Kelly talked me into it. (You know, Kelly, the one in the Brave's hat.) Kelly is convinced that I suffer from self-imposed social impairment. (No, I have classes most weekends and 2 little girls. Anyway...)
His mission, from all the way in Atlanta, is to get me out of the house. He once talked me into calling up a guy here in L-town that I only know in passing to ask him to go to a play after my "date" cancelled on me. (That was a bust, I was embarrassed, but Kelly called it progress.)
He started on me as soon as he found out the girls were going to Myrtle Beach with G & V this week. I told him "no" a dozen times...
Me: Kelly, it's a five hour drive!
Other Kelly: I know you've spent 5 hours or more driving in one day when we worked for NFIB!
If I did come, I could only stay one day.
Yeah, but when are you going to have another chance? One day is better than no day.
It's impractical.
If you keep waiting for practical you'll never go anywhere!
What will your girlfriend think?
She won't care!
I can't afford it.
Don't worry about that, I got it.
I need a pedicure.
We'll do that first thing!
We?
Yeah, I'll get one too, it'll be fun.
On that last one, I figured he REALLY wanted me to visit... but I was still saying no.
Then Friday night/Saturday morning his girlfriend broke up with him. I figured I might as well go. If I didn't, I'd still be spending most of Sunday and Monday on the phone listening to him rehashing the whole relationship and break-up. I wouldn't get anything practical done around here, anyway.
Listening when he needs me to, what I do. That's my contribution to the friendship. Since this blog will tell you what a great friend he is, I figured I'd take this opportunity to throw that in to defend myself. I really do try to pull my weight, friendship-wise. I might even be worth all the nice stuff he did for me.
I set out Sunday morning with idea that this trip would be great to blog about. I was going to make one of those really cute blog-travel-stories I've seen in other people's blogs, complete with pictures. The following is my attempt at that... Sort of.
Kermit and the Trip Down
Since this would be Kermit's first long trip, I figured it would be a good time to check out how many miles per gallon he'd really get. I kept going after I probably should have already pulled over for gas. I was trying to get the "trip" odometer to an even 300 miles.
I kept thinking, "Boy that gauge says the gas is really low, I wonder why the light hasn't come on..."
 |
| If you'll notice, the little gas thingy over on the gas gauge is not lit. Turns out, it does not light. Now, if you'll look to the left, you'll see that the gas thingy in the RPM gauge WAS lit... for who knows how long? |
Kermit got right at 20 mpg on this trip... less than I had hoped, but better than Daisy would have, so I'm not complaining. Daisy would have keeled over right outside LaFayette. I suppose it would have made getting a picture of the sign easier. The picture below is one of about 5 attempts.
 |
| I wanted to get a picture of the LaFayette sign for Daddy, mostly cause they messed up and didn't spell his name right. |
Right about here (see below) is where I started realizing how little I get out these days. In college I used to go visit Chelle in Columbus, on roads arguably at least as confusing as Atlanta, and I didn't worry. Why is it that, as we age, we lose that sense of invincibility? I accidentally drove past my exit and nearly had a nervous breakdown...
 |
| This is I-75 coming into Atlanta. No, I did not properly frame the picture. I was too tense from driving in 6 lanes of traffic. |
I arrived in Atlanta between 1 and 2 pm. Kelly had me meet him at Cumberland Mall. I was nervous and intimidated, by the whole thing, though I'm not sure why. I hadn't seen him face to face in a while, but this is Kelly: I talk to him almost every day. So yeah, maybe he's right, I really need to get out more.
New Food
He took me to PF Chang's for lunch, since I had never been there. It seemed pretty fancy for lunch to me, but as I was sitting there (feeling a bit like a bumpkin) I realized that several years ago I wouldn't have been even a little uncomfortable. We told our waitress how I was visiting from out of town, blah blah blah. He ordered seared Ahi tuna (read: almost-but-not-quite raw) so I could try it. (Delicious.) The waitress even sensed how out-of-place I felt.
She commented, "That's really sweet."
"What is?"
"He's taking care of you."
Which is the kind of friend Kelly is.
And so the stage was set for Kelly's (Braves-hat Kelly's) plans for my visit: an exercise in taking this Kelly (that would be me) out of her comfort zone but keeping just enough of the familiar that she'll go along with it. From there we went to the mall nail salon, and true to his word, Kelly got a pedicure, too.
In counseling, we'd say he was "modeling a behavior" for me: Willingness to Try New Things.
Having my feet massaged did help me relax, and watching his (pedicurist?) made me laugh. Every time Kelly said something about how good his chair felt, the little Asian lady who was working on his feet looked at me and made a funny face. She cracked me up.
From there, Kelly led me through Atlanta to drop my things off at his place (actually in Decatur, he just moved there last week), have a beer and head right back out.
 |
| I was actually trying to get a shot of the really cool building but before I could zoom in the light turned green. That's Kelly's truck turning ahead of me. |
New Beverages
We went to Twain's Billiards and Tap. (Could a pub's name possibly sound more like a place I'd love? I think not.) In keeping with the outside-but-inside-my-comfort-zone theme, my new thing to try was crafted ales, but surrounded by the familiarity of pool tables.
This was brilliance on Kelly's part. Let me get my stick in my hand, shoot a couple games, get "into stroke" and I'm comfortable no matter where I am. He picked Mad Happy Pale Ale for me and after I'd had a couple I was completely relaxed and my game was ON. I ran over Kelly like a Mack Truck. (No shame to Kelly there, he doesn't play, and I don't think he much cared. He's awesome like that).
