Well, I made it to the Great Smoky Mountains, driving from Florida to North Carolina during the flood of the half-millennium. Honest to dog, it rained every step of the way.
We passed through (valued commenter) Raven Country:
(Sorry about your Dawgs, dude. But how ’bout them Gators?!?!) We ate like two-headed hogs at the world-famous Dillard House:
We traversed terrifying mountain roads and amassed scores of hateful followers who were no-doubt cursing us as stupid fucking Floridian, leaf-peeping scumbags who have no business driving on so much as a bunny slope. But finally we arrived:
It’s lovely but COLD! My siblings laughed at me for bringing two large suitcases filled with every sweater and lined jacket I own, but they’ll soon be asking for loaners. I’m feeling magnanimous, so I will say yes.
Now we’re watching the Panthers whup the Bucs (I’ve got the Panthers minus 14, and those feckers better cover the spread!).
What are you up to today? Open thread!
redshirt
Carolinians are aggressive drivers?
dedc79
The Fan Duel / Draft King nonsense is completely out of control. I hope some court decides this stuff is gambling just so the ads will stop.
schrodinger's cat
@redshirt: They haven’t come to Boston!
schrodinger's cat
Sunday Kitteh has been up to no good!
Brother Dingaling
That table is making me miss my grandma
shell
Ummmm, grits and sausage gravy.
Am I the only northern girl who loves grits?
Denali
Hope you enjoy the Smokies. My home turf. Don’t miss Cades Coves – should be beautiful this time of year. And don’t feed the bears!
cmorenc
@Betty Cracker:
The thing they wuz callin’ you wuz “Floridiots”
We of course know you’re an unusually intelligent woman – but that’s difficult to tell from riding behind in another car, not knowing y’all.
redshirt
@schrodinger’s cat: RIght? Or the Northeast in general.
I suspect though that all drivers, everywhere, are rude and inconsiderate.
Goblue72
@efgoldman: Not this Pats fan.
jl
So, I learned something from this post: Florida is flat because FloridaMan (and FloridaWoman) drivers cannot handle roads that go up and down, even a little bit. Did I get that right?
Thanks for pics. I will remember the name Dillard House for when I am back in those parts. Going to look it up right now.
schrodinger's cat
@redshirt: I suspect you are right. Driving on the Washington DC Beltway was no picnic either.
redshirt
@efgoldman:
They looked great against the Dolphins last week, but maybe that just means the Dolphins are real bad, as further evidenced today in London.
Regardless, the AFC East is the Pats’, and I don’t see any other AFC team that can stop them. 19-0.
Iowa Old Lady
I hesitate to ask but how many people were intended to eat that tableful of food? If it’s less than 6, I don’t know how you ever rolled out of there.
SiubhanDuinne
@shell:
I was born and raised near Chicago, and we had grits two or three times a week. Not for breakfast, ever, but as the starch with dinner, in place of rice or potatoes. I still love them, but rarely eat them these days, despite living in Atlanta for 31 years come tomorrow.
elmo
@schrodinger’s cat: The Beltway is part of my daily commute. Once you get the hang of it, it’s no big deal. I also grew up in Southern California, went to school in Boston, and I’ve driven in rush hours in Atlanta, San Francisco, and Chicago. My traffic bona fides are unimpeachable. But one of the worst traffic jams I’ve ever experienced was Cades Cove in the springtime, with a mama deer and two babies right off the side of the road.
I swear to FSM if I’d had a hunting rifle I’d have taken them out just to get the damn cars moving! It’s a fucking DEER, people, you’ve never seen a DEER before?
MattF
@elmo: I’m another Beltway driver. Had a fender-bender once and pulled over to the shoulder– and was immediatly accosted by several guys with gas cans all offering fuel (at a low, low price, I assume) just in case I’d run out.
redshirt
@Iowa Old Lady:
lol. I could eat all of that plus desert plus ready for dinner in 6 hours or so.
redshirt
I was very disappointed to realize that the drivers of rural Maine are just as bad as everyone in Boston – just much much much slower.
Brachiator
Of course, you could pick up a few extra bucks if you rent them.
Looks like a great view.
I’m almost feeling guilty that I am procrastinating and not doing some work at home. Channel surfed from the Giants game and ran across a fun tv program about Afro-Peruvian music and dance.
elmo
@MattF: Yikes. I’ve been fortunate not to have had any accidents, fender or otherwise, on the Beltway. I’m on it a good distance – from Branch Ave in PG County all the way to the Dulles toll road, every day. The express lanes are a gift from FSM, touched by His noodly appendage, rAmen.
Aleta
Love all the side dishes in the .South, and how they can be had not far from the freeway.
