epilogue: the end of the road

and so went the road trip. the morning after, gabe and wade headed to atlanta to finally see the apartment they had decided to rent, sight unseen. i headed back to athens to pack myself up for the trip back to kansas. that night, we all went out to eat at thai spoon with madison and ali in tow. some basketball was watched, some walker's karaoke was sung, and we parted ways.

the next night, i left for kansas, after a good long attempt at saying goodbye to all of the friends who were still around. i covered most of the important ones. it was marlee's birthday, so everyone was in the same place. like fish in a barrel.

after the two and a half weeks on the road with two guys i consider to be my best friends, it was a sad irony that the final leg of my journey was taken alone, under the cover of stormy night and morning fog. really, though, life is all about launching. leaving what you're comfortable with, and jetting yourself into something unexpected. if i'd never left kansas, i'd have never had the opportunities to do so many amazing things - from becoming an sec football fan to being in an a cappella group, to taking an insanely well worth it road trip. i'd not trade these experiences for anything.

after a month back in leavenworth, working hard, seeing the people who still love me and those who always have, i'm again going into that dark night with no one in the passenger's seat. the memory of those who've ridden shotgun in the past will sustain me, though. it always has.

here's to the road. may the unexpected twists and turns lead you to destinations as wondrous as those i've been blessed to pass through so far.

days sixteen and seventeen

the final two days of our road trip were interesting in that we all got a chance to go home. we woke up around ten on tuesday, had a little food, laughed at wade's 7-year-old brother andrew's antics, and headed to leavenworth.

mom and dad were both home, luckily, so we sat and talked with them briefly about our favorite parts of the trip. i headed upstairs to make a mix cd that would carry us through the remainder of the trip - believe me, and the other two, it was long overdue. the guys convinced mom and dad to put on some baby dvds. apparently, i had some trouble with standing up when i was not yet two years old. go figure.

i fiddled around on the computer for a bit, then played gabe "only wins by deuce" shaukat in some ping pong. won. played wade "internet may-may" wisdom. won. played gabe again. lost by deuce. perfection would have been ideal, but i was off my game.


i drove the guys around leavenworth high school, then we ate lunch with mom and dad at homer's. the food was greasy and delicious, quite satisfying for the bros. from there, we headed up to padilla field, where i had the opportunity to reclaim my glorious past on the baseball field. it was unfortunately unkempt, but we managed to get a few pitches in from the mound and take some grounders anyway.

we headed back to kansas city, where we got to make fun of wade's brother andrew for looking like short round from indiana jones and the temple of doom. the kid has also apparently pooped in the pool. cool little guy, though. lots of energy. steve took us to the royals game and bought us some beers. his devious plot to inebriate gabe and myself to the extent that we were no longer capable of beating him and wade in a friendly game of 8-ball was totally foiled. gabe and i took the series 2-1. how'd the royals game go, you ask? we left in the seventh. it ended up going about twelve innings, a real nail-biter. of course, the boys in blue couldn't keep it together and ended up dropping the series to the twins.

we slept well, and drove all the way back to columbus the next day. via the southern route. if you've ever seen deliverance, you're well aware of many of the wonders and joys that southern missouri, arkansas, and alabama hold. we slept in columbus, and i departed early the next morning, bringing our road trip to an end. the odometer hit 8000 miles just south of atlanta.

here's to closed chapters of open books.

provisional post 5: "the coolness factor"

wade, oh wade. how gabe and i envy you, with your ultrasupercool piece of technology. wow man. that iphone is totally awesome. in marketing class, gabe and i learned about people like you. you're part of a class of people known as "early adopters." this rather ho-hum term (you may mentally replace it with "trend setters" from here on out, mr. wisdom) is defined thusly:

"an early adopter is a person who embraces new technology before most other people do. early adopters tend to buy or try out new hardware items and programs, and new versions of existing programs, sooner than most of their peers." (courtesy whatis.com)

hmm. when did you receive that iphone, wade? was it when that device still ran in the $499 dollar range? what do iphones retail for now, anyway? hasn't the price dropped to about, oh... $299? what value did you derive from that extra $200? adjusted for inflation, isn't that about $250?

oh, now we understand. you couldn't stand to go one more day living without an iphone, not because of its revolutionary interface, nor its convenient and seamless melding of cellular telephone with 8-gig mp3 player. no sir. you had to have your iphone because of the... "coolness factor."

at one point during the trip, gabe and i decided that it was about time to start making fun of wade for his iphone. the only thing less cool than not having an iphone is having an iphone and not being able to keep your damn hands off of it for one goddamn minute. "oh, hey guys, did you hear about xyz important news topic? no? oh, sorry, i just read it on my iphone." quoth the wade. after a bit of preliminary ribbing, wade starting espousing the virtues of being an early adopter, namely, that early adopters alone get to enjoy (and pay extra for) "the coolness factor." let the record show, those actual words ("those actual words" being "the coolness factor") passed wade's brain-to-mouth censorship neurons. after a stunned silence at such a bombastic proclamation from our perfectly coiffed companion, gabe and i could control ourselves no longer. the floodgates had opened. we chuckled heartily and made revelry at wade's expense. this guy. what kind of tool says stuff like "coolness factor?" who does he think he is, malcom gladwell or something? has our friend become chuck klosterman in brooks brothers and rainbows? jeesus.

