2nd and 3rd Levels

The 2nd level, of Dante's Hell that is, would be not just entering the South, but having to stay there for a few days. The levels become progressively worse and involve having conversations, staying longer, and purchasing property. So for the purpose of this blog ... I traversed the 2nd and 3rd levels of hell.

When you left me last time I was leaving, NAY FLEEING, the state line of West Virginia. We continued to drive through North and South Carolina until reaching our destination; Savannah, GA.

**A side note. Although we did not stop in Charlotte but just drove through it, it seemed to be a reasonably sweet city and the only place I saw that I would live. The rest of the South was undeniably READ THAT ANDREW UNDEFREAKINGNIABLY terrible.**

So it was the Fourth of July weekend and hotels were a tad scarce. We also are shackled by my parent's darn dog, Toby. So we have to find pet friendly hotels, which is great for the guy allergic to dogs and cats. I can handle my parents dog as he has hair, so he doesn't shed, as opposed to fur. But I assure you the majority of the muts at this hotel were not hair dogs. My allergies are going crazy. So we got to our hotel room, and as is the unwritten law about hotels, it's hot in the room. No one wants to leave the air on because it's wasteful. I can understand that. No one wants to blatantly raise electricity bills and hurt the environment (except me). But this hotel ... the hotel of the south ... has gone too far. Allow me to elaborate.

I'm sure some of you have seen hotels that have placards telling you they will only wash towels left on the floor to conserve water. So if you will reuse your towel, hang it up, and Mother Earth thanks you. Some ask you to turn the water off when brushing your teeth and help save a stinking whale or something. It's irritating, but no big deal. Allow me to say that I usually leave the water running and throw clean towels on the floor to make them wash them. I hate stupid stuff like that. So I take the extreme and I'm wasteful. Where as before I would have been responsible and polite.

There are also other hotels that when you enter, you have to leave your hotel key in the wall for the lights to be on or the air to be on. This is annoying, but easily averted by, oh I don't know, ASKING FOR A SECOND FREAKING KEY AT THE DESK. How hard is that? The concept started in Europe so it's undoubtedly socialist, but has since made its way here to the States and I abhor it. As aforementioned, I always get an extra key, leave it in slot, leave the lights on and the air conditioning on high when I'm gone. Yes I'm a turd.

Allow me to say that I'm a bit of a harsh user of the environment. Everything grows back. There's always more water. Nothing is being destroyed. Please. I hate recycling. You all know that. Also, and let me put this bluntly ...

I would drill right through a reindeer's head for a gallon of oil. I'm sick of people telling me that drilling in Alaska is bad. Please.

So this hotel we stay at has a new, and even worse form of protecting the environment and conserving energy. It's called The Energy Eye. I had never seen one before this trip and it's terrible. It's kind of like a motion detector that comes with your house's security system. It detects motion in the room and people so that when you're in the room the air kicks on higher and colder. But when your gone there is NO WAY for you to make the air cooler so when you return from the 110 degree day in the sun, that your room is refreshing like your home would be.

So here we are, at a pet friendly hotel, my allergies are bad, it's 110 out, and we can't make it cooler. Not to mention that my pillow had blood on it. I'm sure that was to save the environment too. They probably killed the last heavy user of water and buried him in the earth to grow a tree. We can't get the air cold, and the eye doesn't seem to work well. It barely senses movement, so when you're in the room, if you don't move in your sleep it will cut out and back on. I can't stand it.

I went ape on The Energy Eye. I broke it off it's stupid post and threw it against the wall. I then placed it on the table right next to us so it sensed every motion possible. What you have to do, after breaking it off, is put it next to a fan or something tht blows a shirt in front of it. Then you too my friends, can be a harsh user of the environment again.

So that's it for now. I was going to blog more, but this one got a trifle long and out of hand. Next time stay tuned for our interaction at the Dairy Queen where they took 20 minutes to get us ice cream, barely spoke english, and didn't have chocolate.

THE SOUTH WILL RISE AGAIN! If it takes them 20 minutes to get a freaking blizzard, I'm banking on some 200 years before they think of rising again actually. I think we're safe Yanks!

1st Level

Man I need to post an alarm clock that tells me when to blog or something. It seems like just yesterday that I blogged when in reality it was like 2 weeks ago. Hmmm ... has to be an easy way to remedy that.

So back to the subject at hand. My parents have long talked about moving somewhere where it's not always winter and never Christmas (name that reference you smart kiddies) so they started looking at more "fortunate" climates. After several trips and journeys to the south, they decided that Savannah, GA was where they would make new root. So after a life in Western Pennsylvania, and some hard years no less along the trash filled Monongohela river, they moved to sunny climates, multiple golf courses, and easy access to water that's not polluted.

My parents being the strong supporters of capitalism that they are, have accumulated a fair amount of goods and junk during their years on God's green earth though and needed some help and extra muscle, mostly the former, in moving their worldly possessions down to Savannah. Solution: Keith generously offers to take his summer vacation to move Mom and Dad down there and help unpack their stuff on the other end. In return a get two rounds of golf and food for the week. Sounds like a plan to me?

So we leave Pittsburgh. Yep, you guessed correctly, the sky was gray, but oddly enough you couldn't see a single cloud in the sky. That's the way it always is. It's like a curse from God for something we did years ago I'm sure. But I get to drive my Dad's Jaguar down with XM radio. It's pretty slamming. I'm cruising listening to anything from the Goo Goo Dolls, Pussy Cat Dolls, to Classical Music ... ok no pussy cat dolls since I hate them. They're awful. I can't even come up with something witty to say I hate them so much.

Anyway, we stop for dinner in West Virginia. No, we didn't eat road kill, we stopped at a gas station where I got a piece of Pizza that had been there since roughly the Jurrassic period. It was rather unfortunate since we saw an oasis of Burger Kings roughly 5 minutes later. But I did decide to eat a piece of food that has descended from God's hand to us here on earth. I wholeheartedly believe God gave us this food in order to make us a more happy people ...

None other than ...

The Fruit Pie.

Those things are so slamming. Sure there is approximately 75,000 calories in one and I think maybe 164,000 grams of fat, but who cares. Once you bite through the hard and frosted coated crust and get to the fake fruit filling, all is well with the world. The Apple Fruit Pie might make me smile more than like 99% of all other things in life. Other contenders being like the Steelers winning the Super Bowl.

Now if we could have had the Steelers serve me a fruit pie after winning ... hmmmmm ...

The trip went downhill after this moment though. Well, that's not entirely true. We did get out of West Virginia without contracting anything as serious as say, I don't know: The Bird Flu, SARS, 1 tooth, or a sister for a wife. So I'd say that was a positive. But as we continued further south to the Mason Dixon line, things only continued to get worse. Next time allow me to marvel you with stories of:

1.) Our Hotel!!!!!!!! Dirty, hot, and concious of saving the environment! Damn Liberals!

2.) My 20 minute trip to Dairy Queen!!!!!!!!!!!! Still no chocolate ice cream!

3.) Our trip to IHOP!!!!!!!!!!!! Nothing like slow service when you're waiting for breakfast food!

The North reigns supreme!!!!!!!! Just like Jefferson Starship! We Built This City on Rock and Roll Guys!!!!