He finally asked the guy practicing on the table next to us if he wanted to play me. An older fella practicing all alone, Kelly and I figured he'd beat me, but I ran over him too. Maybe he was letting me win... those beers had a little bit higher alcohol content and I had three or four so I wouldn't have noticed... but Wendy, if you're reading, tell Richie I shot like God on the pool table. He'll know. Even if I had lost, as "in stroke" as my game felt, it would still have been a win. When we left any nervousness I had felt was gone.
New Goofiness
From there we went back to Kelly's to get blankets and went right back out. First we stopped for snacks, then headed here:
This is the one major park where my family camped several different times as I was growing up, and in keeping with the theme, something familiar, even if I hadn't been there in 25 years. Stone Mountain is the largest piece of granite in the world, and features a huge carving on the side of figures from the confederacy side of the Civil War. At night, they project a huge laser show onto and over the carving. (I'm sure there are samples of it on youtube.) Lots more interesting information about Stone Mountain, especially the history, here.
 |
| To give you some perspective, I've seen a photo of a man sitting in Robert E. Lee's ear. |
People bring blankets and chairs and wait on a grassy hill in front of the mountain for the show to start. There is constantly music blaring from the speakers up until, during, and even for a bit after, the light show.
 |
| Down at the bottom of the hill there are always lots of kids playing and dancing. The girls in the picture are doing some kind of dance to "All the Single Ladies." |
AGAIN, Kelly made me step out of my comfort zone. Somewhere, in some camera belonging to someone I don't know, theres a picture of the two Kellys doing "The Chicken Dance." If I hadn't gotten up with him he would have been standing there beside me, Chicken-dancing all alone, and somehow that would have been worse.
 |
| I still haven't mastered the art of taking a picture of myself with someone else in the picture. If you look between us you can get something of an idea of the number of people spread out all over this hill. Plus I had to post this picture because Kelly looks almost maniacal in it. Serves him right for making me do the Chicken Dance. |
If going to the laser show had been the only thing we did, the whole trip would still have been worth the drive. The finale featured a huge fireworks display and I knew I was sitting there, mouth agape, fascinated with the whole thing and looking like a big goober... but by this time I didn't care. After the fireworks, we just sat there on the blanket and let everyone else clear out. It's amazing the simple joy of just sitting outside on a warm night with a great friend to chat with.
More New Food And Beverage
BUT wait! There's more! (And at this point I'm thinking "Whaaaa? You know I turn into a pumpkin at midnight, right?")
From there we headed to a little strip of pubs right across from the courthouse in Decatur. For those of you who remember the hey-day of First Street in Richmond, it was extremely similar, right down to the parking strip in the middle between the courthouse and the pubs. The big differences were that the bars were a little nicer, and there was outdoor seating in front of all of them. First we went to The Brick Store pub, where Kelly decided I needed to try a little "hoppier" beer. Since I really enjoyed the one from Twain's I tried another pale ale, Belgian this time. I liked this one, but it didn't make me nearly as "hoppy" as the one at Twain's. I thought the one Kelly picked for himself was Yuck-o, but we don't develop new tastes all in one day, so I'm told. We nursed those beers pretty slowly.
When we finished, I was starving, so we walked over to Zucca Bar and Pizzeria (second from the left in the picture in the link) and ordered a couple slices to-go. Since the order took a long time, we sat listening to reggae, people-watching and making predictions/guesses about the relationships of the people around us. On beyond the front bar there were booths on either side of the room, and some girls got up and started dancing in the middle. I should have known better than to point this out to Kelly... we had to go join them.
I really needed all the stuff Kelly got me to do to get a little more outside myself. I've become stodgy. Way back, getting up and dancing to reggae in a bar with no dance floor would have been MY idea.
We finally arrived back at his place to eat our pizza (Which was the bomb-diggity pizza, just sayin'.) at around 2. Of course, new apartment, the only thing he had to drink with the pizza was beer. I re-read this and we sound like The Kelly & Kelly Lush's Show, so let me say we never actually reached "drunk" at any time during the day. However, the combination of "I'm never up this late and I almost never get a chance to drink beer" got the better of me and I crashed on the futon, probably mid-sentence.
So that was my day, Sunday. It was almost surreal. When the girls aren't home I spend the bulk of the time by myself. I get so caught up in the things I NEED to do, "fun" (unless it was something for the girls) wasn't something I would plan for. "Fun" has been something that happened almost by accident on the way through the responsibilities of life.
Of all the new things Kelly made me try, to me the most fascinating was simply having "fun" be the goal all day long:
"Wow, that was cool, what's the NEXT fun thing we can go do?"
Adventures in Bathing
Kelly had an errand to run Monday morning, so I woke up hearing the water in the shower turning on, off again, on again, off again, on again. Huh?
Did I mention Kelly just moved to this place? Or that the gas hasn't been turned on yet, so there's no hot water? I figured out why I'd been hearing the on again, off again... Get hair wet, turn the water off. Shampoo. Rinse. Turn the water off again. Soap up. Rinse. I was really glad he was out running errands when I got in the shower... being able to howl loudly almost made the cold bearable.
With that title, you were thinking that paragraph was going to be about something else, weren't you? Tsk tsk tsk. Aren't you ashamed of yourself!
Heading Home
He got back, we headed out for coffee and breakfast/lunch, then just hung out at his house for a while longer before I got on the road. Busy running around was great, but so was sitting around talking. I bet I thanked him a million times. I hope he knows how grateful I am, not just for the day, but to have friend like him to orchestrate such a day for me. (If he doesn't he can read it here, huh?) I finally headed out around 2:30.
 |
| Tried one more time to get a picture of the really cool building. I still don't know what it was. |
 |
| Leaving Atlanta |
The trip back was long and uneventful and I spent a lot of it wishing I had taken more pictures.
 |
| But I did finally get a picture of a LaFayette sign! |
 |
| The Welcome Home sign though? Not so much. |
Whew!
No comments:
Post a Comment