If you ask Henry, our drive home from Louisville last Sunday was: long, annoying, awful, terrible, headache-inducing, frustrating, expensive.

If you ask me, it was: SO MUCH FUN OMG WE DID ALL THE THINGS!

Before saying goodbye to Louisville, we stopped for breakfast at For Goodness Crepes. Chooch had been craving crepes recently, god only knows why, so we figured we would be nice parents and find a creperie since we usually force him to eat at places that make him miserable.

LOL j/k I wanted crepes too and thought this place had a cute name and that’s all that matters.

As soon as we walked in, I knew I was going to love it because it wasn’t stuffed with people. Crowded breakfast spots make me so anxious – the AM is way too early for me to voluntarily deal with crowds. No breakfast is worth that, sorry not even Pamela’s and I LOVE PAMELA’S.

(Seriously though, come visit me in Pittsburgh and we will go to Pamela’s during an off-hour and you can have the greatest pancakes of your life. AND LYONAISSE POTATOES.)

But anyway, this is about Louisville, not Pittsburgh. I’m not sure what the “best place” for breakfast is considered because I never research those things beforehand, but I was extremely pleased with our experience at this crepe place. I ordered from the savory menu, something called I Dream of Veggies; it was Asian-inspired and had this glorious ginger mayo-type sauce that I would honestly do a shot of right now if placed in front of me, no fucks given. OMG and edamame. I love edamame. This crepe was the limit.

Chooch got the cinnamon roll crepe and of course I stole several bites — it was like a carnival on my tongue. An actual cinnamon roll was deconstructed inside there, I think, and the cream cheese sauce was so sweet and tangy….take me back. Take me back right now.

Who cares what Henry got. Meat crepe.

Oh also! After we ordered at the counter, I got to pick my own coffee cup! I chose one shaped like a vintage Santa Claus and was stupdily excited about it.

We played Hangman while we waited for our crepes and it was Big Fun – I love when restaurants provide games. I literally only looked at my phone when I was using it to take pictures, and that’s how it should be when you’re eating with your family!

(I’m sorry, I know a lot of people lump in “taking pictures” as well, but I honetsly take pictures constantly. I love taking pictures, and I love having picture mementos of each day. It’s important to me, as a chronic memory hoarder. I love collecting snaps!)

During Hangman, one of my words was “hyperbole.”

“What even is that?” Chooch asked after no one guessed it.

“Um,” I started, trying to think of the best way to explaing it. “…my blog.”

“Your mom’s whole life,” Henry muttered.

Chooch’s message to Louisville.

At first, I thought Chooch made this one up too and I was like, “OMG MY SON IS A PRODIGY! WHAT A GODDAMN GENIUS! THE NEXT GREAT AMERICAN POET!” But then he was like, “No it was already there, I was just showing it to you.”

Great. Back to having a basic 5th grader.

It was sad leaving Louisville without really getting a chance to see it (although we did accidentally go over the same bridge to Indiana like 8x during our stage, so that’s one thing we became pretty acquainted with) so now I want to go back again for a full weekend, when there isn’t a show to go to, because on our way out I saw A LOT of antique stores. In spite of Henry’s valiant efforts to distract me.

Originally, we were going to go to some cavern (Lost Caves, I think? Too lazy to look it up, thorough and informative blogger that I am) but Henry was like, ‘THIS IS IN THE COMPLETE OPPOSITE DIRECTION OF WHERE WE NEED TO GO. WHY CAN’T YOU LEARN TO READ A MAP, I DON’T UNDERSTAND.” God, sorry to be such a navigational piece of shit, Henry. Go fuck a compass.

I had a back-up plan though, but I was sure he wasn’t going to go for it.

My back-up plan was a VENTRILOQUIST MUSEUM in Fort Mitchell, KY, right outside of Cincinnati.

I kind of just mumbled it.

Henry got real tense behind the wheel and sighed.

“Never mind. You won’t want to go there,” I said in my soft, sad voice, just one whimper shy of reaching full-blown Sally Struthers level.

“It’s probably not even open on Sundays,” Henry said in a tone that sounded to me like he was trying to will it not to be open.

I checked Roadside America.

“It says it’s open on Sundays from May through September!” I squealed. And then, “Oh. ‘By appointment only.'”

So Henry was all, “Yeah sure whatever, go on and call.” Probably because he thought there was no way in hell that someone was going to answer.

But someone did! A woman! I asked her how far in advance appointments needed to be made and she said usually 2 days, but then she paused and said, “Although….how many do you have in your party? I might be able to squeeze you in with my 1:00pm group.”

I told her three and she said that would be no problem! And she took my name! And said she would see me at 1!!

I was so stoked! But then I hung up and noticed that Henry was staring at me in the way that he does when he’s ready to burst into Flames of Madness and wants to take me down into the ashes with him. 

“So….we have an appointment for today! But….it’s not until 1…..”

It was only a little after 11:00am and we were mere minutes away from Fort Mitchell. Henry had plans on us being home that day by 4 and now this was definitely not going to happen if we were still going to be in Kentucky until at least 2pm at this point. 

So I started doing that thing I do where I get real pouty and repeatedly wail, “JUST FORGET IT!” and make him feel like he’s the worst person in the world when he hasn’t even said no yet.

“DO YOU WANT TO GO THERE OR NOT?!” he yelled, yanking the steering wheel and driving the car onto the exit for Fort Mitchell without even waiting for me to answer because after 15 years, he knows how these games end: with probably some crocodile tears and definitely me getting my way.

So now we had an hour + to kill in some small town in Kentucky.

Obviously, we went to a cemetery, where at first I was still being a baby and said I was just “GOING TO SIT IN THE CAR AND DIE” while they were like, “K have fun” and left me there with the windows up.

And then when I finally got out of the car, I set the car alarm off because our car is dumb so then Henry and Chooch knew that I wasn’t wallowing anymore, ugh.

OUR LITTLE ANGEL.

Oh, I just remembered why I was pouting in the car! I wanted to take a picture of Chooch holding the Artifex Pereo screenprint that he had signed at the show, but his posing and posture wasn’t up to my standards so I shrieked, “JUST FORGET IT!” and if I die first, is that what Henry will use for my epitaph?

DEEP THOUGHTS.

Henry found one of those things he used to smoke when he was a kid and I tried to act like I didn’t care because I was still in Miserable Bitch mode, but then I broke down and took a picture.

Sometimes you just gotta let my mood swings play out, guys. I’ll come back around eventually.

(And then I wonder why barely anyone is close to me, lol.)

We still had time to kill, plus Chooch and I had to pee, so we went to Krogers across the street and walked around like we have never been to a grocery store before and then I flipped out because some girl was handing out samples of cheese TOOTHPICKED ONTO MEAT so of course I gave her a huffy “No!” when she offered one to me. 

“Maybe it’s because it’s the meat they’re trying to get you to buy,” Henry suggested around a mouthful of THE ENEMY’S CHEESE SAMPLE, always the Devil’s advocate.

“NO, IT WAS THE CHEESE. SHE CLEARLY SAID DO YOU WANT TO TRY BLAHBLAH CHEESE?!” I barked, so mad that my rage had erased the memory of what kind of cheese was causing me to launch missiles of protest in the first place. 

“Well, you could ask for a sample of just the cheese,” Henry said. Like, oh OK, let me do this broad’s job for her.

“She should have samples of JUST CHEESE already available, because guess what, NOT EVERYONE LIKES MEAT, god forbid!” I cried, deep in the throes of my scheduled Sunday Shit Fit. There was no turning back now. I hated Kroger’s.

I then proceeded to spend the next twenty minutes bitching about it in a passive aggressive manner, as I’m prone to do, hoping that the right Kroger employee would hear me and publicly flog the cheese-sample meater-upper.

Instead, I just loudly said, “I GUESS I WILL JUST HAVE TO WRITE A LETTER!”

“Literally no one is going to care,” Henry sighed. “And also, that girl wasn’t even a Kroger employee, probably.”

This could be true. Janna had a short-lived job handing out samples of peppers or condoms or pepper condoms at Giant Eagle, and it was some temp agency that got her the gig.

Then Kroger’s can just forward my complaint on to her true employer!

Dumb bitch!

OK, that’s enough for this installment. Tune in later to read all about the most amazing museum, Vent Haven. That place still feels like a dream to me.

