boston to c'ville: 2001.04.20 - 2001.04.22
cindy, ken, lauren and i just got back from our exodus to dmb [ charlottesville, va ]. i've never had so much fun whilst being immersed in such consistent confusion. i shall elaborate:
friday
we catch the 20:45 train from boston to dc, complete with first-class sleeper cars [ props to ken on that ]. food and all is included with the fare, so eat we do. dinner, rum & coke to wash it down, and breakfast in the morning. i seem to have consumed more rum than coke, mostly thanks to lauren consistently [ and discreetly ] emptying some of her glass into mine, complemented with ken's refilling expertise. to bed we go.
saturday
the crazy train conductor freaks us out the entire night. i go to the bathroom around 2:30 am, she peeks from her little seat thing, as if she's spying on me. louis says 'grrr' to such peepiness. we eat around 5:55, as the train arrives in dc around 6:15. collecting our stuff and what not, we [ again ] admire the coolness of the sleeping car before exiting the train. none of our minds are functioning very properly, as 'tis early and none of us slept for long the night before. [ the whole moving train notion makes sleeping quite a chore. ] after several minutes' discussion betwixt us, we decide to investigate the dc scene, and leave union station, trekking towards the mall. it's really quiet, as not too many people are around the capitol at 6:30ish on a saturday morning. we are too busy enjoying the flowering trees to notice the lack of tourists. within several minutes, we make our way to the head of the mall, and start meandering around. when we get about halfway between the washington monument and the lincoln memorial, we encounter a squirrel. this is no ordinary squirrel. this one quickly draws our attention, as he is walking with us for several moments. once he sees that has our undivided attention, he proceeds to demonstrate his uncanny ability to stand up straight. i kneel down to get a better photo. he walks up to me. he reaches up and grabs my pants. he begins to climb onto me. i jump up, thinking 'rabies, rabies, rabies. icky, icky, icky.' i remember that i have almonds from tlhs. so, i toss a couple on the ground for him, to reimburse him for his demonstrated talent, if you will. he was quick to pick it up. not just one: two. it's ok, i put about ten out for it. after a couple moments more amusement with the congregation of critters that had formed, we wander over to the lincoln memorial. chill there for a bit. stopping by the vietnam memorial [ gulp ], we make our way to a cab stop, and quickly catch one to union station. we go to the amtrak desk, looking up how we can get down to c'ville. there's a bus that goes that afternoon. great. all trains and buses to c'ville today are sold out. fcuk. the lady at the desk asks me if that's a new word i've learned [ 'fcuk' ]. i say sorry, when what i really mean to say is 'hey lady, you want me to show you a couple other words i just learned?' she suggests we look into renting a car. we do as such. we first go to budget rent-a-car. conveniently, they've actually run out of cars. a good feature for a car renting company? so we go to national rent-a-car. wait in line for ten minutes. talk to them and give them our information. 'sorry, we can't rent cars to someone under the age of twenty-one.' i ask about exceptions for those running under the auspices of a corporation. 'sorry. you're not in our database.' we go back to the amtrak desk. we find out that there's a bus station right down the street, and that the lady before was only telling us about the buses amtrak has a co-share in. we leave for there. we get lost. we turn around. we find it. we go in. we buy tickets to richmond, where we can meet our friend jon [ of u. richmond ]. cindy and lauren cut in line. we get crap about doing as such. we ignore it. we wait. we wait. we wait. we get on the bus. it's running 30 minutes late. it leaves. it arrives 30 minutes early. i question greyhound's scheduling system. we call up jon. he picks us up. he was going to rent us a car, but he suggests borrowing his, so as to avoid numerous legal issues that might arise were something to go wrong on the road. he offers his for our use. we say 'that'd be awesome.' we check out u. richmond. we drive to c'ville. on the way, we decide to call up the hotel to get directions, so that we can all shower, change and what not. looking @ the reservations, i realize that we'd made reservations for the Omni in charlotte, nc and not charlottesville, va. i call up the friendly folks @ omni and work through the business of changing reservations from charlotte to richmond, as it turns out that the omni in c'ville has no free rooms. that set, we all realize that we don't have time to shower. we deal. we get lost going to the stadium, but manage to make it there around 18:15 or so. we miss soulive. we get inside the stadium between the sets of soulive and neil young & crazy horse. neil young & crazy horse plays. dmb plays. upon exiting the stadium, cindy and i end up on the uva campus. the wrong way. we explore for a while more whilst searching for the parking lot in which the car resides.
sunday
we find it, approximately an hour after the end of the show. ken and lauren are there waiting. we sit in traffic for a bit, and then head down to richmond. we fill up with gas and ken [ driving ] fills up with mt dew. we get lost searching for our hotel. we arrive @ the hotel at 2:30. we get two rooms. request a wake-up call for each room @ 7:00. request that both bills be placed under my door and that i be able to do express check-out for both rooms from my room. we find our rooms. cindy showers. i set up room service for the next morning, to save time. i set the alarm for 6:35 so that i can shower for a while longer in the morning. we sleep. cindy and i wake up at 7:08 to the sound of "room service!" i get up, spend a minute opening the door, grab the food and sign off for the expense. i curse about the lack of wake-up call and the fact that the alarm clock didn't work. i quickly take a shower and stuff some food into my face. we throw our stuff together and head to the car. ken and lauren get directions to the u. richmond stadium, learning that it's right on campus. we drive there, discovering it to be nowhere near campus. we call jon, who tries as hard as he can to direct us to the university. we get lost. we need to catch the 8:15 bus from the bus station. we call up jon, and ask him if it's cool if we leave his car at the bus station. he and ken work out a place to hide the keys to the car. i wait in line to buy bus tickets. it's 8:13 when i finally get up to the guy selling them. i ask for four tickets, which he is hesitant to sell me. i tell him that we need to be on that bus. he sells me four tickets. we wait. we see the bus leave. we realize that they're going to run another bus, so we get on that. we arrive in dc around 11:40, fifty minutes late. our train leaves at 12:05, so we decide to grab some eats quickly and head for the train. we get food. we get to the gate, which is packed. we walk down to the end of the train when they open the gate. we get two sets of seats side-by-side. we eat. we talk. we rest. the train arrives at springfield, where ken departs, one and a half hours late. fortunately, he's still able to catch a bus to amherst. it takes another hour or so to get to boston. we arrive two hours late. lauren's parents are there to meet her, and cindy and i head home via the t.