needless to say, "coolness factor" was one of the highlights of an otherwise monotonous drive through god knows where.

days fourteen and fifteen

we woke up sunday morning with sunlight pouring into greg's 52nd floor apartment. he has a perfect view of lake michigan and chicago's skyline. we looked on in awe, then got our day going.

the sears tower was our first stop. the line was long, and some idiot employee tried to get us to go to the 99th floor instead of the skydeck, which was on the 103rd floor. we did not pay skydeck prices to see the 99th floor, so we stuck with it. the wait was well worth it. greg's apartment view, while stunning, limited us to about a 120 degree slice of chicago. the full 360 degrees was stunning.

side note - the elevator ride features a little cartoon of two birds spouting off facts about the tower with speech liberally peppered with bird-like puns. the cartoon itself wasn't all that entertaining, but we entertained ourselves making fun of it, so in a roundabout way, it served its purpose.

we headed back down and met up with chris chiego at giordano's. he was in town to read for a high school quiz bowl tournament. we talked about that for a bit, we discussed his visit to weirdo enclave deep springs college, then we parted ways. gabe "where's unlv" shaukat, wade "i pay for the coolness factor" wisdom, and i headed to see indiana jones 4. altogether entertaining, but a bit more ridiculous than indy generally gets. my low expectations were exceeded, though.

that night, greg took us out (on a sunday - odd for three southern boys) to a number of places. we had a great time, drank plenty of beers, and developed some indigestion at Mitchell's, which is basically an overpriced version of athens's grill with worse fries. and no feta dressing. we hit the hay hard.

the next morning, we woke up late and headed to wrigleyville to acquire cubs tickets. we got three "limited visibility" seats and hit the stadium for the cubs-dodgers memorial day matchup. it was a really good game to watch, and the cubs came out on top 3-1. we were in high spirits as we hit the road to kansas city. we reached steve and karen wisdom's place at about 1:30am, where we slept soundly.

here's to greg cavitt and the cubbies.

provisional post 4: same girl

one song that has kept us going throughout the drive, and certainly deserves its own post, is the r. kelly/usher song "same girl." the lyrical genius on display here is enormous. the ballad tells an awesome story, and it has a great hook. we have played this song, no lie, at least once every day we've been on the road. other songs, such as usher's new (and sure to be number one single upon its release) "what's a man to do," and some linkin park songs have been played pretty heavily as well, but none has the meaning for us that we ascribe to "same girl."

i was going to post the lyrics, but that would take a little longer than i have this morning. so, without further ado, here's the video. let it be said that i think the video is a little far fetched, while the song portrays a more likely scenario. you'll see what i mean after you watch it.

watched it? my issues with the video vs. the song basically can be summed up by saying that there's no effing way that two twins both went to georgia tech, live together on peachtree, work for tbs, share a car, have a kid, have a beauty mark on the left side of their mouths, and would lie about having a phone turned off. it's just too much. if it was actually the same girl, all these would be plausible. twins? come on now. that being said, my issues with the video don't change the fact that the song itself is amazing.

days eleven, twelve and thirteen

our brief foray into the greater denver area was little more than an oil change (dad mandate - must get oil changes at the dealership), some subway, a jovial conversation with the checkout guy at 7-11, and some playing on the monkey bars at the global leaders academy elementary school. tornado warnings in the counties north of us had us a little hesitant, but we're invincible young men, not mere weather-susceptible mortals, so we pressed north to wyoming.

the drive was probably my most difficult of the trip. i took the whole six or so hours through some pretty torrential downpours, substantially iced roads, and heavy winds on the clearer segments. once you get north of the rockies, the land turns into an endless sea of small rolling hills with some rocky outcroppings poking through every once in a while. some comic fighting for the front seat ensued at a rest stop up north. wade won out. a word on the rest stop - it was basically a glorified outhouse. the toilets didn't flush. it was like using a port-o-potty, but with a little more distance between you and the waste. still, a little weird. athens, take note. hopefully we don't end up with port-o-potties in the slc, but you know. whatever saves water.

we got in to the dime horseshoe in sundance at about 9. the place was hopping, the free popcorn was hot, and the pool table was wide open. we met wade's friend sam yemington, who told us about the time he came to atlanta, but wade wouldn't come hang out. apparently, wade was "busy" watching heroes. with us. wade has tivo. we made fun of him. we also met sam's brother will, who had gone to school in chicago but moved back to sundance with his girlfriend alanna. sounds like "atlanta," but without the t. she has a degree in bookmaking and was working on the yemingtons' ranch to make some money for supplies and such. basically, she makes handmade moleskines. the three were very good company, and we had a great time that night. we slept in sam, will, and alanna's living room. shadow the cat slept with gabe, and i shared a mattress with grits, a really friendly airedale terrier.