Dreamy sighs and eyelash bats,

Erin Rachelle, Dummy Lover.

Maybe some people think roadside attractions (a/k/a TOURIST TRAPS) are super tacky, but I just think that road trips would be remiss without stopping to see at least one giant rubberband ball. Henry is one of those people who finds limited, if any, joy in anything off the beaten path, so our travel days are usually full of lots of yelling, pouting, tires squealing, and hands punching the steering wheel.

I almost always get my way, though! And Henry will usually admit later that it “wasn’t bad.” Except for the cuckoo clock cluster. He was 100% not a fan of that side trip.

Loveland Castle has been on my radar for some time now and our travel day on Saturday was actually planned around a stop at its hallowed grounds.  This joint is nearly in the middle of nowhere, right outside of Cincinnati, down a concerning road that seems like it’s going to drop you straight into a river, until it suddenly turns and THERE IS THE CASTLE.

It’s much smaller than I anticipated, though I’m not sure what I was actually expecting — Neuschwanstein Castle? I mean, it’s just Ohio, after all. It was at least bigger than White Castle, so there’s that.

[Though, speaking of Germany — I kept seeing this shit called goetta on menus while we were in the area and it turns out it’s some kind of gross German breakfast meat product that’s a Cincinnati staple and  I’m like, how did I have a best friend from that area for like 6 years and she never mentioned goetta (not that I’d be interested in it because meat, but still) or took me to Loveland Castle?! Probably because she was too busy keeping me hidden in her bedroom like a DEAD BUTTERFLY NAILED TO A BOARD. You know what I mean. If not, just skip ahead.]

My initial thought was: this place is a clusterfuck. There was no order whatsoever! You walk in to some glorified gift shop and bump into people and then when the young guy at the counter fails to acknowledge you, you stand there with money in your hand until he finally asks, “How many adults and kids?” No ticket was administered, no hands were stamped — we could have probably just walked in and not even paid.

He didn’t even tell us where to start!! People were literally stumbling about like drunk lemmings.

The tour is self-guided. I hate self-guided tours. I need someone beating information into me. I can’t be trusted to stop and read plaques on walls, although at one point, we were passing back through the gift shop when some man in Loveland t-shirt stood up and gave those of us in the room a brief, yet wildly entertaining, history of the Castle. His name was Sir Dave and he had a great local flavor about him, if you know what I mean (do you know what I mean) and I wished so badly that he would just escort us through the whole damn Castle – it wasn’t that big!

He even managed to charm Henry, but I might just be mixing it up with the fact that he mentioned the SERVICE, at which point Henry adopted an “I’m listening” visage.

Sir Dave told us about the Castle’s builder, Sir Harry Delos Andrews, and how he became enamored with architecture when he was in Europe DURING THE WAR (he was a MEDIC). And so in the 1950-something, he started to build his own damn castle on the banks of the Little Miami River, using milk cartons filled with clay or something that I can’t be expected to remember, to make bricks. There are like over a million of them that make up the Castle. I think that’s what I heard somewhere.

Or dreamt.

Sir Harry was like a Boy Scout leader too or something and they helped him build the Castle. He called them the Knights of the Golden Trail.

I literally can’t imagine Chooch being a Boy Scout.

I almost fell down a stone staircase at one point and Chooch thought this was the funniest thing ever and then wanted me to reenact it later and I was like, “Who taught you to be such an assho—-oh. Never mind.”

YOU SHOULD KNOW WHAT KOGT STANDS FOR SINCE I WRITE SUCH INFORMATIVE TRAVEL GUIDES.

A bedroom cell.

There is something on this wall that I HATE. Bonus points if you can find it.

You can’t expect me to read all of these artifacts. I paid $5 and I wanted someone to tell me The Facts!

Queens of Roadside Attractions.

Chooch’s review: I thought Loveland Castle was cool and scary (not really) but it was scary that 2 drunk men came in and attacked Sir Harry and stole some weapons. Also I saw a white box with a Bee’s Nest inside so, YAY!!!

I want that lantern.

Sir Harry had an IQ of 189!

Here’s a picture of Henry learning how to build me a castle.

Sir Dave gave us a riddle, something about Sir Harry being pronounced dead in 1918 (I think?) and then died in 1981, and said we would have to watch the short documentary playing upstairs in one of the towers. So we watched it and it wasn’t really a riddle, but like….something that seriously happened? They thought he had died of spinal meningitis when he was IN THE SERVICE and declared him dead but then realized three days later that he wasn’t dead and had to give a shot of adrenaline to the heart, at which point he awoke and it turned out he had some kind of rare antibody in him or something, I quit paying attention once we got the answer.

These two assholes I travel with always act like every roadside attraction we stop at is the worst thing since I introduced Jonny Craig into their lives, but they later admitted that Loveland Castle was “pretty cool.”

Patriotic party hat!

Overall, I was glad that we made the detour. It only took about an hour to see it all (and that’s because we looped around it twice and then watched that 20 minute documentary too) and the history was juicy enough to make it worthwhile.  Anyway, if you’re into Boy Scouts; medieval things; and the possibility of tumbling down narrow, uneven, spiral stone staircases, then you should visit Loveland Castle.

(If you collect magnets like I do, prepare to be disappointed though. Their souvenir selection is sparse.)

(I think Henry secretly joined the KOGT when I wasn’t looking.)

(Also, I think I have a crush on Sir Dave?!)

****

Afterward, we ate lunch at Sugar & Spice, another place my ex-BFF never took me!

“Maybe it wasn’t around when you were friends,” Henry said, ALWAYS DEFENDING HER.

“It was established in 1942!” I cried, jabbing my finger at my Sugar & Spice coffee cup that said “EST. 1942.”

Ugh.

7:47am: We just pulled out of the driveway. “I need coffee” I immediately said. “Yeah, I’m well aware of what everyone needs,” Henry snapped. Whoa. CRAPPY PANTS IS HERE, EVERYONE.

7:49am: Chooch is mad because Henry got a new phone (he’s been using an old person flip phone for the last few mths because his real one broke) and he wants to hold it so badly but Henry is like DONT START WITH THIS PHONE SHIT!! Kids and phones, amirite.

8:16am: I can’t believe I’m about to admit this but I succumbed to the basic bitch pressure and got a….pumpkin macchiato. I know! I’m the worst! I’m so predictable! But at least it wasn’t from Starbucks. In other news, I’m not being a bitch anymore because I got a pumpkin macchiato.

8:42am: I had planned on swinging by the Cincinnati area because I have always wanted to go to the Loveland Castle (and by always I mean for the 4 years I’ve known of its existence). Henry just had me look up the directions on Google maps so I clicked on the map thing in my Roadside America app and started crying because it said it was nearly 7 hours away and HOW WILL WE HAVE TIME so Henry got all huffy and said, “send me the directions!” So I did and he was like, “because these directions have us starting in MARYLAND, that’s why it says it’s so far away!”

While I was giggling, Henry said in a very weary voice, “How do you survive?”

8:59am: Chooch just came back with cheese curls from Sheetz and you would have thought I was asking him for a kidney, I hate him.

Oh for fucks sake, Henry couldn’t find the lemon packet things for his signature unsweetened iced tea, and some Sheetz lady JUST BROUGHT THEM OUT TO THE CAR FOR HIM BEFORE WE LEFT and Henry is SO FUCKING EXCITED ABOUT THIS and wants to write to Sheetz now except he doesn’t know the broad’s name.

He can just send them this picture of her then, I guess.

9:18am: I wonder how many hours of mocking Henry in a hick farmer accent before I finally pierce the barrier he mentally puts up between us. YOU CAN’T BLOCK ME OUT FOREVER, SWEET PEA.

9:51am: I hate when I start to like something Top 40ish and Chooch pops up from the backseat to tell me that they used to be a YouTuber, ugh.

10:42am: Stopped at rest area in some Ohio place and a man in a suit asked Chooch if his name was LESTER and then was crippled with disbelief when Chooch said no because HE LOOKS JUST LIKE SOME BOY HE KNOWS and as we left him in our dust, I could still hear him back there wow’ing in shock.

Obligatory rest stop bathroom selfie. If I look haggard that’s because I stayed up all night watching Danity Kane videos/Making the Band recaps on YouTube.

Meanwhile, I almost forgot that Chooch’s name was Lester back when we kidnapped him 10 years ago.

