Alabama Getaway

Being a nice guy, gentle readers, can sometimes be very tiring. Yesterday, after driving for eight hours in order to get to Baton Rouge, I was relaxing in my hotel room when Ted, my roommate, who had driven the van most of the way to LA, discovered that somewhere in his travels that day he had lost his wallet. He searched his (copious) pockets and tore apart the van in search of it, all in vain. We discovered, through deductive reasoning, deep hypnosis, and asking Carol for an old receipt (don't question my methods--mere mortals cannot hope to understand the depth of my power) that he had more than likely left the wallet in a Wal-Mart....in Alabama. A phone call confirmed our fears (and hopes) His wallet was indeed in an Alabamian Wal-Mart. (I want to point out something that only I can register right now. The term Alabamian, which I thought I had made up, does not trigger my spell-check alert. I had no idea that word existed, nor did I suspect that I knew how to spell it. I am truly awesome.)

So here was a dilemma--All of Ted's money, cards, driver's license and DOT permit resided in his wallet, which was being eternally greeted by Wal-Mart employees. Without it, he was for all intents and purposes cut off from the rest of the world, as he could not drive or access his funds. And having anything new (say a license or bank card) sent to him was difficult since he was never in one place more than a day or so. He tried to get the Wal-Mart to mail the wallet to Chamber so that Chamber could mail it to him, but to no avail. The most they would do would be to mail it in a self-addressed stamped box that Ted had to send to them. Suffice it to say, that was out of the question. The only alternative was to drive back to Alabama the next day and pick up the wallet. That was doable since we had today off, but the question was--who was going to go with him? He couldn't go by himself because he had no license. The Wal-Mart was 3 hours away, so it meant that someone had to give up their day off to drive him back and forth from Alabama so he could recover his wallet. Guess who? Well, who else am I going to ask to do it? I doubt anyone would jump at the prospect, and I would hope someone would do that for me were it to happen t me, so I volunteered to take him. And I did. We hit the road at 8 this morning, our one day off this week, and drove three hours to Saraland, AL where Ted picked up his wallet and I picked up some more toothpaste. (See, it wasn't a wasted trip for me after all.) We then turned around and hit the road, trying to get back to Louisiana early enough for Levitt to take he van to pick Flo up at the airport. Flo was in NY this weekend doing a big cattle call audition and was flying back from her stopover in Atlanta. On the way back, I got a call from Levitt asking if we could go pick Flo up ourselves. This required us to stop and kill some time before proceeding rather than coming back and giving Levitt the van. That was fine with me, because it meant we were able to stop for lunch. We ate at a place called WOW--grill and wingery. (WOW stands for World of Wings) I decided against getting more gumbo--I didn't want to over-gumbo myself. (The cast had gone out to a place called Copeland's last night where I got authentic New Orleans gumbo for the first time in my life and it was incredible. I do love me some gumbo.) I instead decided on enchilada soup and a bowl of melted cheese and chili. Or as I like to call it, the cardiac special. We were able to kill enough time to make it to the airport just as Flo was coming out of the terminal. So we all got back to the hotel safely, happily, and walletfully.

Other than that, I did not do much at all today. I went and soaked in the hotel's hot tub, and I got some coffee at Starbuck's. Other than that, I was as unproductive as possible. Before I hit the hay tonight, I shall be working on one of my many writing projects, which are going well, although I have to tell you, it's an odd experience trying to write four or five things at the same time. Trying to keep plot lines straight in my head when I don't get back a particular plot for about four or five days is challenging. But it's cheaper than drinking. This next week is going to be interesting, since we have the drive to Dallas in the middle of the week, and then driving from Dallas to Pennsylvania. I am sure I will be captaining the truck during one, two or all of those days, which of course leads me to this evening's campaign slogan--Pond in 2012--Driving US Into the Future.....