will and alanna

the next morning, we went out to the yemingtons' ranch, about ten miles outside of sundance. i loved it. we shot guns, we saw the branding equipment, i drove a tractor, we shot more guns. we toured a house on their land that hadn't been touched since the fifties. it was full of treasures, like an old sears catalog and a can of hi-c. we met sam's mom, who was very nice and happy to see us. we then went and saw will's white house, situated on the property across the street from the ranch. some digging around produced a couple empty beer cans, which we set up on a pile of scrapwood for target practice. gabe "shooting merit badge" shaukat, wade "afraid of cliffs" wisdom and i all managed to at least graze a can. pretty good for our first day.

sam "remington" yemington

from there, we headed to the carlile store to play ropeball, a game we were familiar with due to its popularity at football tailgates. first, we needed to go inside to get the equipment. i couldn't believe what i saw - four 12-packs of game fuel. just sitting there, waiting to be bought. gabe paid for them, and we exchanged numerous high fives before we secured them in the back seat of sam's suv. gabe and i dominated wade and same in a chilly game of rope ball, then we headed to devil's tower.


along the drive up to the tower was a field overflowing with enormous prairie dogs. sam told us about a creative guy who cast a marshmallow on a fishing pole out into the field and managed to catch one. he was apprehended pretty quickly and got in lots of trouble, but it's hilarious either way. devil's tower was rocky and impressive. we grabbed some lunch and headed back to the ranch, where sam got a phone call from his mom. she had snagged her left thumb in a lead rope when she was feeding horses and needed to go to the hospital. wade, gabe and i played trivial pursuit (fyi - the baby boomer edition sucks and is impossibly difficult) until he got back. apparently, the damage was pretty severe. later on that night, we found out that she had the tip of her thumb amputated. pretty bad thing, but she's still with us.

we got back into sundance, showered, and headed out for another night on the town. the bar of the evening was turf, which featured a decent cover band, dollar cans of bud light, and seemingly the town's entire population. there was plenty of dancing and revelry. pool cost a quarter to play, but some ill-advised bets against jerry, the town psychologist, left wade about $20 in the hole. gabe held his own. we hit the hay at about 12:30, knowing that we had a long day of driving ahead of us.

after waking the next morning, we got in the car and got on the road by 9:30. we took a brief detour to mt. rushmore for pictures and such. the photos look pretty fake, but rest assured, we were actually there. we headed on. and on. and on. gabe took us all the way through south dakota (boring), i took us all the way through southern minnesota and wisconsin (mostly boring, some pretty barns), then gabe finished us out. we got into wade's uncle greg's place in chicago at about 2am, where we crashed.

more has happened since then, but i'll save that for another post.

here's to shooting guns, whiskey and water, and the yemingtons.

provisional post 3: wade's idiosyncracies

this is wade.

wade

wade has idiosyncracies. these include (but are certainly not limited to):

• his inability to drive
• his perfectionism when it comes to hair
• his penchant for hiding behind things in pictures
• his inability to take anything in pill form

first, i'll address his inability to drive as it pertains to our current situation on the road. gabe and i knew what we were getting into. we would have to split driving during the trip while wade offered moral support from the passengers seat. i think what we didn't realize was how DAMN LONG some of these drives would be. having a third guy to drive would have been a good thing - evidenced by the forthcoming "things we never heard wade say on this trip," list.

"no need to sleep in the car in nevada, boys, i'll take this one on through the night!"
"so jeff, that crippling narcolepsy of yours seems to be giving you trouble. i'll take the wheel if you need it."
"guys - you just sit back and enjoy the scenery on ca-1. i'll drive these treacherous turns butting right up on cliff sides."

wade's perfect hair really has no interesting components to it, aside from its perfect part (on the right side of his head) and the luxurious and unchanging way his hair falls on his forehead.

wade's cat-like sense of curiousity is on full display in some of our state sign pictures. he hides behind poles, peering out at the camera like a sly siamese. this is more endearing than anything else.

finally, wade can't take anything in pill form. the last time he attempted to take a pill was in yemen, and that was out of utter necessity. he describes the experience thusly: "it sucked." he gets by with nose spray, dayquil, and pepto bismol.

all these things aside, wade is really a great person. he's helped me through some particularly difficult times. he's also the most gracious of the group in terms of thanking our hosts and interacting with people in general, always asking "how are you today," of the convenience store and restaurant cashiers, striking up conversations with random folks at bars in wyoming (the nature of which was a bit sinister, but we'll forget that for now), and offering consoling to sam when his mom had to have her thumb tip cut off. the trip, and life in general, would definitely suck without wade around. and ladies - he's available.