11:57am: Reminsicing about the time I listened to this Perfidious Words song on repeat for approx. 5 hours when I worked the late shift at my last job, and then accidentally became suicidal because of it. Henry is not enjoying this stroll down memory lane.

12:12pm: Henry is in another rest area, doing whatever he does in there, so Lester and I are talking behind his back. “He’s in such a bad mood today.” “I know.”

Just wait until we get to the castle! That’ll be sure to turn his frown upside down and back around into a greater frown.

1:38pm: well we just finished touring Loveland Castle and Henry is in an even worse mood, as predicted! The only time he smiled was when the guide mentioned THE SERVICE.

ASSHOLE ALERT.

Whatever. Lester had a good time in the castle.

1:43pm: Some broad in a car next to us at a red light sneezed so I said bless you and Lester is like SO EMBARRASSED.

2:13pm: we’re at Sugar & Spice for lunch and this place is a WONDERLAND.

Our waitress was this old lady who seemed concerned that no one had brought me my coffee 30 seconds after I ordered it.

“You had a coffee right?” she asked. “And no one brought it yet???”

I shook my head no, slowly, because I didn’t understand how anyone would know I ordered it when she was still standing there taking our order?

“Wait—did you just tell me that now?” She asked. “Oh, ha! I saw it there and forgot that I had just written it down.”

O.o

The restrooms were DOWNSTAIRS. I love when the restrooms are downstairs! This place was EVERYTHING!

I read about it on Roadside America and literally the only reason we went is because they give out FREE RUBBER DUCKIES. Chooch and I were so nervous that we weren’t going to get one and neither of us wanted to ask and Henry was like THIS IS ALL YOU DONT LOOK AT ME so finally I cleared my throat and asked the lady at the register if the duck thing was still a go, and she silently reached for a bucket on a shelf and told us to go on and take a rubber duck and Chooch nearly clotheslined himself against the counter in his overzealous rummaging.

4:58pm: Nothing noteworthy has happened in hours but we just made it to the hotel – some generic Radisson. Three hours until Artifex Pereo!!

6:51pm: just saw Jerry’s Junk and it was mildly cool but also pretty anticlimactic.

However, I bet that man has a TON OF SHIT that I would buy if he was selling. Meanwhile, Chooch casually asked me to put on Danity Kane, lol.

And Henry is having a blast telling Louisville drivers that they’re doing it wrong. “YOU CANT TURN LEFT ON RED!”

7:24pm: Benjamin the Lyft driver is taking us to the venue now and listening to him and Henry attempt to make small talk with each other is simultaneously killing me and giving me life. Also I couldn’t get my seatbelt to fasten so I’m just sitting here with my arm thru it like a sling.

8:52pm: Huge difference between me and Chooch: when I need to pee in a public place, I freak out and spend 25 minutes trying to build up the courage to look for the bathroom and then I hoarsely whisper to Henry WHERE DO YOU THINK THE BATHROOM IS OMG HELP. Chooch gets right up and sets out to find it himself.

10:32pm: This night is so excelsior. Every band has been wonderful, the venue is great, Henry is actually in a good mood and said that he liked the last band that played (Funeral Portrait) and now Artifex Pereo is about to go on and I’m so sweaty and Chooch is half asleep in a chair and all the Artifex guys keep asking him if he’s going to make it and it’s just good fucking vibes all over, can I stay in Louisville forever.

12:02am: Waiting for our Lyft driver, Nicholas, to pick our exhausted, sweaty asses up. I hope I lost weight. I SWEAT SO MUCH.

“There’s so much wrong with my body,” Chooch just randomly said.

12:23am: Nicholas returned us safely to our hotel (he was an A+ Lyft driver and gave us non-stressful conversation) and then we had cheerful banter with the ladies at the front desk because we’re all delirious from the hotbox that is New Vintage, and now I’m ready to get my Savasana on in this stiff-as-fuck bed.

PEACE OUT, GIRL SCOUT.

I felt #soblessed that we had time for a Dutch Haven visit before the show on Saturday. There is a certain magic to this place, like a butterscotch candy in grandma’s purse.

I have a cold and I’m half-asleep writing this on the couch. Don’t question me.

We were pretty full from our late lunch at Bridgeport Family Restaurant, where all the regulars loafed at the  counter, engrossed in whatever kids talent show that’s hosted by Steve Harvey.

I really can’t stand Steve Harvey and none of those kids had any talent worth writing home about.

Anyway, I was so big high off life (and all that manure in the air) that I was scream-laughing the whole way to Dutch Haven and Henry was not pleased. I just really love road trips, guys. 

Inside Dutch Haven, Chooch acted as though he’s never had shoo-fly pie before and devoured two samples of it before ordering a whole slice all while making foodgasm sound effects. You’d think we kept him locked in the car every other time we swung by the Haven.  

Oh my god, and the whipped cream to shoo-fly ratio is DIVINE, like a holy helmet to protect the molasses-y relic below.

I’m thankful that my beloved shoo-fly is 4 hours away because I don’t ever want the novelty to wear off.

Of course I ate my slice too fast and got really sick. Totally worth it though.

And then Henry gave us $5 so we could buy a horseshoe from some random unattended horseshoe stand outside of Dutch Haven and I got really worried that whatever Amish kid was shilling these wouldn’t know if we paid even though I definitely shoved a $5 bill into the metal cash box and I hope no one actually steals a horse shoe! The stand was right next to the parking lot for Dienner’s, which is a SMORGASBORD RESTAURANT for disgusting pot-bellied TOURISTS UGH. Everyone knows those are the types of people who piss on the honor system!

But seriously, why would you want to buy six of these?

Someone should bake me a shoo-fly pie for my birthday which is JULY 30TH. You have time.

9:24 We’re headed home from Lancaster. I figured I would Liveblog to keep myself busy, but I’m just going to wait to post it until it’s done because my WordPress app hates me. 

Henry was upset because some guy kept staring at him when he and Chooch went to grab some hotel “breakfast.” I figured he was exaggerating because you know how flagrant Henry’s imagination is. But then when we were leaving the hotel after checking out, Henry said “Look there’s that guy who was staring at me” and wouldn’t you know it, that guy’s eyes were GLUED to Henry even as we sat in the car. It was nuts. Then I realized Henry was wearing his Arizona Iced Tea hat so I said, “Maybe he’s staring at your hat and it’s making him thirsty.” Sounds like I cracked that motherfucking case, bitches. 

 
Chooch and I took this picture before we left the room, and Henry titled it “Two Idiots In a Mirror.” OR YOU KNOW, EMAROSE TWINS. But whatever. Use whichever one you want. I don’t care. 

9:48am: Henry’s reminiscing about his paperboy days and I promise you he has told me this story before, verbatim. Delivering newspapers in the 70s must have made a pretty big impact on him. From Newspapers to FAYGO: The Life Of Henry J. Robbins. 

10:35am: If you ever feel like people don’t give a fuck about Easter anymore, just drive through Gettysburg on Easter Sunday. The Easter hats are out in full effect. Also, if you ever want to be embarrassed at Henry’s and my utter lack of historical knowledge, sit in the car with us as we drive through Gettysburg while Chooch bombards us with war questions. At least I knew it wasn’t WORLD WAR 2 though, CHOOCH. 

11:16: At a Sheetz somewhere on Rt. 30. Some older broad was in a bathroom stall talking on the phone and it was really uncomfortable because I just wanted to pee, you know? Then she was out of the stall and blocking the sink when I came out, still on the phone too! So she moved out of the way and after she ended the call, she said to me, “When your daughter starts talking, you don’t stop her” and then we shared a moment of polite laughter so then I felt kind of bad for psychically wishing she eats a bad egg today. Then the Sheetz barista (lol) gave me cold coffee instead of hot so Henry had to go back in and deal with it on behalf since it’s Easter and he didn’t want me to make some young teenage boy cry. Henry the Patron Saint of Sheetz Baristas. 

On the real, I wouldn’t want to make coffee for fucking assholes like me all day long so sorry for psychically wishing you eat too many jellybeans today, barista boy. 

11:26: NOW MY COFFEE IS TOO HOT. 

