Welcome to LA, fat ass.

Day 6
States I Ass-Kicked Today: AZ
Current Location: Los Angeles, CA
Hours of Sleep Last Night: 4.5

So, amazingly, I made it to our new apartment in one piece and without any of the following: car problems, accidents, speeding tickets, diseases, ligature marks, clean clothes or interesting stories.

Here's a summary of my trek:
3200 - approximate no. of miles driven
51 - approximate no. of hours on the road
3 - approximate no. of hours spent actually moving over the last 6 days
15 - approximate no. of lbs of junk/fast food consumed
11 - approximate no. of lbs gained
3 - approximate no. of times Chris said "You're not that fat" when I got here
16 - approximate no. of cookies Chris baked for me
12 - approximate no. he ate before I got home
65 - approximate no. of times I heard Kid Rock's new song on the radio
2200 - approximate no. of times I heard "God" said on the radio
3 - approximate no. of hours spent talking to myself
26 - approximate no. of times Chris told me "something cute" the dog had done while we spoke on the phone
14 - times word "approximate" has appeared in this blog so far

Okay, day 6. I got up early to hit the Flagstaff Holiday Inn Express free breakfast to find... bedlam. A huge mob fighting for baked goods and juice. It was complete and total anarchy. Men had their ties around their heads, tourists had jelly smeared on their faces like war paint. I saw a 6-year old on a table brandishing a plastic knife and threatening to slice the throats of anyone who attempted to touch her Fruit Loops. I saw a soccer mom light a carton of orange juice on fire and throw it into the crowd, Molotov cocktail-style. I saw an old woman scream a battle cry and dive into a dog-pile for half a muffin. She didn't make it. I just wanted a piece of fruit. Sweet Jesus, just a piece of fruit. The things I did. The horror.

Back on the road I drove really far out of my way to see the Grand Canyon. And apparently I am soulless and evil, because I got bored after staring at it for 10 minutes, got back in my car and left. I have gotten nothing but shit about this. People are downright offended. Chris is horrified. "How can you not be impressed by the Grand fucking Canyon?!?!" I was impressed. I just didn't know what to do after I had done my staring. Should I compose a poem regarding it's vastness? Should I throw myself into it as a sacrifice to it's splendor? Should I talk to the myriad of Asian tourists milling about about how great our country is because, well, look at the size of our hole!




What's fun is when you get in your car and see a sign that reads "Los Angeles - 466 miles".

For a while I cut over and drove historic Route 66 - beautiful, with antique cars going by and little old-school towns dotted with soda shoppes and general stores and... Exxons. I bought a root beer and turned on the oldies station and drove. Awesome, until I realized I don't really like root beer and was getting a bruised butt.


Finally I arrived home, exhausted. After two days of seeing no one on the road, it's a bit jarring to be in a city again. It's a bit sad, because as much as I bitch, I actually really enjoyed the trip. That and I'm lazy and not looking forward to having to do work again.


Favorite pictures:

Woman at Graceland.

"Participated in drug experimentation" - from the old people at the Route 66 museum.

Apparently PBR was once used for gonorrhea.

Wow, if you're an insomniac or so hepped up on speed that your heart my burst if you don't calm down, read this blog. Bo-ring. Better stop before it gets worse.

Well, end of transmission I guess. Thanks for reading. Sorry if you did.

It's symbolic, jerk.

My Windshield is a Bug's Worst Nightmare

Day 5

States I Ass-Kicked Today: New Mexico

Current Location: Flagstaff, Arizona

Total Miles Traveled So Far: About 2,600

Dead Insects on Windshield: About 2,600

My favorite sign for today:

"Or they may not. Whatever." - state of New Mexico

This morning I awoke bright and early. Not of my own volition, mind you. I was on the first floor of the crack den Super 8 and a guy outside decided to rifle through his pickup while his loud car alarm went off. First I thought "He's robbing that truck!" and my reaction was relief, because it wasn't our car. Then, after a good three minutes, douche pulls his key fob out of his pocket and shuts off the alarm. Are you kidding, dick? I wanted to pull off his Calvin-peeing-on-a-Ford-symbol mud flaps and shove them down his throat. Finally I got back into bed and shut my weary eyes... only to be awoken immediately by two Mexican cleaning ladies screaming back and forth and cackling at the top of their lungs in the hallway.

