this evening.
Officer: Where are you from?
Me: PA.
Officer: And you’re driving?
Me: Yes.
Officer: *pause* *returns to police car* *returns to my car* Sir, please get out of the car.
*We walk to behind my car*
Officer: She yours?
Me: Mine?
Officer: Yours.
Me: Sure?
Officer: Ok, please drive slower.  You want to make it to Florida in one piece.

We made Orlando in time to take a night time tour of a cemetery.  The guide mentioned that it was the only cemetery in Orlando County and then did so again every five sentences.  The tour ended, thankfully, and we returned to the hotel for a proper night’s rest.

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Carl and I rose at the crack of 10 and he refused my invite to breakfast.  I went to shower and learned that I left my towel at home so I used a hand cloth to dry myself.  Traffic out of Fayetteville was fine and I got to take in the sights of the south:

  • A realtor offering “free Christian flags”
  • A Walgreen’s selling a “9′ apple pie” at less than 7 cents a square foot
  • A gas station offering a free “bootle of water”, I assume a bootle is a small boot
  • A White’s Motel and Restaurant, thought that was illegal

I-75 into Tampa turned into a parking lot and I lost about an hour seemingly due to the world’s tiniest car accident.  As traffic was at a stand still I started looking into whether Biscayne National Park required any sort of reservations and discovered my second omission of trip, my national park pass.  Traffic flow resumed and I made it to Tampa with great haste meeting Bob Tyler and quickly going to Steak n’ Shake.  His Steak n’ Shake exists at some sort of strangeness nexus (Fark.com refers to it as “Florida”) and I lost an hour to stories of a boy that barked like a dog, Bob’s friends’ inability to properly roll up and snap a straw, the subterfuge required to a member of a restaurant wait staff, and finally a Gabe Newell impersonator who manipulated his newspaper quite angrily.  We slammed some cookie-topped brownies and I left for Miami Beach.

Alex and Ashley met me in front of the Bass Museum of Art at around 2:30 AM and I made way to their tiny apartment.

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Why I volunteered to help Kyle move from Florida is beyond me.  Our trip to Penn State still stands out as my worst trip ever.  We left at 7:30 in a GMC Sierra and 27 hours of podcasts for 42 hours of driving.  The trip down was marked by false hope:IMG_0708

I thought this was the furthest south Wawa and shed a tear leaving it, until I saw signs for the next 3.  Boo…

At about 1 AM we encountered an “I-95 South Closed” sign.  Hm…. So we took a detour around

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CAPE FUCKING FEAR!!! I want to become a dentist in this plaza and knock out the light behind “Cape” so I can be the dentist at Fear Plaza.  Later, there was another delay.

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A jack-knifed trailer.  I’ve always been stunned by the jack knifed trailer on an on-ramp.  LIke some how one thinks that throwing the wheel will magically fix your truck once you realize you’re going the wrong way.

I was hell-bent on going to a Waffle House after reading a review in Maxim that they were superior to IHOP.  This died in my chest after Kyle pointed out to me that the car was being cased by four separate people and I spotted two pimps.  Go Carolina!  We switched after 11 hours and in Georgia I noticed a sign where the design was identical to the Brass Ring Cafe in Hopewell/Pennington.

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We arrived in Florida and began Operation:Packupkyleslife.  I wanted to pack-up and return to PA the same day, but biology interfered.  I met Kyle’s cat Dunyazad.  A cat that fits into the category of animals with awesome names that are abbreviated to something retarded, in this case “dunners” or “duny” or something equally dumb.

I had an idea to increase our efficiency on the way back:

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BED SAIL!

Packing was an ordeal with the ultimate goal of “protect the suade couch and queen sized bed”.  I was angry at Kyle for dragging his feet until I realized he was leaving his life behind, frown.  We departed the next day after packing in the rain which only stoked the fires of my determination.

The drive back was awesome in that I got to drive 1100 miles at a maximum speed of 63 MPH, w00t.  Our overnight stop involve Dunderella nearly becoming potty trained.

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We had to pull over about 6 times because something was about to bounce out and kill someone.  I ran out of podcasts around Fredericksburg, Va and was reduced to listening to old episodes of Security Now! and listening to PC security problems from 2005.  Anyway, observations:

Virginia had signs that said “Overheight Vehicle Detector ahead”.  Isn’t that just a bridge?  Virginia also had the best custom plates: “LRIGTAB”, “Uh huh”, “W00K1EE”, “Nerdc4rt” and “FLAMING”.  The last was on a Hummer H3, no idea.  Finally, Virginia had many illuminated signs that said “DUI Crackdown In Effect” with metal signs beneath that said “CRUSH CRIME”.  Best crimefighting initiative name ever.

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Please note that Hell is in comic sans.

Salvation came when we did find the furthest south (on I-95) Wawa.  It was glorious.  Most rest stations had hand blow-dryers.  I much prefer a paper towel but this Wawa had retrofitted a jet engine as a hand dryer.  I was nearly knocked over initially by its force.

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I have more pictures available on my Flickr Feed of this trip.

I’m glad I made the 2200 mile trip alive.  The 800 mile trip to Glen Ellyn will be a cakewalk.  Go 5-Color Worlds!