12:30: We were going to walk to the abandoned turnpike tunnels near Beeezewood because every time we drive past we never have time. But then we realized that it’s apparently an all-day jaunt by foot so we decided we would just do better research (this is a new thing for us—due diligence as opposed to our usual spontaneity/unpreparedness). However now Chooch is in the backseat beating his head off the window because WE NEVER DO ANYTHING FUN. THE ONLY FUN THING WE DID ALL WEEKEND WAS THE CONCERT AND NOTHING ELSE and we were like “hello that was the whole point of the weekend so shut up Mr. S. Poiled Rotten. Now Henry is yelling at him and I’m like “Hahaha better you than me, little boy!”

  
1:04: Just drove through Bedford and Henry pointed out a restaurant that was open but then continued to drive and now we’re out of Bedford so I guess we’re not eating in Bedford.

Meanwhile, I have on a Bled Fest play list and I keep asking Henry if he’s stoked to see each band that comes on and then I hurry up and repeat his response in a mocking manner before he even has a chance to finish because I know exactly what he’s going to say and I can say it better than him. THAT IS HOW GOOD I AM AT IMITATING HIM. 

1:13: UGH we just drove through the area that has all of those sickening windmill things and I was dry heaving. 

“There’s nothing wrong with them!” Henry yelled. 

“WHAT IF YOU FELL OUT OF THE SKY AND LANDED ON ONE?! THESE ARE HAZARDS!” I cried. 

“Why would you be falling out of the sky?” Henry asked in that smug tone. 

Because maybe I’m skydiving that day? I DONT KNOW. Regardless, they’re disgusting. 

“How are they disgusting?” Chooch asked incredulously. 

“Chooch, anything mommy doesn’t like or understand is disgusting,” Henry calmly explained. “Like my breathing.”

GOT THAT RIGHT, POPS.

LOL. “Pops.”

2:19: Just left our beloved Summit Diner in Somerset after Chooch barfed in the bathroom then came back to the table crying and gagging so we made him go outside while we paid because BOY DONT BE PUKING AT THE TABLE. Prior to that, Henry and I had a coleslaw standoff because I always take his picture while he’s eating coleslaw so then I had to let him take a picture of me eating his coleslaw to even the playing field. THAT’S FINE. YOU WIN SOME YOU LOSE SOME. 

 
This one is from yesterday at Bridgeport Family Restaurant. I was laughing so hard about this that I started sobbing in the car. It’s that Amish air that does it to me. I get psychotically giddy. 

WHATEVER at least my double chin miraculously hid itself for this photo. 
 Coleslaw King. 

Coleslaw is probably one of the few things that Henry and I share a mutual love for. Although I’m way more picky about my coleslaw than he is. For instance, I had the worst coleslaw that’s ever touched my tongue last week at Diamond Market but I bet Henry would have liked it. It was so vinegary!!

  
All the waitresses had on bunny ears in case anyone dared forget that today is Easter. 

Now I’m sitting in the car while Henry and Chooch are in Walmart because we didn’t get Chooch an Easter basket since I was too preoccupied with making one for Emarosa (dorky fan girl, party of one for that corner table by the bathroom) so Henry’s letting him pick out some small item of cheap joy I guess. 

Speaking of bathrooms, I had to pee so bad when we got to the diner but the bathroom was occupied so I went back to our table and proceeded to stress out over this and then Henry had to use the men’s room so I told him to check the women’s room while he was back there and he was all YEAH THATS NOT WEIRD. Anyway, I didn’t want to go back and try again because there was a table of people near it and I didn’t want to walk past them again because I’m neurotic and assumed that they were paying attention to my bladder strife. Finally, as Henry was paying the bill, I tried again and as it turns out, there was never anyone in there that whole time because, FUNNY STORY, I was turning the knob the wrong way. 

2:42: They’re back from Walmart. Chooch didn’t see anything he wanted so he got Kleenex and then actually won something out of the claw machine: a Chinese takeout container with stickers inside?!

3:26: Randomly started missing my old pink Converse. “Remember when I lost one but then you found it? It was that one weekend Christina was visiting and I was crying.”

“Ha, which weekend? You were always crying when Christina was visiting.” True story. 

In other news, Chooch is back to calling Henry Pee-Paw. I thought that one was permanently put to rest but apparently on Easter, all kinds of things are resurrected. 

4:40: Just stopped at a Dollar General down the street from our house because we need cat food (for our actual cats, not Easter dinner) and I can’t wait to get inside my house and close my eyes. I got hardly any sleep last night because ADRENALINE and I won’t sleep in the car because I’m afraid that if I fall asleep, Henry will fall asleep. And you know what that means: no more live blogs. Unless there’s a way to Liveblog from the afterlife. And I can’t think of any other way other possessing someone alive, and that just seems like a lot of effort to tell the Internet about which latest body part has sufficiently decomposed. 

I have no idea what I’m talking about. I’m exhausted and we have been listening to The Summer Set for the last hour and that is some fucking sugary pop brainrot. 

ON THAT NOTE I’M HOME NOW BEST WEEKEND EVER!!!

Troy Hill is a neighborhood somewhere on a hill some direction outside of Pittsburgh. You know, over there.  The last time I was there was when Andrea was visiting in 2011 and we went to see the largest collection of relics this side of the Vatican. Right up there on Troy Hill! It was also the first time Andrea got to hear real life Pittsburgh accents, so that is usually when I think of when, if ever, Troy Hill comes to mind.

Those relics are kind of a hidden gem here in the city. I never knew they existed until I took some Christianity class at Pitt back in 2006 (once upon a time, I was going to major in English Writing and minor in Religious Studies—look at me now!) and the professor told us about it and while most of the class looked bored as fuck, I was furiously scribbling the information down in my notebook because BONES.

A few years ago, Troy Hill added another gem into their hidden treasure chest when some art-savvy dude bought an abandoned house and then commission German artist Thorsten Brinkmann to set up shop and turn this average, unassuming Pittsburgh brick house into a gesamtkunstwerk called La Hütte Royal. Kara and I have wanted to check this place out for some time now, but like usual, we get distracted by life and it gets moved to the back-burner. However, last month when I asked her if she wanted to go to the Mattress Factory with Corey and me, she rekindled the idea of La Hütte and Corey was definitely on board for this change of scenery.

Touring the house is free, but an appointment must be made. I was mildly stressed about this because 1. I hate making appointments and 2. I hate having responsibilities. THANK GOD I was able to fulfill these requirements through email, and that is how we ended up with a 2pm engagement on Troy Hill last Saturday.

This is also how I learned, 9 months after purchasing my car, that I absolutely cannot parallel park by relying on the backup camera. Plus, Kara and Corey were heckling me! Finally, I went old school and threw my arm over the back of my seat and successfully parked without the aid of a visual device.

“THIS IS LIKE A TEXTBOOK PARK JOB, TOO!” Corey exclaimed. “Like if we had a ruler, it would be the perfect distance from the curb.”  That made me feel better for the previous botched attempts, so thank you COR-COR!

(That’s what Chooch calls him and it’s incredibly obnoxious.)

Here’s the telephone pole that I did NOT wreck into, no thanks to the backup camera.

I texted the docen, Ryan, to let him know that we were running on time and then the three of us tentatively climbed the steps of a very unassuming brick house on a regular old Pittsburgh street. Kara made herself at home by plopping down on the porch swing while I tried to pee in anticipation of who was going to open the front door. I kept envisioning some stuffy older man like Dick from the Bayernhof, but instead we got a young college student in skinny jeans and a beanie and in my head I was thinking, “LET’S BLOW THIS LA HÜTTE STAND AND GO TO A BEACH SLANG SHOW TOGETHER!”

I mean, I was like, “Oh hello, Ryan. I’m Erin.”

AND I’M SINGLE AND CERTAINLY NOT EVEN CLOSE TO 36 YEARS OLD.

J/K.

We had to wait for two other people, who turned out to be SOPHIE the COSTUME DESIGNER and her plaid-shirted companion. They both seemed to be drowning in each others’ ennui. SOPHIE of course had previously visited La Hütte, but her manpanion had no idea where she had brought him. Another fun date with SOPHIE, he probably mumble-cored to his other lumbersexual bruhs over nitro coffee and poutine the next day.

(I swear to god, I leave the house repeating to myself, “You love people. All people. All people are love” but then I find myself standing on a porch with the likes of SOPHIE and I remember why I often dislike leaving the house.)

