photo #2173879

Yeah, it started out like "one of them" today. Check levels and tire pressures since we ain't used our car in two weeks. Start and warm it. Bring it to the front gate while flinging expletives at George for flinging pinecones at us. Clear the front gate and lock it. Settle in for the "Mila Miglia" headed for our "big city" 18 or so miles away. Rockingham, N.C.. Surviving the trip feels like winning the Daytona 500 ! Dodging semi's who swoop your lane to see if a white bearded old man in a 1963 Ford Falcon is naked is rather disturbing, but they do it anyway. The first gas station after exiting I-74 is showing $4.69/gal. Now, drivers slow down to mach two, but I never know why. Ain't no police anywhere. Our heads continue on swivels as we negotiate our way to the first store to top off our reserves. Milk's $3.69/gal., the eggs were .89/dozen, but we buy fresh eggs from a neighbor. Any inexpensive breads now "contain biologically engineered ingredients" so we make our own. 98% of our list was in stock, and we loaded the car. I need helper springs ! Y'all that know us know my son and I pick on each other, and we "cut the fool" when we're in public. We had the cashier in tears by the time we left. Yeah, we were just warming up for the final stop that has Yankee food and other weird stuff my wife likes, and we all know how important it is to make HER happy. In we went, like Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder in Stir Crazy. We had everybody laughing at us as we "comedified" the entire store. Employees and customers alike loved to laugh instead of their normal "weaned on a pickle puss" or the more traditional burr under their saddle. We wound up at one register for checkout (no, not Wal-Mart.....I refuse to shop there). Also, I refuse to check myself out because they don't give me an employee discount, and I'd probably cheat anyway. WELL, they opened another register, thinking I might drop dead at my age waiting. I don't know which of the three of us were laughing harder. She loved it, so did we. Especially when I said my son was so ugly I was going to have to drive home in reverse to keep from seeing his mug. Yep, the old Falcon survived another trip. Fresh produce and egg/meat run in two weeks, trip to the dump next week. Life's hard in the country. Gotta enjoy them city folks whilst ya can !