StuffI'mMovingFromMyMySpaceBlogBeforeIShutItDown: August 14, 2007 entry

We observe our heroine browsing through her old MySpace blog, checking it over for important tidbits she might not want to be lost when MySpace goes the way of Hammer pants, Dorothy Hamil haircuts, and The Macarena. Miraculously, she spots a blog entry of such high quality that she simply can't make that double-layer click-through then CATCHPA entry to finally see the entry deleted from 2007's favorite website.

Peering over our heroine's shoulder, we read...
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August 14, 2007

On the road again

Today I drove from Charleston to Union, West Virginia and then on to Roanoke, Virginia in an attempt to find a man that my firm wants to give tens of thousands of dollars. Actually, we're not giving it to him, more like holding it for him. He was a class member in a big class action involving mortgages and the case settled. He's my last missing class member and it is absolutely required that we find him. But he's a hard man to find.

Nonetheless, I don't mind a road trip too much. A four-hour drive is totally do-able. Sometimes I amuse myself with my observations and stream of consciousness. Here is some of what I thought about and saw in my four hours of driving today:

I am unable to hear the song Three Times a Lady without singing the chorus, out loud, as: "Unce...tice...fee tiiimmes a maadaayy." What can I say? As a child, The Little Rascals and Saturday Night Live were two of my favorite shows!


On the way through Lewisburg, I saw signs that said, "fair parking," and "no fair parking." I can't imagine that the "no fair parking" gets much business. Honesty in advertising is great but maybe they should just get out of the business.

Do you notice that, with every really good song that comes on the radio, or from your CD, or iPod or whatever, you turn up the radio? When the volume finally reaches its limits, it's a real downer. Then you're just stuck and your hearing is, of course, depleted and permanently damaged, so now you can barely hear your favorite song!!!!

When I get to a spot with bad radio reception, I either hook up the iPod or search for a CD. Today, I found a CD. It was a CD of love songs that someone had made me when he was overseas with the military. (Aawwww.) That reminds me of another time in the van...I found an unlabeled CD. I put it in and the first song was something really cool like Al Green or something. After that, Kung Foo Fighting. (Also cool, but odd.) After that, another really cool song. After that, the MoviePhone bit from Seinfeld (audio only...duh):

It was like a hilarious mystery!! The pattern went on like that for the whole CD...one great song, then something funny. I still don't know where it came from. Eric probably made it and then just forgot.

And perhaps the three sexiest songs in the entire universe are Crazy for You (Madonna), I'm on Fire (Bruce Springsteen), and Every Breath You Take (The Police). I mean, they're ssseexxxxy. Oh, yeah.... Excuse me for a second.



Ok. I'm back.

I have never driven down I-64 across Sandstone Mountain when it did not smell strongly of burning brakes. That stretch of road must be absolute hell on the truck drivers.

To the lady in the red Corolla: that white pick up truck with a yellow, flashing light in the middle of the grassy median is not, as you fear, a police officer in the wrong kind of vehicle and with the wrong color flashing lights. It is, in fact, a Division of Highways vehicle. There is absolutely no need to slam on your brakes. This causes me to slam on my brakes and annoys me greatly as you'd been playing the "I'm not going to use my cruise control" game with me for about 20 miles. Moreover, there is really, really, really no need to slow your speed down to 55 on the Interstate..cop or no cop. The speed limit is 70.

Somewhere just over the West Virginia border (in Virginia), I saw a tree with maybe 100 coffee cups nailed to it. They were all over the half of the tree that faces the road and went all the way to maybe 15 feet up the trunk. How cool! I wonder if it was Outsider Art or if someone hung their coffee cup on a spare nail one day (so they could carry a package from the mailbox, or a stray goat or something) and just thought it looked damned cool.

I saw this sign when entering the Interstate in Virginia:



I wonder what it means. I bet they don't like The Fonz.

If I ever accidentally leave my cell phone on after talking to someone and while I'm driving on a road trip, they'll be treated to a non-stop Karaoke-like, bad-singing fest like they've never heard before. In fact, if this ever happens when you and I are talking, you'd best just go ahead and try to disconnect the call. My singing voice could seriously break your phone otherwise.

And whatever happened to Eminem? I haven't heard anything new from him since before he remarried Kim and then sort of lost it.

When I got to the Monroe County Courthouse, I walked in and asked the first person I saw in the clerk's office if they knew the guy I was trying to find. They did (they always do in small towns) but they hadn't seen him for years. They gave me his daughter's phone number, though. This reminds me of walking into the Lawrence County, Ohio courthouse looking to find the birthmother of a client. (I had already found her name...now I just needed to find her.) The first woman knew her and sort of knew where she lived. The second guy drew me a freaking map to her house!!! (Here's a nice tidbit: when I drove out to her house and talked to her, she was, of course, wary of me. She asked what her supposed son's name was and I told her, "Brian." Her face softened. She knew that was right. Her voice was very sad when she said, quite simply, "I never wanted to give him up...but my parents made me." She went on to explain that she had been so distraught and inconsolable that the social worker had broken the rules and told her her son's adoptive name.)

When you drive through very, very rural areas...like where cars don't come along but maybe once a minute on the road...and when you do pass someone coming the other direction, the proper and accepted etiquette is to raise your four fingers (on the hand nearest the window) in a sort of modified wave. Everyone does it and I love it!! Okay, this may only apply to West Virginia. I've noticed it now in Monroe County and Pocahontas County.

That is all.