Ryan gave us the run-down on the rules, which included twisting doorknobs (all doors that open can be entered), sitting on chair-like objects (everything but the chairs in the tiny dining room could be sat upon), and red-curtained fireplaces (there is only one in the house and that was our cue to get down and crawl). I asked about pictures, because I know Corey’s head was going to blow up in wonder, and Ryan happily said that we could photograph our faces off for all he cared, and we were welcome to share them on any social media sites but that we would need permission from the artist if we want to, you know, put them on a blog or whatever.

I didn’t say anything but the whole time, I was thinking, “Does my zero-revenue-generating blog with 5 followers count?” Like, I didn’t want to ask and be laughed at. So I said nothing and figured OH WELL I just won’t post any. Except for that first photo down there of Corey, because that bell-thing comes up all over the place when you Google search the house so I made the executive decision that this was OK because I don’t really feel like bothering some German artist right now.

Once we were in the foyer, backs slightly arched to avoid Suffocation By Large Hanging Torture Bell, Ryan collected our jackets and sent us on our way. I was relieved that SOPHIE and her downtrodden date got a head start into the basement, leaving us free to explore without judgment.

We started in the basement, which had a boxing ring built in what appeared to be the garage. Here is where I want to start spewing out every single detail of what we saw, but I think it’s kind of worthless to just read the words instead of actually experiencing it. Because putting it here in type makes it seem like it’s someone’s refuse, belongings left behind, that were just strewn about haphazardly and stamped as Art. But it’s not like that — there is a method to the madness, rhyme to the reason…it’s just that I don’t know exactly what those methods and rhymes are because I’m not Thorsten Brinkmann.

The house’s innards have been completely revamped into what the inside of my head looks like, a/k/a an explosion of color, hidden passages, and filth.

The main floor was primarily built around vinyl and I had to really dig deep to keep from lying supine across all of the beauty. All of the “chair-like objects” in the living room had record covers adhered to the surface…so needless to say I came home with new dining room chair projects for Henry.

I lied. Two more pictures. Will I be arrested?!

The upstairs is where shit got real crunk. We had to crawl through a tiny fireplace and along secret corridors built between the floors and it was horrifying and exciting all at once! I am so claustrophobic and hate not knowing where I’m going, especially when tight spaces are involved. I think Chuck E. Cheese’s infamous Cheese Factory ruined me at a young age.

Please tell me you know what I’m talking about. It was the first introduction to trauma for many kids in the early 80s, and it was definitely my first encounter with the crippling fear of being abandoned and left for dead inside a giant wheel of Swiss cheese, inexplicably sound-tracked by ominous outer space bleeps.

This is how I felt about La Hütte, with the added sensation of voyeurism thrown in. There were times when it really did feel like sneaking around someone’s decrepit home.

The tour ended in the attic, when we burst through a door on a wave of Corey’s bombastic laughter to find SOPHIE and her ambivalent beau (ambivabeau?), seated in old beauty salon hair dryers and watching a film of Thorsten himself trying a number of ways to sit in a chair.

Afterward, Ryan (who was sitting in the corner and I didn’t even notice!) was anxious to get some sort of dialogue going but I refused to speak in front of SOPHIE so we all kind of just sat there while SOPHIE talked about being in COSTUME DESIGN SCHOOL and Ryan was like, “There’s a whole school for that?” So yeah, take that SOPHIE. Anyway, we stuck around while Ryan escorted them back down to the foyer and when he returned, we all had a nice chat about the house, the owner (who lives down the street in a really nice house with a black fence), the artist, etc. etc. Ryan told us that Thorsten built the installation around the history of the house and its previous inhabitants, and used most of the things he found around the house.

I was hoping he wouldn’t make us go around and offer our interpretations, because I am really horrible at that. I love art–I love making it and I love looking at it, but I rarely try to “figure it out.” I can only tell you how it makes me feel, and this house made me feel like Alice in Wonderland—like I was somewhere I wasn’t meant to be, and it was at times beautiful and quirky, and at other times creepy and uncomfortable. And in keeping with the Alice theme, I was reminded a lot of how I felt the first time I watched Alice, a stop-motion film by Czech director Jan Svankmajer, who also made Little Otik which absolutely wrecked me during my pregnancy.

While it’s not clear to me what Thorsten hopes visitors will take away from La Hütte Royal (I tried not to read too much about it before we visited), I personally felt like we were in an entirely different world. For most of our time in the house, I had no idea what floor we were even on, because there was so much crawling and climbing. I loved the play on dimensions and how space was completely fucked with—it was basically my dream house. In one room, I’d expect to see the white rabbit, and in the next, Leatherface. When can I move in!?

After a nice discussion with Ryan, we excused ourselves. “We’re going to eat PB&J now at Peanut Butter Jelly Time in Bloomfield,” I explained (IN CASE HE WANTED TO COME, TOO).

“That sounds disgusting,” Ryan said.

Somewhere, PB&J is art, OK Ryan?

As much as it sucked to part ways with Terri and Christian after breakfast at Panera (where Henry’s confident stride was in full effect thanks to Panera Worker Nikki, who was brusque and disgruntled to Chooch & me but apparently very sweet and accommodating to Henry), I was anxious to get on the road because it meant it was almost DUTCH HAVEN TIME.

It’s impossible to be anywhere in the eastern part of Pennsylvania without stopping for my favorite Dutch delicacy: motherfucking shoofly pie.

What? That’s what they call it. At night, after the bonnets come off. Motherfucking shoo-fly pie.

OK, you’re right, Google Translate. It’s probably moederfucking shoo-fly pie.

Actually, I wasn’t even going to ask if we could stop, because I had a feeling Henry was going to grunt something in a fatherly-fashion about how “it’s either shoo-fly pie or the shoe house; pick one!” and if I had to choose….it was going to be the shoe house, you guys. I know! What kind of fair-weathered shoo-fly pie eater am I? (Actually, I’ve eaten the shoo-fly in various types of weather.) So I kept my mouth shut and was rewarded when Henry suggested, all on his own, that we stop!

Some man working behind the pie counter asked us if we wanted a sample and we were like, “Pshhh, fuck that molasses-y noise, we want a SLICE.”

“Oh, you’ve been here before,” he said, but did not seem very excited about it. That’s OK. I wasn’t looking for enthusiasm to put in my mouth. Just some shoo-fly pie. Put it in there.

BAE.

(Do you guys remember the great shoo-fly pie tragedy of last fall? I’m #soblessed to have had the opportunity to eat the fuck out of it twice since then.)

Chooch has become obsessed with pumpkin pie somehow, behind my back, so that’s what he had. We were all very quiet and still while enjoying our pie outside of Dutch Haven.

Applauding the autumnal offerings.

Before we left, we stopped at the neighboring building, which used to be this creepy BBQ joint and is now a creepy popcorn joint. A young employee was outside on the porch, working hard at a popcorn machine. “Please, help yourself to the samples on the table inside,” he said in a strange robot-trying-to-act-human staccato. I think he was probably recently estranged from Amishdom, so not quite a shitty human being yet.

There were two elderly women in there, and the one was determined to make sure Chooch tried all of her favorite flavors, and then when that was done, she started pressing him for information on his favorite flavor profiles and he kept tossing me furtive glances, like I was even thinking about saving his annoying ass. HOW DOES IT FEEL, SUCKER? ANSWER THE QUESTIONS! The lady’s companion finally pulled her off of us and we were able to enjoy samples at our own leisure and without her staring at us expectantly.

We each chose a small container to buy and the other woman cried, “Well, what did you choose?!” It’s like they’re reporters for the Popcorn Times.

Or, you know, “just friendly,” according to Henry.

The only other notable moment of our drive home was when we stopped to eat the the Summit Diner in Somerset, and Chooch decided to reenact the time last December when Henry asked the waitress for a napkin, not knowing that there was an entire napkin dispenser on the table. So Chooch asked our waitress for our napkin, and then shot us giggling glances as the waitress said, “There’s some right there on the table, hon.” It was incredibly awkward because it looked like he was laughing at the waitress and she totally picked up on that; and since I was the one sitting next to the dispenser,  I had to go through the motions of getting him a napkin that he didn’t even need.

“Thanks for making me play a part in your stupid reenactment,” I mumbled, crumbling the napkin and chucking it at his face.

