Tonight's entry comes to you from just west of Nashville, Tennessee, where our rider group has come together for the first time. Three of us loaded up four bikes late this morning and headed down US-41 (I am a sucker for U.S. Routes rather than interstates; it's the Real America and all that), and Matt flew in from Bend, Oregon, via Seattle, starting at 6:09 this morning. After packing 9000 things into our support van, I struggle to understand how people ride with just what they can carry. Every inch of space is taken, and then some.
It rained like hell for parts of the drive, but all of us arrived without incident. That's a good start. Our family tradition is to start a long road trip with Willie Nelson's "On the Road Again;" it was a fine way to roll out.
Packing yesterday was an exercise in the ridiculous: it was seemingly infinite stops and starts, with pieces scattered everywhere. I would remember stuff, and then forget it, and then remember it again as the day moved on. At 9:00 p.m., when I was contemplating bedtime, I realized that I needed to do a load of laundry or I'd be well short on socks and bike shorts. Sitcoms use the "dopey, bumbling husband and in-control wife" trope to the point that it is nauseating, but doing my own packing for a long trip made me realize just how good Brigid is at this stuff and how much I rely on her. (Thank you, dear.) Running around like an idiot all day also made both of us impatient and crabby; I suspect that a week away will be some welcome quiet for her. And fairly so.
On our ride down here, we covered a number of critically important topics: is Danville, Illinois somehow connected to the pretzel industry? (no, it seems not), where does I-74 begin? (Davenport, Iowa), how old was James K. Polk when he died? (53, only 3 months after he left office), and stuff even more mundane and idiotic than that if you can believe it.
Also on the way down, I tried to convince Brandon and Mike that Matt (who they have never met before tonight) was a hardcore Donald Trump guy, and believed that Mr. Trump was actually a genius who was just acting so ridiculous and petulant so that he could get elected, after which point he'd show his true self and be an excellent and principled president. I am pretty sure I had them convinced, but then as soon as Matt met them he gave all of my hard work away. I think partly he couldn't keep a straight face and partly he didn't want to even pretend that was the case.
Tomorrow morning we hit the road for Natchez, which will mark the starting point of the ride. Our best deal for hotels was at a place with an attached casino, so if one of us gets hot at the craps table maybe the ride will be over before it even starts.
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