In which we use KW’s brain ’cause it’s more efficient
We were hemming and hawing about whether or not to take a rocket trip to Houghton Lake this weekend. Drive up at 0-skunk-30 tomorrow morning and come home on Sunday. I want to go up there so badly I can almost taste it but, in the end, I decided I just couldn’t. We have a complicated couple of weeks coming up and I have a lot to get done in the next few days and, as much as I’d love to be rattling around “up north”, I need to take advantage of some of the stores and things that Megalopolis has to offer. And I need to do that on a weekend, when I don’t work. Because, as much as I love my career, I don’t get much done after my work day. I can be on the freeway heading home thinking I’m gonna do this and that productive-type-thing when I get home and then, as soon as I GET home, I think, “Bag it!” (I do manage to write my blahg and that is why it is so often such a big jumbled up higgledy-piggledy mess.)
Anyway, we were in town tonight and we walked down to the Old Town Barrrrooooom and I said to the GG, “Maybe it would be good if we checked out our route to Asheville on the iPad.” We have an upcoming road trip to Asheville, North Carolina and it’s been a long time since I’ve been “down south” but I know that the general route is to take the I75 SUV Speedway down to Knoxville or somewhere thereabouts and hang a left. I couldn’t remember the specifics. Somehow the GG’s route didn’t look right to me. Why are we turning east at Toledo and heading down through Pennsylvania? And all the way to the Atlantic coast. Hmmmm. Because he was apparently planning to go to Asheville, VIRGINIA! Roight. I can just picture us in the car at 0-skunk-30 screaming at each other because whoever was driving was making (or not making) a [wrong] turn at Toledo. And Mouse screaming at us for screaming at each other. Fun times. Um, where are we going again?
And then there was this whole bunch of confusion when we were getting ready to leave and a group of party guyz who were in town for the UM homecoming wanted our table. I was talking to one of the party guyz while the GG made a pit stop and when the GG came back, he thought that the party guy was this project manager from my work who had also happened to be in the barrrooom earlier and stopped by to say hello. It was loud in there and I couldn’t get the GG to understand that the party guy wasn’t the project manager and that, in fact, I didn’t know the party guy from Adam. So the GG kept talking to the party guy and calling him by the project manager’s name and the party guy and his buddies started playing along and, by the time we walked out, I was laughing so hard I almost literally couldn’t walk and I had to FORCE myself to regain some semblance of composure before we got to Mouse’s work so she wouldn’t think I was drunk or something and kick me out. And YES, I KNOW this isn’t funny to any of you. Really, you had to be there! And I was and I’m writing about it so I won’t forget it. Because, omigosh, I am laughing all over again and I am outta words and y’all think I am nuts!
And now it’s 10 PM and I better get to bed because I may not be driving to HL at 0-skunk-30 tomorrow but I will be up at 0-skunk-30 walking, going to the grokkery store, doing laundry, and driving to Haberman’s Fabrics over in Royal Joke (yay) with Mouse. And a bunch of other things, some of them a little secret.
G’night,
KW
P.S. I am elated that I can now successfully exchange text messages with The Commander and that she seems to see the utility of that method of communication in some circumstances. If you are my age or thereabouts and have not yet mastered text messaging on your cell phone, take a note!
October 15th, 2010 at 9:48 pm
Secret? Of course I focus on that! It is lucky that you found the error of the directions and I completely understand the hilarity of mistaken identity. If I were to write down all the things that happened in NYC that totally cracked Ashley and me up, everyone would say, “Ho hum.” But at the time, it’s hilarious and it’s part of the beauty of actually being there in the moment!
October 16th, 2010 at 1:45 am
Knoxville?
If you are needing a break – remember the Rey.
Texting? I don’t (not included in my plan, and I don’t want to pay more).
But I did, successfully, take a picture with Ashlan’s phone and e-mail it to her so she could tell me what to buy.
October 16th, 2010 at 7:37 am
I text. just quite slowly since it’s just a phone keypad not a fancy smart phone. 😉
October 16th, 2010 at 8:05 am
Text plan for the GG and me (also The Commander): $5/month each for 200 msgs. Mouse: $20 for unlimited. It’s worth it to me to be able to send quick updates (“just landed”, etc.) without messing around with phone etiquette and sometimes crappy phone service (“hellooooo hellooooo, can you hear me?”, etc.).
What worked well last night was that we were having dinner in a very noisy bar and I didn’t hear my phone when The Commander called. She left a voice message, which I listened to and, upon learning that she was just calling to chat, I texted her back that it was too noisy to talk and I’d call later. She replied to the text and I called her when we got home. So she knew that I’d gotten the call and message and I knew that things were fine with her.
Disclaimer: I’m not proselytizing. I’m just interested in how technology is changing our lives. I didn’t do very well with texting back when I had a dumb phone 😉 I LOVE being able to send photos with my phone.
October 16th, 2010 at 8:50 am
To get to NC for the wedding, you can just shoot down 75 to the 40, go East and drop down again. Or you CAN turn left at Toledo, run the turnpike and drop down 77 alll the way there, a much nicer drive depending on what you like to see. Either way, you will end up going through beautiful Mountains and scenery. If you take 77, there is a really nice place called the Tamarack that Ann and Mouse would LOVE, IF you go past it during business hours. I drove both ways so many times it’s silly, but I would definately go down 77. One of my last runs out East we went to Asheville, but we came from Philly. The 75 route will have more traffic and more cities and actually slow you down. Driving through the swervy canyons is pretty an your GPS will cut out, along with your phone, but so what. The 77 route will have more scenery, less traffic and larger mountains. Time, it will be about the same.
Look at a map and ask yourself, would you rather head East in Ohio on a turnpike, or down there through mountains and traffic??