A few years ago, we were going to Lancaster, PA for a Pierce the Veil show and I thought it would be incredibly fun to stop at this storied house that’s shaped like a shoe in Hallam — a true road tripper’s wet dream. I had seen it on some local roadside attractions show and started obsessing. Like I do. Since it was off-season, I emailed them two months in advance to see if we could stop by for a tour. The reply I got was curt and also kind of rude. I don’t remember what they said exactly, other than it made me rage vocally at my desk. I mean, don’t live in a shoe  if you don’t want people to email you about it!!

Fast forward to several weeks ago. My anger had subsided a bit over the years and I decided to look the house up again since we were going to be in the area in a few weeks. The website announced that not only was this still peak season, but the house had new owners! I asked Henry if we could stop for a tour on our way home from Philly this past weekend, and he said yes, which leads me  to believe that he is either cheating on me or dying.

I excitedly told Glenn  that not only did I get my way about going to Philly, but Henry was also taking me to the shoe house!

“He really needs to stop rewarding behavior,” Glenn sighed. He was really happy when Henry initially said no to Philly because I came back from my break crying.

But you know, THINGS CHANGE. It’s harder for Henry to say no to me in person, anyway.

The Haines Shoe House is really close to Rt. 30, so Henry couldn’t bitch about it being out of the way, like he did about every single place we stopped at on the way home from vacation last month. The man who built it in the 40s put it close to the highway so it cold be seen because it was essentially advertising his shoe company.

The tour is $5 a person, what a steal.

“Nope, I’m good,” Henry said as he handed me $10. Chooch wasn’t too excited about this either, but I was like, “DO NOT MAKE ME TAKE THIS TOUR ALONE, PLEASE, I BROUGHT YOU INTO THIS WORLD.” And he was like, “Yeah, a world full of stupid novelty houses to tour.” He and Henry just don’t get excited about these things.

After I paid the lady in the gift shop, she asked Chooch for his hand so she could stamp it.

I stuck mine out too and she said, “Oh, no. We just do this for the kids.” She laughed a little and then realized my hand was still there. “But I mean, that’s fine, if you want a stamp too.”

“I mean, she basically is a kid, so…” Chooch said with a roll of his mean eyes. Shut up, Chooch.

She stamped my hand but didn’t even bother to re-ink the stamp first so it looks STUPID.

It’s supposed to be a shoe! You can’t even tell! Chooch’s was so much nicer than mine.

So then our tour guide came in and retrieved us. Immediately, she made a passive aggressive comment about not sitting on the furniture, because of course as soon as we entered the house, Chooch’s ass helped itself to an armchair cushion. But you guys, his leggggs. They were so tireddddd. He was so exhausteddddd. His life is so roughhhhh.

We learned some boring ass facts about Mahlon Haines and his shoe company. He was really into pimping out his company and even ran for Congress at one point just so he could essentially advertise his company with promotional compact mirrors. I didn’t know what else to say, every time the guide stopped talking and looked at me expectantly, so I just kept saying, “Wow, he was like, really smart.”

Chooch just looked really bored and annoyed the whole time, but I swear to god it was really cool to walk around and see that even the windowsills were curved. The guide kept encouraging me to take photos, and I’m so used to being told to not take photos so that I have to take clandestine spy-cam shots the whole time that I actually felt too nervous to take more photos than I did.

In the early days of the shoe house, Mahlon held contests for newlyweds to honeymoon in the shoe. In the honeymoon suite, there’s a laminated letter of marital advice he typed up for his guests. “YEAH, TAKE A PICTURE OF THAT!” the guide said when she saw me awkwardly taking out my phone. I felt so on the spot through the whole tour!

He really thought highly of himself.

My favorite thing about the house’s interior was the eccentric color scheme. The upstairs bedroom was mint and lavender, for fuck’s sake. I commented on this and the tour guide said that the new owners are actually in the process of repainting all of the walls neutral colors. “They’re trying to get the house back to the way it originally was, since the people who owned this for the last 15 years had it painted this way,” the guide continued, practically turning her nose up at the glorious hues. Apparently, they’re using old black and white photos as their reference. GOOD LUCK WITH THAT. You own a house shaped like a shoe! Why try to downplay that with a neutral interior of beige and egg white? Go big or go home!

In the maid’s quarters, the guide said, “I bet you’ve never seen one of those before!” pointing at an old sweeper leaning against the wall.

“It’s a vacuum. Mu grandma has one of those in her house,” Chooch said, spitting chunks of ennui onto the floor for the invisible maid to sweep up. He was just not impressed by a single thing in this giant shoe, byt at least he was being quiet about it.

And then the guide instructed us to sit at the kitchen  table so she could take our picture, because that is apparently what all of the other tourists like to do. I got really nervous and stressed out because I hate having my photo taken and what if one of my furry-lovers sexted me while she was holding my phone!?

(Just kidding. I don’t have any furry-lovers. Yet. #Anthrocon2016)

But would you look at my happy face!? And Chooch’s pained expression.

Our guide said something about the arch at the top of the steps, so I took that as my cue to take a picture of it.

The tour was over after a soft 10 minutes. We found Henry in the parking lot, leaning against the car, and looking at boring Henry-things on his phone. Probably pallet DIYs and computer part auctions.  I made him go back into the gift shop with me because I didn’t have my wallet and I wanted a post card and a magnet to add to my growing tourist trap desk-shrine at work.

It’s actually pretty nightmarish, now that I really look at it. I found out later that Henry had checked in to the Haine’s Shoe House on Facebook, like he was actually so stoked to be there. He didn’t even go inside of it! What a shoe house poser fan.

There’s even a shoe-shaped doghouse in the yard. And Chooch wants everyone to know that he was “as calm as [he] was at the stroller place.” I asked him if he learned anything at the shoe house and he said no.

After we left, Henry kept asking me questions about the Haines shoe company and my response to every question was a solid, “I don’t know.” So, I guess I didn’t learn much either. Except that I need to do a better job advertising all of my crappy wares. Maybe Henry could build me a Jeffrey Dahmer-shaped house?

***

Today after work, I asked Chooch if he told any of his friends about the shoe house.

“Nah,” he shrugged. “I told them we went to Panera, though.”

OK, but Panera is not SHAPED LIKE A SHOE.

Last winter, after we decided where this summer’s vacation was going to take us—-and Henry started bleeding money from all blue-collared orifices—-I excitedly consulted Roadside America to find all the ways to drag our trek back to Pittsburgh into a poorly-written modern remake of Homer’s Odyssey, only with less blood weddings, spiritual growth, and Latin declensions.

One of the “attractions” I read about was this mysterious-sounding African village in Sheldon, SC called Kingdom of Oyotunji. I sent Henry the link and received no response. Shocker. During the beginning half of our trip, I kept bringing it up, and Henry just kept saying things like, “We’re not going that way” and “It recently burned to the ground” and “Katy Perry is performing there all week.”

But I would not be deterred.

It turns out, when we left Savannah that Friday in July, the village was on our exact route to Charlotte, NC. Henry either must have had his guard down or was just that fatigued from fielding my lofty requests all week, because he actually turned off the highway when we arrived at the Sheldon exit! I couldn’t believe my good fortune.

“Is this place is even open?” he sighed. “It better fucking be open.” But I could tell that what he really meant was, “I hope it’s not open because I don’t want to go but I am still going to be mad if it’s not open because either way this is a waste of time and I hate you.” Over the years, we have learned to communicate through a series of huffy sighs, glares, and fists slamming against steering wheels.

Actually, their website said that they were open until 7:00 (it wasn’t quite 6 yet so we had time in our favor, at least), but they recommend that you email them if you want to stop by for a tour. I mean, I did that, but we were already about 20 minutes away so we were going to stop by regardless. Also, it seemed weird to me that this mysterious US-seceded African village in the Gulleh Geeche South Carolina low-country (I got that from their website because I’m a journalist now) even has the Internet and didn’t require me to send notice via carrier pigeon.

Just kidding. I’m not that culturally ignorant. But on that note, the Oyotunji community is something that I definitely know nothing about and I was genuinely interested in learning about how they live. (And also genuinely interested in making Henry feel uncomfortable, because he HATES taking tours of places.)

Chooch was sleeping when we made it to the entrance of the kingdom, which required us to turn off the highway and continue on down a dirt road buffeted by forest. The whole time, Henry was murmuring, “I hate you. I fucking hate you. Fuck my life” through gritted teeth, while I cracked up next to him so hard that I was wheezing.

“It’s not fucking funny!” he said. BUT IT IS, HERNY.

