Driving is scary and fun
I made it across country, thanks to craigslist, friends, and the public buses of the northeast. I rode with my now good friend Mark from Seattle to Pittsburgh.
I met Mark on a wednesday (assassinated on friday) for coffee and quickly determined that he was not a creep. He was in fact, one of the kindest, most beautiful people I have ever met. Both in monetary generosity (paid for all the gas, tolls, and hotels) as well as straight up personal generosity. He called to make sure I was safe after we split in Pittsburgh, and helped return my laptop charger to me from indiana. Amazing dude. My little 14 year old cousin heard that I rode with some dude I didn't know and exclaimed,"But he could have been a tranny!!" Not the case. We took the high road. From Seattle through Snoqualmie Pass, through Montana, N. Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania. Possible the most brutal weather route we could have taken. We were driving a Budget Moving van, like this one:
It was a complete whiteout blizzard from Snoqualmie Pass to Indiana. For real. A few breaks in Dakota, but after hearing baout the pending Lakota independence, we were ill at ease with the threat of attacks (But for real, check that out. Of course it is not being reported/well). Montana takes forever to drive across. Upon entering the city limits of Bozeman, MT, we were greeted with the full power of this armed and operational highway system in a blizzard. Fire at will, God! I was driving. Going like 65 MPH in the right lane of the... well here's this shittily made flash animation i made in a few mintues after getting into the hotel room in bozeman.
Here's the text account. I was going 65 in the right lane of the eastbound highway. The road looked way clearer than everywhere else we had driven that day. So far on the ride, we saw jacknifed semis that we had to drive around, flipped cars in the median, and lots of ambulances. Cars were ppassing me. Play it cool, Tim. If any of you have not driven with me before, I am a terrified driver, slow, cautious, and maybe a little haphazard. This time, I was just slow and careful. But nonetheless, all of a sudden the van does a 90 degree turn, flips onto two wheels, and then just as fast does another 90 degree turn. I get way tactical, cut the wheel and slam us down onto all four wheels, but now we are going backwards down the highway at 65 mph. Then we careen across the median (a 8 foot deep, 30 foot wide snow covered ditch) and into the lane of westbound traffic. My foot is firmly slammed on the brake, while I try to see out the sideviews to assess the situation. We stop just in time. In fact, we spun out and almost died just in time; one secnod before and we would have been creamed by oncoming cars, one second after and we would have flown off a 30 foot bridge. It was a shaky experience, but at no time did I think I was going to die. Idi Amin said he knew when he would die, I just knew it wasnt then.
From then on out, it was easy. We got to Pittsburgh on the 4th day. I found a ride on craigslist the day before, with an amazing woman named Carolyn. She was driving to the Hudson Valley. Why? To house sit for Bob Bielecki of course! Friends with lke a million friends of mine, MFA student at CMU. She took me as far at the Kingston Rhinecliff bridge. From there I hiked the 7 miles to Red Hook and stayed with Paige Meade and Chris Rice. The next day, I hitched a ride with friend Tristan to Albany. From there I took a bus to Dover New Hampshire, where my mother picked me up. 5 days, 3162 miles, and cost me about 75 bucks. It would have been cheaper, but the last of my food stamps were spent on road trip food demolished by "friends," so I had to use like $15 USD to replace it, plus I took the bus to NH from Albany. I am pleased with the journey.
It was a complete whiteout blizzard from Snoqualmie Pass to Indiana. For real. A few breaks in Dakota, but after hearing baout the pending Lakota independence, we were ill at ease with the threat of attacks (But for real, check that out. Of course it is not being reported/well). Montana takes forever to drive across. Upon entering the city limits of Bozeman, MT, we were greeted with the full power of this armed and operational highway system in a blizzard. Fire at will, God! I was driving. Going like 65 MPH in the right lane of the... well here's this shittily made flash animation i made in a few mintues after getting into the hotel room in bozeman.
Here's the text account. I was going 65 in the right lane of the eastbound highway. The road looked way clearer than everywhere else we had driven that day. So far on the ride, we saw jacknifed semis that we had to drive around, flipped cars in the median, and lots of ambulances. Cars were ppassing me. Play it cool, Tim. If any of you have not driven with me before, I am a terrified driver, slow, cautious, and maybe a little haphazard. This time, I was just slow and careful. But nonetheless, all of a sudden the van does a 90 degree turn, flips onto two wheels, and then just as fast does another 90 degree turn. I get way tactical, cut the wheel and slam us down onto all four wheels, but now we are going backwards down the highway at 65 mph. Then we careen across the median (a 8 foot deep, 30 foot wide snow covered ditch) and into the lane of westbound traffic. My foot is firmly slammed on the brake, while I try to see out the sideviews to assess the situation. We stop just in time. In fact, we spun out and almost died just in time; one secnod before and we would have been creamed by oncoming cars, one second after and we would have flown off a 30 foot bridge. It was a shaky experience, but at no time did I think I was going to die. Idi Amin said he knew when he would die, I just knew it wasnt then.
From then on out, it was easy. We got to Pittsburgh on the 4th day. I found a ride on craigslist the day before, with an amazing woman named Carolyn. She was driving to the Hudson Valley. Why? To house sit for Bob Bielecki of course! Friends with lke a million friends of mine, MFA student at CMU. She took me as far at the Kingston Rhinecliff bridge. From there I hiked the 7 miles to Red Hook and stayed with Paige Meade and Chris Rice. The next day, I hitched a ride with friend Tristan to Albany. From there I took a bus to Dover New Hampshire, where my mother picked me up. 5 days, 3162 miles, and cost me about 75 bucks. It would have been cheaper, but the last of my food stamps were spent on road trip food demolished by "friends," so I had to use like $15 USD to replace it, plus I took the bus to NH from Albany. I am pleased with the journey.
The lost ode to Craigslist Rideshare
I am veritably broke. I have been self employed-ish doing tutoring gigs around town, trying to make it a bit more legit for myself. We'll see how that works out. The main prongs in this attack are: petal power cleaning service, lasercave ltd custom ethical effects pedals and dry goods, and tutoring. Sounds reasonable.
Anyhow, I have little to no money, but would very much like to visit the parents in PA and NH, and other homies on the east coast. I had planned to buy a plane ticket back in early December, but was waiting for an interested party to confirm driving to PDX from SLC for a NYE Mt. Hood climb. I waited too long, shit got expensive, homie flaked out, and I found a ride from Seattle to Pittsburgh for free on Craigslist.
Seattle to Pittsburgh for free. Interesting. I leave tomorrow morning. I have food (that which remains from a savage attack by Brodskian hunger daemons), $32 iPod touch (not a typo, works perfectly), several audiobooks:
Songs of Innocence and Experience - W. Blake
Call of the Wild - J. London
Ozymandias of Egypt - P.B. Shelley
Adventures of Alice in Wonderland - L. Carroll
Common Sense - T. Paine (hehe)
Mountains of California - J. Muir
Kubla Khan - S.T. Coleridge
and a feeling that this will be fun and enriching. Met the driver yesterday. He's a nice guy, not a creep. Exciting. Craigslist, you are amazing. People who care on the east coast, I should be there in a few days.