0415 is a disgusting and unholy time of the morning, but there I was, awake and getting dressed.\u00a0 Yep – we’re going back to Huntsville.<\/p>\n
SOBUMD and the three lunatic children dropped me off at my folks’ house Tuesday evening.\u00a0 As I’ve gotten older, the bedtime routine with my parents has evolved – I miss the bedtime stories, but the good-night Scotch is a welcome addition.\u00a0 This kids acknowledged my blandishments about behaving for SOBUMD with their usual nonchalance, left\u00a0with SOBUMD, and we shortly retired to sleep.<\/p>\n
I may\u00a0have mentioned in previous posts that my father collects penguins.\u00a0 I’m used to all the birds around the house, but I’ll confess the penguin mobile over my bed was freaking me out a little.\u00a0 The windows were open, and the little bastards were swaying, floating gently\u00a0just below the ceiling. \u00a0Penguins just shouldn’t fly, ya know?\u00a0 Of course, I’ve only myself to blame – I’m pretty sure we bought it for him.<\/p>\n
Time in the wee hours progressing in the manner of a dream, I suddenly found myself thanking FOBUMD for the stay and the ride to the airport and walking into the eerily empty, post-apocalyptic vision that is DCA before 0500.\u00a0 Neither the folks from TSA not\u00a0the ticket agents\u00a0speak, not even to each other.\u00a0\u00a0I guessed they were communicating through some godless pre-dawn telepathy, as though to break the silence would profane even further this already unholy hour of the morning.\u00a0 As I make my way to the check in desk, they all stare at me like somnambulant feral zombies, with only their eyes moving, waiting for any sign of weakness.\u00a0 I had the distinct and uncanny sense that, were I to stumble, even for a moment, they’d be on me like a pack of hungry dingos on a baby.<\/p>\n
I have no memory of checking in.\u00a0\u00a0I suppose it’s possible that I might have supressed such a memory to protect my sanity, such as it is.\u00a0 The next thing I remember was boarding a plane, finding my seat, and getting up again to make room for my cute twin blonde seatmates.<\/p>\n
Things were looking up.\u00a0 I like this dream.\u00a0 So did they, evidently – they were both asleep before we pulled away from the gate.<\/p>\n
As I reseated myself, an even more stunning brunette stopped in front of me and asked if she could move my hat.\u00a0 I took it from the overhead bin and, after watching her struggle for a moment, offered to help with getting her carry-on up into the bin.\u00a0 Mind you, when I say carry on, as far as US Airways is concerned, if it has wheels, it’s a carry on.\u00a0 This was proven by the fact that she was pulling a 1973 Ethen Allen hardwood dresser that was taller than the Reigning Queen of Pink.\u00a0 It had rolling casters on it, though, so it’s a carry on.\u00a0 For $25 per checked bag, I didn’t really blame her.<\/p>\n
My sleeping beauties made a few kind remarks about how strong I was, how polite I was, and US Airways redefining “carry on” – and drifted back to sleep.<\/p>\n
I have vague and uncomfortable memories of channelling OJ Simpson in the airport at Charlotte, NC, which is somewhere between “bigger than I expected” and “fucking enormous.”\u00a0 Mind you, when I say\u00a0I was channelling OJ Simpson, I don’t mean I was jumping over furniture and people, I mean I looked like a slow-moving white Bronco going through the interminable hallways.\u00a0 Walking out to the tarmac to board the next hop, I realized that happiness is seeing US Airways loading your luggage onto the same plane you’re boarding.\u00a0 Mind you, since my luggage is technically smaller than most Buicks (at least smaller than pre-1990’s Buicks), I could have saved myself the worry and just carried it on.<\/p>\n
We landed in Huntsville, where I was reunited with my luggage, rental cars, and that smell of Alabama air that is unlike anything else.\u00a0 It’s not just roast pig, it’s something else undefinable.\u00a0\u00a0 It was a nice day, so with the windows down I drove about until hearing from my cohort that they’d meet me for lunch.\u00a0 That right – it was time for Thomas Pit<\/a>.<\/p>\n It remains a subject of myth and legend up here in the northern climes, but it’s real, and it’s been real since 1932, when between 80% and 90% of all Huntsville voted for Franklin Delano Roosevelt and put their faith and their BBQ in the New Deal.\u00a0 Since then, it’s been pulled pig the best way, in a smokehouse behind the restaurant that may have seen a layer of paint on the outside, but the inside is just the same as it’s always been.\u00a0 You cook pigs for 80 years, you get damn good at it, is my guess.<\/p>\n But I was stymied!\u00a0 The cohorts were late getting out of their meetings, and we were all due back to work (I do, actually, work sometimes, hard though that is to believe) in short order.\u00a0 We settled for nearby and quick.\u00a0 It was Steak-n-Shake.<\/p>\n I have to admit that Steak-n-Shake does not suck.\u00a0 The problem lies in its reach – I can go to Steak-n-Shake without leaving my home state.\u00a0 (I don’t, but I could.)\u00a0 I’ll go to chains at home, but when I’m travelling, I want to eat the local fare, not homogenized Generican food you can get anywhere.\u00a0\u00a0 However, in this case as in so many others, omnivorousness was trumped by expedience, and we retired back to the work.<\/p>\n Dinner turned out to be a return to the Ol\u2019 Heidelberg<\/a>, which lives up to its name by hanging multiple pictures of the bridge over the Rhine showing the ruins of the old Heidelberg castle in the background.\u00a0 The surest sign that you’re not really in Germany is the wait, though – people don’t actually wait, usually, for dinner in Germany; if the place is full, you go down the street a block to a place that isn’t.\u00a0 In this case, we waited for 20 minutes outside in the fading nice day, until we realized that we could get beer and then bring it back outside to keep waiting, but with beer.\u00a0 Elements of my cohort were keen on a repeat of the last trip to the Ol’ Heidelberg, which involved Spaten Optimator.\u00a0 My cohort whispered, \u201cOptimator!\u201d \u00a0I looked at her and said, \u201cOptimator!\u201d\u00a0 But again, we were stymied!\u00a0 They had Spaten, to be sure, and they had a few other varients, but not the Optimator.<\/p>\n What’s that you say?\u00a0 A\u00a0locally brewed Porter, you say, on draft?\u00a0 You can recommend it since I liked the Optimator?\u00a0 Hmmm.\u00a0 Well, what’s it called?<\/p>\n “Big Bear.”\u00a0 How could we go wrong with a local brew called Big Bear?\u00a0 And so, we had us some Bears.<\/p>\n