At the end of the path, we could see the gate to the compound, and Henry started to rejoice because it was closed.

“Yeah but keep going, maybe there’s a doorbell,” I urged, because we had come so far!

Most of my pictures are blurry and out of focus because I guess I was just that excited about being there.

Henry kept trying to tell me in a dozen different ways that this joint was closed, but too bad I noticed the “Blow Your Horn” sign next to the gate before he had a chance to gouge my eyes out with his strong and masculine Service thumbs.

“Blow the horn,” I demanded.

“No, I’m not blowing the fucking horn,” Henry hissed in response.

But if you ask Henry to do something enough times while consistently raising your voice until it’s a crackling screech, he eventually gives up and does the thing! So he reluctantly pressed down on the car horn and then we waited.

“No one’s coming,” he sighed, ready to throw the car into drive.

“Just wait!” I begged, holding my gaze hard against the big red doors.

After about 30 seconds of nail-biting suspense, a man dressed in a white robe stepped out from behind a fence along the left-hand perimeter of the property.

“Oh great, Erin. Just great,” Henry huffed, lowering the window so the man could talk to us.

“Are you guys looking to do the tour?” he asked after we exchanged proper Southern salutations. (You know. “Hello”s were said.) Leaning across Henry, I emphatically nodded my head. You bet your white-robed ass I want a tour. I want to know all about the Oyotunji tribe! I was just getting ready to barrel-roll myself out of the car when he went on to explain that unfortunately, they’ve been mourning the death of their leader, in Africa, for the last three days and had closed the community off to the public for that.

“We open back up tomorrow though, if you’ll be in the area?”

Henry nodded and said something along the lines of, “Yeah, we might be.”

“I was actually just on my way out to take a shower when I heard you beep,” the man said, explaining that he’s not usually the one who gives the tours.

He then gave us a brief run-down of the community, told us how he’s originally from Florida but had shed his American citizenship 20+ years ago in favor of living a simple life in the woods of South Carolina. They’re a community of around 40 people, self-sustained, they home school their children, and basically live a life where no one has to give a shit about the things that Americans give a shit about that don’t even matter, like Donald Trump, the idiot Superbowl, and Miley Cyrus’s pasties.

I can only imagine how better behaved their kids are than Chooch.

This whole time, I was trying to maintain strong eye contact with him while chewing on the insides of my cheeks to keep from laughing outright. Look, please understand that I don’t think anything about their community is funny, and I certainly don’t find humor in the fact that they were all in mourning, but it was the situation itself: the detour into the woods of Beaufort County, Henry’s reluctance, the Jonestown Massacre vibe of it all….it was all of these things, like sitting in church during the homily and feeling that itch to laugh out loud for no good reason, that had me writhing in giddy discomfort.

Some other tourist-sucker pulled in behind us about 10 minutes into our on-the-fly history lesson from our new robed friend. He quickly wrapped it up and then excused himself to go talk to the other visitor.

“Are we really going to come back tomorrow?!” I screamed as we slowly drove back out to the highway.

“Wha—-? No!” he said, his big bushy brows all furrowed.

“But when that guy asked if we were going to be in the area—”

“Yeah well, I didn’t mean it.” And he used his End of Story tone, so I sulked for awhile.

Oyotunji, I’ll be back for you someday.

But then we pulled over at the Carolina Cider Company! We had been on a mission to procure boiled peanuts the whole time we were in the south and finally, it was our time. On our last day, no less.

Chooch was still sleeping, how he managed to sleep through all of the Oyotunji excitement, I’ll never know. At first, Henry was like, “Just crack the window, he’ll be fine.” But then I was overcome with paranoia and something else that I couldn’t quite put my finger on….the overwhelming need to PARENT, maybe? Nah. I think I have it confused with the desire to not have Child Protective Services called on my ass.

What would the Oyotunji do, I thought hard to myself.  Aside from probably not giving a shit about boiled peanuts, I mean.

I went out to the car to wake up Chooch and proceeded to set off the car alarm. The proprietor of the cider establishment and the only two patrons there at that time stopped what they were doing in order to gawk at me from the open doors of the store.

“What are you doing!?” Henry yelled, marching over with the car keys to stop the alarm. SO SORRY THAT I WAS TRYING TO SAVE MY KID FROM ASPHYXIATION.

So then I was able to save Chooch and he groggily followed me into the store while I excitedly told him about what he had missed, but I don’t think he believed me.

Henry bought us stuff and boiled peanuts are weird as fuck, yet I couldn’t stop eating them.

Eventually, we made it to a shady Red Roof Inn, I mean shadier than the typical Red Roof Inn, in Charlotte. We had to pass Carowinds on the way, with its coasters all sexy and lit up against the night sky. I begged Henry to take us there but he was like, “IT’S NEARLY 10’O CLOCK AT NIGHT!” God, he always has an excuse.

Luckily, the Red Roof was only shady on the outside (i.e. the parking lot and the entire right section of the motel where I’m pretty sure people were living and since it was a Friday night, shit was popping off) and the inside was clean and recently remodeled. I realized that HENRY hadn’t fed us dinner, so he went to a vending machine and came back with snacks and a Snickers. THANKS, PA.

We live large on vacation.

***

Anyway, aside from some additional pictures from our travel day back to Pittsburgh, that pretty  much wraps up our whirlwind Southern road trip, which took me an entire month to recap. But holy shit, we did so much! I love these trips so much, and I know that they don’t really seem like “vacations” because we’re so go-go-go, but I couldn’t imagine sitting in one place for 7 days and “relaxing.” I honestly don’t know how to relax. I look forward to these trips so much because we get to see cool things, meet really awesome people, and make some pretty hilarious memories.

We hadn’t even crossed the Pennsylvania state line yet and I was already asking Henry where we’re going to go next. He just glared at me.

I love when weekends start off with breakfast at Pamela’s with Wendy and Jeannie. Usually we go to the same one, in Shadyside, but Wendy decided to change things up this time and chose the one in Squirrel Hill, because it would be “more convenient for everyone,” which really means, “more convenient for Wendy and more annoying for Erin and Jeannie.” God, ever since she became pregnant, it’s become all about her.

Because I can never remember what the parking sitch is like near this particular Pamela’s, I wound up leaving way too early and ended up in a parking lot that was entirely empty and within perfect walking distance, with a good thirty minutes to spare—this is what happens when you’re a spaz about being late. So I spent my time wisely, listening to Icarus the Owl and the new Carly Rae Jepsen album, which is FIRE. I’m not even joking.

And of course, taking selfies with Large Marge:

Breakfast was great. Wendy spent the whole time talking about growing a human while Jeannie and I nodded and concentrated on our food.

“Did you know that Wendy’s pregnant?” Jeannie side-barred.

“I always forget that she is, thank god she’s so good at reminding at us,” I answered.

I think Wendy was about to tell us to shut up but then Pregnancy side-tracked her.

Later that day, Henry found some ice cream place for us to try in Butler, which is like an hour away from Pittsburgh in case you don’t live here and are like, “The fuck is Butler?” Professional Driver Henry loves driving and “getting ice cream” is less about the actual ice cream and more about the Adventure. It’s one of my favorite summer things!

Chooch slept on the way there, so we talked shit on him the whole time.

When we got to the ice cream place, it was around 5 so I made the unilateral decision that we should eat dinner first. Henry drove toward downtown Butler while I embarked on another frustrating field trip into the bowels of Yelp. I was really getting angry when we drove past some place called the Chop Shop and I started bitching about how we should just eat there because Yelp is a piece of shit. I checked out their menu and they had at least one vegetarian item, so Henry turned around and parked the car. I was still full from breakfast, so I figured I’d just get a salad anyway. Henry made the “if you say so” face and tentatively followed Chooch and me inside, bracing himself for disaster.

The vibe of the Chop Shop is small town gas station. Our waiter (BRANDON <3<3<3) was dressed like a gas station attendant and there was all kinds of old school garage paraphernalia strewn about. The booth was covered in the softest suede so my dumb legs didn’t stick to them since I was wearing shorts. IT’S THE LITTLE THINGS.

(The pain of pulling bare skin from vinyl seats, amirite.)

