fbhjr

The trip south really started Wednesday. That was the day we picked up the
rental car, and

morgan_lafaye came
over to make sandwiches for the trip.

Thursday morning they and my wife left about 10 in my wife’s Subaru. I
worked half a day as apparently no one could oversee sweeping the floor for
Friday’s tour except me, then I headed home to get my car going.

palusbuteo met me at my place. I hadn’t planned to bring the
fez with me, but apparently it wanted to go…

It was still very clearly winter at home when we set out.

We got on the road just after 1PM, at the same time my wife was crossing
the Hudson river just north of New York City.

We picked up Jose. Jose has a reputation for being late, forgetting all
his things or not being ready when you come to get him.
Thursday afternoon he was ready when we got there and had all his things
ready to go.
But, he had accidently walked off with his wife’s cellphone. So, we had to
spend 20 minutes driving to where she worked to give it back.
But, then it was off to get John.

John lives near where we had our own faire in 2011, where we are doing a
show this spring and where my wife and I are having our anniversary party.

When we got to John’s place we did find that “pack light” means different
things to different people. For Jose and John it appears to mean “just one
suitcase, but it can be huge.”

But, we got it all in and set off again.

We got to the area of New York City just about 4:15 in the afternoon.

I won’t lie. I had the fear of the traffic in my heart.
But, Jose said “go for it!”
So, we drove straight into the city and out the other side.
I have NEVER seen so little traffic in NYC.
We got through the whole city, out the other side and past the beltway in
New Jersey before 5.
Jose more than redeemed the 20 minutes for his wife cellphone as I had
expected to spend 2 hours for what took us 45 minutes.
Maybe it was the lucky fez…

So, instead of being stuck in NYC traffic, we got to watch the sun set over
New Jersey as we sped along.

Where we went we found signs that car one had been there ahead of us.

Over the 1300 miles there are several spots we call “the nothing” where
there isn’t a whole lot on either side of the road.
Often there are other cars out there with you.

But, not always.

The signs of car 1 remained at our rest stops.

By the time the sun came back up, we were in the south.

Just as we crossed into Alabama we got a call from my wife. One of the
others in her car had been taking a turn at driving and she had gone to
sleep. When she woke up they were pulled off in a rest area and the other
two were also asleep. She had no idea where they were or how long they had
been pulled over.
I was able to track her iPhone and found out they were less than an hour in
front of us.
They took off again, but just as we got to the Florida border, we caught up
with them.

Soon, we were all at the faire site together.

The unloading and set up of the tent goes much better when there are a lot
of people.

We couldn’t find the faire organizer, but we found his assistant. She’s
the one who really knows what’s going on anyhow.

After we got everything set up, it was still before noon on Friday. So, we
went off to the local Waffle House for a good breakfast and googlie eyes.

Some folks go to extremes to show googlie eyes.

I went off to the Pensacola airport to get Tom who was flying in.

His plane was an hour late. While I waited for him there was a man walking
up and down in front of the airport while talking on his cellphone. For
almost that whole time he said nothing but “that’s bullshit” into his phone
at varying volumes. Then, he went into the airport and went away.