Thoughts from the Road

This being somewhat off-season for travel to Florida, as it was about 80° at home the day before leaving Ohio, the buses were not very crowded the whole trip. The schedule said we stay on the same bus the entire trip down to Jacksonville FL and only change once for the last leg of the journey.

The Ashland KY greyhound station is also an amtrak station, but for the first time we were there when an amtrak train pulled out, seriously the first train i've seen in a little while, and the only amtrak train i've ever seen. We got a quick smoke break and then, after we got back on the road, i realised i was about to miss the season finale of Medium, so i called my mother and had her record it for me.

Naturally i start worrying now. I had given Dave a key to my backdoor so he could get in and take care of my cats. When i went home i retrieved a backdoor key from outside so i could get in; hanging my car keys on a hook, i noticed another single key hanging nearby, and it too was a backdoor key, so riding down the road in the dark and quiet, i start wondering, how did i get 3 keys to my backdoor? maybe i didnt give Dave the right key! i bought the doorknob myself and replaced the old one just in the last year or two, but what door comes with 3 keys? the outdoor key was now indoors, and i took the 3rd key with me. oh my, what'll i do if Dave can't get in? another worry is that every once in a while an upstairs bathroom faucet doesn't shut off entirely and drips water all over the floor. it hadn't done that since February but what if it did that just as i am going on vacation, and Dave gets there to find my house flooded and my cats about drowned! okay, so i worry too much!

a young man boarded in Ashland KY, pulls out his Dell laptop computer, and proceeds to start watching a slasher movie! i am taking my Dell laptop but i'm too nervous to use it on the bus, so i had left mine in my suitcase.

We cross the state line at Huntington where the sign says "Welcome to West Virginia...Open For Business" even tho it is 1030p and most things look closed! i suppose they meant it figuratively.

at Charleston WV, i get to talking to the man with the Dell computer, and he turns out to be a pleasant guy working in the cable industry. we talk more on the bus about computers, but it turns out his real passion is cars, and he wants to talk about race cars, but i tell him what i know about cars he could put in his eye! we talk a little more while smoking 1/2 a cigarette in Beckley WV, but after the bus got back under way, every body went to sleep and i didnt get to talk to him again.

We had a long stop at Whythville VA but it is now 330a, McDonalds and the BP station are closed, so i walk about 1/2 a block to the only open gas station in this interstate exit, fill my own mug with a machine-made latte, and the counter girl says she doesnt charge for refills. i walk back to the bus, stand in the chilly evening weather drinking my latte and getting in 2 smokes, and all of a sudden a pregnant woman comes barrelling out of the bus, makes a beeline to the bushes, and has morning sickness all over them! after she goes back in, a grey kitty cat comes to me out of nowhere and lets me pet him.

i get my first little bit of sleep of the evening before we get to our next stop. Winston-Salem NC has a really fancy bus station run by the W-S Transit Authority, i know because a history of W-S buses is etched on the glass of the office! i got in a smoke while reading it at 530am, but after i reclaim my seat, they start letting in new passengers, the bus pretty much fills up and i get my first seatmate so far in the trip, a 66-year-old woman travelling with a very old man, who takes a seat across the aisle.

His seatmate debarks at the next stop, Shaaa-let NC, which i found out was actually Charlotte, so my seatmate goes over to sit with him, and again i get to spread out. I get in a couple of smokes and give one to a black man who complains while he was sleeping on a bench somebody stole his wallet and bus ticket...but not his nice-looking suitcases! he actually asks to borrow my cell phone so he can call his mother or brother, and i actually let him! he didnt get ahold of anyone and i retreat to another area, the bus station is full of phones that make collect calls. the pregnant girl gets some fruit for breakfast as it is now 8a but she gives me the grapes out of it. all i got there otherwise was coffee. we leave Charlotte a 1/2 hour late waiting for a connecting bus--that we didnt get any passengers from!