RSA
Hey, you’re just four and a half hours away! If you looked east you could probably see my house. Back when I drove a little two-seater car, it was fun to drive the mountain roads in western NC, where the speed limits are ridiculously high for safety.
Here in Raleigh, we’re dealing with a lot of post-Joaquin anti-climax.
elmo
@efgoldman: My parents were both New Yorkers, transplanted to Southern California with the Navy. They used an agent to try to find a rental house in eastern San Diego County. The agent told them there was a nice place off a road with a name that sounded like “Hamashaw.” This was in the pre-internet, even pre-Thomas Guide days, but my Dad had navigated all across the New York area and all over the Southeast, so he didn’t think anything of it, and off they went looking for Hamashaw. Couldn’t find it. Friendly gas station attendant gives them detailed directions, and no dice. The only largish street anywhere near the directions was called Jamacha, which is clearly pronounced juMAHka and isn’t anything like HAMushaw.
They were less than pleased when the agent couldn’t stop laughing long enough to explain Spanish pronunciation to them.
John Revolta
@redshirt: When I moved to the Midwest I was surprised to find that drivers out here are surprisingly courteous and cooperative. I mean, these are people who will let you cut in front of them if you signal that you want to! In fact the worst thing I can find to bitch about is how they mostly don’t use their turn signals until they’ve STOPPED to make their Goddamn turn. Other than that I can’t really complain. Which kinda annoys me.
CaseyL
No particular plans for the day, despite gorgeous weather in Seattle. (Still nursing that chest cold, ack.) Laundry, and review a presentation for tomorrow, are the only items on my agenda.
Betty, you sound like a helluva lotta fun to road trip with. I miss driving along the coast (any coast), stopping at whatever looks interesting. I need someone with me who’ll say, “Hey, that looks like fun. Let’s stop and have a look.” Otherwise I get very goal oriented and want to just keep driving.
schrodinger's cat
This spread reminds me of one of my best eating experiences in India, Joshi Club in South Bombay. Its vegetarian, all you can eat (except the dessert). Servers keep bringing piping hot food and keep serving you as the meal goes on. Its usually hot chappatis, bhakri (whole grain flat bread) two kinds of veggies, dal, condiments and rice.
schrodinger's cat
@elmo: I usually took the Metro to work when I lived there, Greenbelt to Arlington.
Ruckus
Hey! It’s raining in socal. Imagine that, with another 200-250 days like this, we’ll only be 2-3 yrs in drought deficit.
elmo
@schrodinger’s cat: In theory I could probably take the Green Line from Branch Ave to the Dulles station on the Silver, but then how to get to the office? It’s at least seven-eight miles.
Brachiator
@elmo:
Early on I worked in the circulation department of a couple of Southern California newspapers. It was often funny to hear people who had recently moved out here try to correctly pronounce the names of the streets they lived on.
Mnemosyne (tablet)
I need to do laundry today, but I hate doing laundry. Maybe if I can keep it to 2 loads I can make myself do it.
schrodinger's cat
@elmo: The office in my case was right outside the metro. I used to drive to the Metro about 2 miles away from home in Old Greenbelt and park there.
Mnemosyne (tablet)
@Brachiator:
And God help them if they thought they had finally figured it out and then had to ask a local for directions to San Pedro or Los Feliz.
Elie
I am licking my chops over that spread, there, Betty! OOOOhhh-wee!
tybee
@Brother Dingaling:
ditto. looks like a sunday dinner for guests…
i don’t see any ice tea but it was in carolina.
heathens.
gene108
Saw a an Internet poster on Facebook, by some early 20 something, about how romance is dead in 2015. And now I feel old.
In 1988, men were gentlemen. In first dates they went on one knee and gave their girl flowers. In 2015 we are hedonistic sex obsessed society. On a first date now the girl goes on her knee and gives her boy a blow job.
I am old enough to remember when we kids in the 1980’s were condemned for loose morals and now we’re the “good old days”.
scav
@gene108: What’s more, the 80s have been mythologized into something entirely beyond reality. On their knees? — not even in sitcoms.
quaker in a basement
“…ate like two-headed hogs…”
That’s going to keep me laughing all day.
Suzanne
@Brachiator: When I lived in Tucson, I worked in a picture frame store, and took orders that required that I get the customers’ addresses. Multiple people who lived on Medici Drive pronounced it “muh-DEE-see”.
As an Italian and an art major, this made me grit my teeth like nobody’s business.
OldDave
Sounds like you’re in the Deal’s Gap area (US-129 TN into NC) – that road has 318 curves in 11 miles. It’s a thing of beauty if you’re equipped with a sports car and enjoy spirited driving, but if not, I can imagine you’d think it was hell.