So if this is garbled and crappy, go fuck yourself. No one else is reading this shit anyway. Chris.

After my restful, soothing morning, I headed to the Roswell UFO Museum and Research Center, where the woman behind the desk kept giving me nasty looks while she helped the old couple in front of me. How does she know I'm from the North already? What the hell, bitch?! I thought. Then it was my turn and I realized she had a lazy eye. I am a terrible person and should rot in hell.

Once inside the actual museum part, the first thing I noticed was a group of visitors wearing tin foil helmets. Seriously. I hope it was a joke. Otherwise, there's a large group of paranoid schizophrenics wandering the tourist attractions of Roswell. Be advised.

As for the museum, it's pretty interesting, actually. LOTS of text to read - it's not really "interactive", but I knew nothing about the Roswell Incident, so that was fascinating. I am a total skeptic about most things, but this gave me pause. They have a ton of sworn affidavits and articles and shiz. Read this is you don't know what I'm talking about: www.roswellufomuseum.com/incident.htm

Oh, and they also have a prop from the Showtime movie "Roswell".

That's actually Kyle MacLachlan in the lab coat. He hasn't had a lot going on since Charlotte dumped his impotent ass. Zing! Oh no she didn't!

Then I headed northwest to Tinkertown - a small museum out in the middle of nowhere. Not to wax rhapsodic (as I so often do), but the landscape and views and sky and mesas and sun and clouds - it was freakin' beautiful today. Okay, that's enough earnestness. Tinkertown started when some crazy guy decided to carve a little house and little people to live there. And he also started embedding bottles into the thick cement walls he was building around his house. Then he decided to make more little people, and more little buildings, and 40 years later he had 50,000 bottles in his walls and a bazillion little carved things sitting around, so they turned his house into a museum. Tin. Foil. Helmets. Anyway, the guy was incredibly talented and this place is insanely weird in a cool way. They have old-timey machines that still work. I did a fortune teller machine. Then they asked me to leave. Hey-oh! See, because I was implying I had sex with the machine... [coughs, clears throat] So, my fortune said I should be nicer to my husband and wear onyx jewelry. I'll do one of those things. If I can find some onyx jewelry. Here's a creepy woman that the guy carved, holding a most-definitely racist doll:Finally, my evening concluded at a restaurant in Flagstaff, where I am staying at a much nicer hotel. I don't like to brag, but can you say Holiday Inn Express? High roller! Anyway, ate dinner at a diner. The waitress was very friendly. She complimented me on my hair. I complimented her on hers. Mainly because I was afraid of her (she had a shaved head with one dyed-black patch of bangs in the front). She kept calling me "babe" and "sweetheart". I was weary of trying to concentrate on my book while the French tourists (no, I don't know why there were French tourists in a diner in Flagstaff) behind me argued loudly. Anyway, I asked for a slice of apple pie to go. The waitress came back with what appeared to be a trash bag. "We had a little extra," she smiled. Oh God, she's trying to poison the Northerner I thought, smelling the bag for an almond-y smell (that's how you identify cyanide. What the hell kind of spy are you?). When I got to the hotel and warily opened the container, there was HALF A PIE in there. Seriously. And... wait for it... wait for it... her number.

I am such a stud.

Edited for content...

