Are We There Yet?

so we got finished our cruise :-( and i felt like things were just starting to get going. we met some really good friends and finished up a little browner than before. but alas, it is time to move on. so after a painful wait to disembark and go through customs we finally were back in orlando waiting for our driver to pick us up. linda (our first driver) finally showed up in a nice black luxury towncar and drove us back to the airport. traveling in style is a luxury that i hope to get used to in the future. the plush leather seats lullued manny and alvin to sleep. again, i had trouble falling asleep.

i figured getting our rental car would be pretty easy, but there is always something, isn't there? apparently, you have to have your "triple A" card on your person in order to get the original rate that you ordered. "because you get so many special priviledges with your AAA card." a slight hassle, but we got in our new car and started driving.

and then you know what happens? a few hours outside of orlando our car informs us that we only have 5% the life of our oil left and that we'd need an oil change. now, i figured we have a dilemma. do we drive all the way in this is really nice car with leather seats, a 6 CD changer, and heated seats all the way to boston. or do we try to try to fix it when we get to dc. a 14 hr drive is plenty of time to think about this, so i turned back to listening to the radio (listen to the volume rise with the rpm's).

you know...you can squezze quite a few states into california. the number of states we drove through was daunting. i found out that there are no reputable hip hop music stations in south carolina and that after numerous billboards saying "topless topless" that the "risque cafe" is in north carolina and doesn't look like it would offer the gradeur that 4 states of signs said it would.



lastly, we also found out that on the east coast a thunderstorm actually amounts to a torrential rainfall, not that spittle that we get in sacramento. there's nothing like a car of californians driving in near zero visability conditions trying to figure out how to turn on the fog lights and stay on the road at the same time. just a note for those driving in storms later, those white lines on the side of the road really do keep you from driving yourself into a ditch (props to manny for braving the madness)

we finally arrived in dc and was greeted by our hostess, jen and her boyfriend. now, jen and i are always missing each other. whenever she's in sac, i'm at home with my family. and now that i come to dc, what happens? she flies to california (she just finished her last law school final for the semester). so, after introductions to each other and jen's house our hostesss left and we were left to ponder how to spend our time the nation's capitol...