I can’t wait to go back.
bago
East coast “mountains”? Puhleaze.
Suzanne
@gene108: Good Lord. You would think they would be happy if they were getting blowjobs on the first date.
What is actually happening, of course, is that they are not getting blowjobs, either on dates or from their wives, and they are bitter about it.
sukabi
@quaker in a basement: It’s true, if you go back to the 1890s.
Julia Grey
The 70s were the really hedonistic, immoral days. Women’s Lib came to flower, it was before AIDS, and reefer madness was everywhere.
And of course *I* was young. It was really all ME, you know. I take full responsibility.
Brachiator
@Mnemosyne (tablet):
Very true. Fortunately, most people adapt fairly quickly.
And one of my favorite off ramps when traveling to Santa Barbara is Salsipuedes St.
On the other hand, locals also develop idiosyncratic pronunciations that become “standard,” like saying “San Peedro” for San Pedro. And don’t get me started on Rodeo Drive.
Roger Moore
@Ruckus:
Not true. It doesn’t matter how many days it rains here if it doesn’t now in the Sierras.
Brachiator
@Suzanne:
These people deserved to be poisoned. ;)
Roger Moore
BTW, isn’t there some kind of sporting event that happens on Sundays that’s deserving of its own thread?
Gator90
@Betty Cracker
I’m not sure how good the Gators are yet, but we have a competent coach and a real quarterback for the first time in years. These developments more than make up for the putrid fiasco that is the Dolphins.
OldDave
@Roger Moore:
No. SATSQ.
Brachiator
@Julia Grey:
Maybe periods of hedonism alternate with more uptight times. Refeer madness, of course, was originally associated with the 1920s or 1930s.
Or maybe some people get lucky and just fall into a pocket of fun, while other people have to suffer (or just don’t know how to party).
gene108
@Suzanne:
I think it was a girl who posted it. More along the lines of romance is dead versus not getting any.
Edit: Yes girl posted it. Romance is dead, guys are horn dogs today. Not like, when I was in high school, in 1988, and we just side hugged each other (sarcasm).
Suzanne
@gene108: Then she’s likely pissed that she’s giving blowjobs and not getting any oral lovin’ herself.
Brachiator
@Gator90:
This is why I’m glad that Los Angeles has a pretty good pro team, the USC Trojans.
Brachiator
@gene108:
When haven’t guys been horn dogs?
shell
@Brachiator: And of course all t he wink-wink-nudge-nudge sitcoms like Threes Company.
gene108
@Brachiator:
1988 apparently.
divF
@Brachiator:
San Rafael.
CaseyL
I love original names for places, and how newcomers tie their tongues in knots trying to pronounce ’em.
I come from the northeast, land of the Schuylkill River, and grew up pronouncing it “Skool kill,” which (I think) is correct. Monongahela, which is pretty straightforward, and Susquehanna, ditto.
Then I moved to the nation’s upper leftmost corner, and found a whole new lexicon of native place names. Puyallup (which at first I mangled as Pull-yall-up); Sequim (which is pronounced Skwim, not See-Quim), Suquamish, Snohomish, Duwamish… and my eternal favorite, Humptulips, which is pronounced the way it looks but doesn’t mean what it seems to mean, alas. (What a story that would be!)
Ruckus
@Roger Moore:
It wasn’t intended to be a factual statement.
Last time it rained in socal a gentleman at the store said well this will help. Told him that the total rainfall was worth maybe 30 seconds of the water we use, probably far less and that very little of it would make it’s way into the water table. We do have settling basins that help but as you are hinting at, most of the rain goes directly out to sea.
joel hanes
COLD!
Impossible. The water is still liquid.
Brachiator
@CaseyL:
“Schuylkill” is Dutch. I remember someone wanting to change a city or landmark name from FishKill or something because they did not want to have any association with “killing.” Then someone pointed out that “kill” in this case meant “creek.” A rough translation of Schuykill would be “hideout creek.”
Southern Beale
Not to be a pedant, Betty Cracker, but as a Tennessean and former copy editor I have to correct you: it’s the Great Smoky Mountains, not SmokEy.
mtraven
I need to share this:
Origuy
The California Spanish place I find funny is Vallejo. In Mexican Spanish it should be vaYAYho, but it’s locally pronounced vaLAYho. It’s named after General Mariano Vallejo, who was a Californio, but if he spoke Castillano, probably pronounced it valYAYho, with an L sound. This is disappearing in modern Castillian.
Betty Cracker
@Southern Beale: Thanks; fixed.