Day 4
State’s I’ve Ass-kicked Today: Texas
Current Location: Roswell, NM
No. of Days I've Worn These Socks: 3 (I wore flip-flops Monday)

So I'm chillin' in a crack den, otherwise known as the Roswell Super 8. I chose it because it's cheap. That should be the slogan here: "Come because it's cheap. Leave because you got burgled and strangled to death." The room is something out of those movies where the family has to go into protective custody and they get put in the shady hotel with dirty carpet and a bedspread from 1972. If there's no blog tomorrow night, somebody call the po-po.

This morning, in Oklahoma, I met God.
And he was made with gravy.

I went to "Classen's" for breakfast - a run-down dive that happened to be within thirty feet of the hotel I stayed in. I got my share of odd looks, for being alone and because I spoke with an English accent. Obviously, I've been eating and going to movies and stuff by myself, and that's slightly unusual, but I've been thinking of ways I could take it a step farther, do shit that would be really weird to do alone. Like, I could go through a corn maze and then celebrate wildly with myself at the end, hugging myself and shouting "I DID IT! I DID IT! I didn't think I could, but I did! Yaaaaaay!!" And I hate how people give you automatic pity when you eat by yourself. "Just one?" said with furrowed brow and pouted lip (you can see the thought bubble reading "You poor pathetic girl that nobody loves. That's it, come in and eat your feelings"). So I've come up with some inappropriate responses to the "Is it just you today?" question: "Yeah, my best friend died three days ago. Thanks for rubbing salt in my wounds." OR "Yeah, I shot my boyfriend point blank in the face this morning. Stupid cops think it was his business partner. Ha! Fucking pigs." OR, my favorite "Yeah, my husband left me because we found out I'm barren. Could I have a booth, please? Thaaaaaanks."

Anyway, back to my spiritual breakfast experience. I asked the waitress what to order and she said she'd have the kitchen put together something, which I took to mean five cooks were going to ejaculate in my food. What came out was ejaculate-free (I think) and nothing short of amazing. They call it "Biscuit Debris". It's biscuits and gravy sprinkled with three kinds of meat and smothered in cheese. Not going to lie, I got a little moist. I took a bite and angels sang. It was RIDICULOUS. I could only eat about a third of it before I felt full and sick. Later I had explosive diarrhea at the Route 66 museum. It was totally worth it.

Next stop, Route 66 museum. Run by old ladies who really want you to know and love that darn road. Not necessarily for the MTV generation. I felt guilty enough to spend a while pretending I gave a shit about road-building so the sweet old lady at the register wouldn't feel like her twilight years were a total waste. Okay, it wasn't that bad. I think my memories are just colored by the unpleasantness I did in their bathroom. Here's a picture of a picture of a sign that might have been somewhere on Route 66 at some point. And now you know what my afternoon was like.

Next I hit the road. It poured today and the only CD I hadn't listened to four thousand times was a Death Cab for Cutie CD. Needless to say, I almost drove myself into a telephone pole. I tried to distract myself with the signs - lots of weird signs out there today. There was an exit sign that read "Corn". There's a town called Corn, Oklahoma. Awesome. Oh, and I forgot, in Tennessee there was a sign praising "The Infant Jesus of Prague." I looked it up and apparently people worship a wooden statue of baby Jesus from Prague. Really. There's a church dedicated to the thing in fucking Tennessee. Southerners are craaaazy. Speaking of which, the radio is a complete void now. Christian rock, Christian ministry, Christian "news" (basically people talking about how they're trying to "pray away abortion"). Yikes.

Later I stopped on a frontage road in Amarillo, Texas to see Cadillac Ranch - an art thing where these cars are lined up in the ground and people spray-paint them. Pretty cool, actually, until I noticed someone was videotaping me looking around at the cars. I pretended not to notice and tried my best to suck it in. The guy said it was for a Swedish TV show. Right. Definitely a news piece on obesity or a segment on the Style Network about how not to dress.

Then I arrived here in rainy Roswell. Memo to self: Roswell sucks my balls.

Luckily, I can sleep well in this murder hole knowing that I'm under the watchful protection of a small wooden statue of the infant Jesus purchased by someone a long time ago in Prague. Whew.

Arkansas is Full of Shitty Drivers

Day 3
Hours on the road: 8.5
States I Ass-kicked today: TN, AR
Current Location: Oklahoma City, OK
Produce consumed over the last three days: 1/2 an apple

"I feel so angry. It's like I've been raped. In the face!" - A quote from Hamlet 2, which I just saw in an empty theater for $5.50. The place had 15 screens and there were 17 cars in the parking lot. Is it that the movies out now suck or that Oklahoma sucks? Answer: a resounding yes.

Why so angry, you ask? Because people in Arkansas should not be allowed into vehicles. Most of the state is backwoods anyway. They can walk. Why do people sit in the left lane doing 2 miles per hour under the speed limit? And why do all the white tractor trailers gather in infuriating little lane-blocking coffee klatches so the rest of us can’t pass? Because they’re racist, that’s why. I just want to get to the next rest stop to pee out that huge Vitamin Water I chugged, but no, I have to idle behind a Triple-A KKK clusterfuck for a good fifteen minutes. Oh, and every time I’ve encountered a Nissan Maxima it’s being driven by a huge twat. Today a woman tailed me for a good ten minutes IN THE RIGHT LANE. I slowed to 40 mph before she passed me. Then I, of course, tailed the shit out of her. And right now she’s at home on her blog talking about this bitch who terrorized her on the road this morning. Just kidding. No one writes blogs anymore.

So this morning I went to Graceland at 8:45AM. Because I'm hardcore. And by hardcore I mean stupid. I had read in a travel book to get there early because it gets really crowded. See Figure 1*.

I enjoyed Graceland. Normally I would have some pithy smartass tirade about tourist traps and shit, but I have to be honest, they called him “The King” for a reason. When you buy everyone you know a horse ‘just because’ and carpet your ceilings with green shag and label your own personal jumbo jet “TCB” (for ‘taking care of business’), you earn my respect. And that’s the only way to earn my respect. So get to it, people. I want a pony.

What’s fun is when you get to the front of a line of people to go on the house tour and there’s some guy taking pictures of people in front of a big Graceland sign and he’s like “You all by yourself?” and everyone in the line turns to look. I got a lot of looks the whole morning, in fact. Probably because I was the only person under 40 there and wandering around talking to myself and taking four billion pictures of Elvis jumpsuits. I think I’ve been in the car too long.

Oh, and apparently, people from the South don’t like us Northerners, with our fancy correct English and mouths full of teeth and cars with power windows. I’ve been sweet as pie to these assholes and all I get is attitude. So today I ate lunch at a diner and faked a Southern accent (crazily exaggerated to Foghorn Leghorn extents), and the people were actually nicer to me. Ridiculous. Which gave me an idea - every time I stop to get gas from now on I’m going to use a different accent. This shouldn’t last long, as all my European accents devolve into some sort of cockney-Irish-Jamaican slang. Hey, I never promised you a rose garden. (I don't know what that means, but I'm leaving it).

* I didn't bring the stupid camera cord to upload my photos to the computer, hence the drawings. Oh, and I was wearing an Elvis belt buckle that matched my boots, too.

Memphis is a Jerk

Day Two
Hours Driven: 6.5
Current Location: Southaven, Mississippi


Is anyone watching this "Fashion Rocks" bullshit on CBS? I just turned on the TV to see an Asian man decked out in silver face paint dancing behind Chris Brown, who, of course, is dance-jumping on trampolines. What the hell? Even the title sucks. It sounds like it should be followed by an exclamation point and proclaimed by a 12-year old girl during a commercial for Barbie clothes.


I got to Memphis around 4:30 (sounds like the first line of one of the many country songs that come up on the scanner before it lands on the one "rock" station in Tennessee, which is inevitably playing Rush), just in time to join the crowd gathering around the fountain inside the Peabody Hotel for their nightly march of the ducks. Yes, I sped relentlessly for this. Here's the scoop on what I'm referring to: http://www.peabodymemphis.com/peabody_ducks/ .
Every morning these ducks march from the elevator and into a fountain, then at night, they march back into the elevator. This is done while dramatic music plays and a huge crowd oohs and aahs and pushes me violently out of the way so they can get a better photo for their gay-ass scrapbook collection. Yeah, that whole stereotype that Southerners are all friendly and polite is bull. The "belles" around me were so totally hardcore whilst jockeying for best duck-watching position that I missed most of the "processional". And I am not small - it takes a lot of force to displace my giant mass. Inertia. A fat body at rest wants to stay at rest. But apparently ducks are like PCP for these people, they get superhuman strength and lose all sanity when faced with fowl. So the whole duck experience was a bit of a letdown after a full day of anticipation. Whatever, I had ribs to eat.

My next destination was across the street and down a sketchy alley which looks like a great spot to be mugged and/or stabbed. Luckily I just got catcalled (because I have a big ass and guys outside BBQ restaurants seem to dig that). Charles Vergos Rendezvous is known for having the best dry-rubbed ribs in Memphis. I had never had a dry-rubbed rib (that's totally a sexual euphemism - for what, I don't know, but I would guess something painful and/or bloody) and again, I was disappointed. The ribs were chewy as shit and not very good. Screw you, Memphis. You're a cold mistress, slowly dashing my hopes and dreams one by one.

Tomorrow I go to Graceland. If that's awful, I'm going to slap a crazy Elvis fan out of sheer frustration. I'll be like "You all shook up now?! Come on teddy bear, it's now or never! I'm a hard headed woman! I'll do the jailhouse rock! You're headed for heartbreak hotel, bitch! God, that was terrible. Terribly AWESOME.

The Odyssey - Day One

Hours on the Road: 9.5 (4PM - 1:30AM)
States I've Ass-Kicked So Far: NJ, PA, MD, WV, VA
Current Location: Bulls Gap, TN

Sitting in a Best Western here in Bulls Gap. As in the gap between civilization and this hotel is startling. The desk clerk here is either a sweet, lonely guy or a psychopathic child rapist. Either way, he gave me a discount, so he's okay in my book.

I guess I forgot how much rage I suppress and how easily that pops up when I'm driving. I'm pretty lucky I didn't die today, what with all the passing on the right and cutting off semis and threatening the lives of old people and swerving about as I try to figure out the scanner on the radio. That girl is so dangerous, dangerous, that girl is a bad girl... (lyrics from one of three songs that I've heard no less than 400 times today - been making up alternate lyrics - "I kicked a squirrel and I liked it."). It's eerie - every couple hours a Top 40/Oldies/Anything-I-Like-To-Listen-To station disappears and is replaced by either another country station or a "Some Melodramatic Old Dude Bitching Us Out Re: The Bible" station. I'm going to show up in California wearing a cowboy hat and an "I Heart Jesus" T-shirt.

Word to the wise - KFC + Car = No. I've been craving the Colonel for months, so I figured I'd quell the belly beast in private (less embarrassing than tearing into a lard-fried chicken carcass in broad daylight). "I'll just grab it to go and eat it back on I-81. Genius!" Yeah, bad idea, Megan. Somewhere around bite 2 of a crumbly extra-crispy thigh, I realized I need at least one hand to drive. End up dropping most of the food in my crotch area and spilling half a soda on my shirt. Smooth. When I stepped out of the car at the next gas station, bits of dead bird and breading and biscuit fell off of me, and I had a giant stain on the front of my shirt. I had to fight off the man pumping gas adjacent to me, as he could barely control his pure animal lust at such a sexy sight.

Which leads me to the one good thing about West Virginia. Wait, to backpedal here, I'm sure West Virginia is a nice place. It's quite beautiful-looking from the highway... But the fact that there are rest stops every five miles leads me to believe that even they know they're just a stepping stone to other, better states. Anyway, the best thing - in WV, it's like Liz Lemon in Ohio. I was disheveled and oily and sporting bloodshot eyes and frizzy hair, and I still felt like a fucking supermodel. Love it. I know, I know, there are good-looking people there somewhere, but I haven't run into many. Just slack-jawed yokel men who want a piece of the Meg Meat (that phrase sounds so gross. I'm leaving it).

Anyway, I'm signing out now - I shouldn't even be awake at this point - have to get up early so I can get to the Peabody Hotel in Memphis to catch the duck march at 5... Yeah, that's how I roll. I'm from the streets, bitch!

My magical weekend with the folks

So, I tend not to visit my family very often, but this weekend I had to do my familial duty. The husband and I are moving across the country, and this has sparked some unexpected panic in my parents. So, to ease the transition, I spent a few days up in the woods with Ma and Pa.

Highlights:


- I am told we're going somewhere "nice" for dinner. "But I only brought jeans. Is it okay if I wear jeans and a polo shirt?" I say, smelling my polo shirt and hoping it doesn't show that I've worn it twice already without washing it. Mom - "Yeah, you should be fine." Once changed, I enter the living room to find Dad in a Hawaiian shirt, shorts and sandals and Mom in a blue plaid sleeveless collared shirt paired with electric blue shorts and sandals (with socks). This is followed by a discussion of how my parents have become obsessed with the show "What Not to Wear". "I've learned so much from what they say!" Mom says, adjusting her blindingly bright leg wear. Dad -"The people they get on that show are a bunch of jerks" (this is his standard party line - usually he's referring to game show contestants and/or anyone in the cast of Seinfeld). Later, when we get to the "nice place" where we're going to eat dinner, I notice a spider climbing up my water glass, then the hicks behind us get into a heated debate about NASCAR. Needless to say, I felt TOTALLY under-dressed.

- Mom and Dad are separated and hate each other... but live in the same house. This is not the best environment for two short-fused people, especially since their house is tiny and in the middle of nowhere. But the cops haven't yet responded to gunshots at the ol' homestead. Nope, instead of violence, we spend the weekend tiptoeing through a minefield of passive-aggressiveness and barely-suppressed rage. Fun. Try not to pick a side when your parents are shouting back and forth about whether or not Dad had the right turn signal on before that last stoplight. Just try.

- My parents are cheap. They have a water-saving thingie in their shower. This is a problem. My hair is huge and unwieldy and it takes a good amount of water just to get it wet - add cleaning myself, shampooing and conditioning, and you can imagine how long it takes to complete the bathing process. I'm pretty sure my parents think I was masturbating. Can't blame them - I had a very special relationship with the shower massager in my house growing up. Women, purchase one. Seriously. Men, hate to tell you, but if those things had dicks, we wouldn't need you at all.

- Mom and Dad drink all the time. And then drive. Dad likes to point out things and turn to show me as the car weaves into the other lane toward oncoming traffic. Meanwhile, it's raining, he's doing 20 mph above the speed limit and the car smells strongly of Coors Light and leftover Olive Garden.


Quotes:


"Nicholson was way better and he didn't get an Oscar. If the kid didn't make that gay movie then die, he'd just be another Joker."

"What's that guy doing in that mailbox?! That's illegal! We should call someone." (Noteworthy because the gentleman going through the mail was black and my parents wouldn't have been the least bit suspicious at all if it was a white guy)

Mom - "Did I tell you Uncle Steve died?" Me - "No." Mom - "Well, he did."

"Did you know they make sliced Havarti cheese now, Megs? Can you believe it?" and "Remember that smoked Gouda we had? Jiminy Christmas that was good!"



Anyway, I survived and tomorrow I start my drive from New Jersey to California. The first leg is from NJ to DC then through the deep South to Memphis. Wish me luck. I just hope I'll be able to find a Cracker Barrel...