Aside from driving through Butler, I haven’t actually parked and gotten out of the car there since 1998, when I drove out there to get a tattoo from some dude I met when I cold-called his tattoo shop from the credit card terminal company I was telemarketing for. My impression of Butler was always that it’s out in the middle of farmlands and what the hell do these people do when they want to go to a concert? So I guess I was pleasantly surprised that we were eating at a restaurant that not only remembered that vegetarians exist, but actually had four different meatless salads to choose from.

And not stupid iceberg lettuce and cucumber salads, either. The salad I ordered had goat cheese and beets and GOOD GREENS. I am ridiculously picky when it comes to salads and I absolutely will not settle for regular lettuce. I hate lettuce. And the salad was big enough that it was totally acceptable as an entree.

We also ordered popcorn with siracha and peanut sauce for an appetizer, and the serving was enormous! Plus complimentary jalapeno cornbread?! I was in-fucking-love with the Chop Shop before my salad was even served, because I love cornbread, but I have had some bad cornbread. Ugh, this was the perfect ratio of sweet and savory, and it was MOIST AS FUCK. I can’t stand when cornbread has that dried-up nun’s vag consistency.

(Speaking of cornbread, I really miss that cornbread shit that ChiChi’s used to serve. It was like molten cornbread, just a puddle of this sweet ass corn splooge, oh how I long for some of that bastardized Mexican side dish goodness. Just because a few people had to go and die after eating bad green onions at ChiChi’s, the rest of have to be punished too!? Unreal.)

When we told Brandon how much we loved the cornbread, he came back with an entire carry-out container full of hunks of it and whispered, “You didn’t get this from me.”

“Give him a huge tip!” I urged Henry. “Like, $200!”

I mean, not that I had a crush on him or anything.

“Let’s write him a note on the back of the check!” I cried, because that’s what I like to do when I’m in love with the waitstaff or their coconut cream pie (although, I have also been known to write a scathing note or five hundred in my time, too).

“Yeah!” Chooch agreed. “Write ‘I’m in love with you, from Erin’.”

Ugh. Chooch is the worst.

Also, our check was less than it usually is when we go to shitty Eat n Park, so that made Henry’s blue-collar salary sing.

The best part about the Chop Shop is that my Yelp nemesis has yet to review it! I was thankful that I was able to enjoy my cornbread without Yelp nemesis’s sickening food-prose tainting my taste buds.

Instead of driving back to the ice cream place that originally brought us out that way, we opted to just go to Madlyn’s down the street because it looked cute and Chooch was all WHY CAN’T I EVER PICK WHERE WE GO and that’s where he wanted to go.

So…

I didn’t really care at that point, because I was so happy to have eaten a salad that didn’t taste like it came out of a prison cafeteria. So when it turned out to be one of those dime a dozen self-serve froyo joints, I didn’t throw a colossal fit like Henry was anticipating. I think what helped was that the teenage froyo clerk was fucking adorbs.

“Have you ever been here before?” he asked. We all said no.

“Well, are you familiar with self-serve frozen yogurt?”

Answering yes to this question apparently comes with a reward of being told, IN DETAIL, how the entire process works: from choosing a cup or cone; the difference between yogurt, sorbet, and custard; a perusal of the topping bar, where a staggering 100+ options lie in wait; and a nod toward the extra toppings, such as the sauces and whipped cream.

It was excruciating. I mean, the kid was adorable and clearly loved his job, so hats off to That Kid. But Jesus. I felt so on the spot after that, like he was quietly judging my choices and sprinkle-drizzling form.

(He failed to include in his instructional lecture that there was a plastic pan over which one is to perform the topping-dropping; I did not realize this until after I had already created a wasteland of intermingling topping crumbs all over the counter.)

Henry opted to put his froyo in a cone and was shocked to discover that getting the stuff in there is a lot harder than it looks.

I told Henry to use my method of capturing a totally non-creepy, unstalkerish picture of the Froyo Prince, but this was the best he was able to produce.

My attempt.

Then Chooch and Henry played Donkey Kong, which was amusing because Chooch gets so mad when Henry does better than him.

God, could he be any less like me? I am always so supportive of Henry when he’s excelling at something!

Afterward, Henry was the best dad ever and took us to Playthings Etc, which is a toy store inside of a STEALTH BOMBER. It’s so cool that it’s even listed on Roadside America. Just sayin’.

Tow young guys were working that evening and one of them immediately complimented Chooch on his choice to have pink hair. Chooch, while never tiring of the actual hair color, is super 100% over graciously accepting people’s compliments. His obligatory “Thanks” these days is bloated with derision and ruffled feathers. And to make it even worse, the toy store guy practically cut himself off from talking about Chooch’s hair in order to gush over my EYEBALL PURSE. Chooch literally threw himself into a full-bodied, “Ugh!” and stomped away.

“He hates it when people like my purse,” I explained.

“Oh….well, he has pink hair!” he shouted at Chooch’s retreating back.

I sometimes wonder what Chooch and I look like through the eyes of a stranger.

Random thing on the wall.

Most of the toys had demo versions that we were allowed to play with, which meant that Henry spent a large portion of his time there shooting Chooch in the back with various Nerf-like guns. I usually get bored in toy stores pretty quickly (shopping in general bores me now that I don’t have the corporate AmEx to use….or maybe “depresses” is more of the word I’m looking for), but this place was the shit because both of the guys were so great at interacting with the customers. They would pop around corners and say, “HEY! Have you ever seen….” and then start demoing something for us. It was exciting!

“Who wants to go outside and see human-sized bubbles?” one of the guys asked, and a bunch of us were tripping over ourselves to follow him out to the parking lot.

At one point, Chooch and I were looking at a collection of realistic animal masks that had a price tag of “Not Today,” according to Henry. One of the guys came over and started talking to us about the masks and I mentioned that we were really into masks and enjoyed doing photo shoots with them.

“She has a blog,” Chooch said with an eye roll and then walked away.

“Well?!” the guy asked. “What is it?”

So then I had to awkwardly tell him about my blog and I hope he never reads this, but hey guy, if you’re reading this, thanks for making our visit super fun! And we’ll be back for that fox mask real soon. Henry promised.

We did leave with a pug, though.

What started out as a simple trip for ice cream turned into an accidental day of local tourism, and I fucking loved it! The main thing I realized about Butler is that every person we encountered there was ridiculously nice and hospitable and now I want to go back and maybe make a friend or something I don’t know.

My sole purpose on road trips is to assume the role of car DJ. Obviously. What else could I possibly be good for? I put on Loverboy to see if Henry would get that far-away look of nostalgia in his eyes.

#negative

So then I put on some good old Engelbert Humperdinck. Classic, you guys. Also, hair goals for Henry. Detached sideburns?! There’s absolutely no rhyme or reason to that. It looks like an accident. In other words: Henry could rock it.

While still in North Carolina, we began passing billboards for South of the Border, a TRUE TOURIST TRAP that I have only heard about, never visited. The first billboard I noticed said that it was 87 miles away.

“EIGHTY-SEVEN MILES AWAY? THAT’S SIDNEY CROSBY’S NUMBER. IT’S FATE. WE HAVE TO GO,” I squealed into the intercom of Wish Headquarters, also known as “Henry’s Ear.”

Then we passed another billboard that said South of the Border is 66 miles away! “THAT WAS MARIO LEMIEUX’S NUMBER! We’re going.”

See also:Letang’s number. Talbot’s number. Sutter’s number. And so on, and so forth.

I had a teacher in elementary school that said “and so on, and so forth” SO OFTEN. And then I never really heard it again.

Probably because it’s really stupid.

Inside Henry’s head at this moment: The letters “FML” fucking each other and giving birth to baby Nancy Kerrigan “whhhhhhhhhy” sound bytes.

The gestation period for these types of mental burdens is very short.

Of course we stopped. And that place was dead. I don’t know what I was expected exactly but I thought it was going to be some sort of fannypacked madness. Tourists bustling about, darting to and fro, scooping up collector’s spoons and flurescent-brimmed visors.

But no. It was just us and a few other carfuls of weary travelers stopping for a bathroom & cold beverage.

I wanted to buy it all inside one of the large gift shops but Henry had that tight-lipped “DONT EVEN” expression on his idiot face, so instead I settled on a magnet and an ice cream dish in the shape of an ice cream cone that says South of the Border on it, which is already the new home to a succulent, THANKS FOR ASKING.

Chooch got nothing because he’s annoying.

At first I thought we were going to have to climb to the top of the sombrero, which is fine but it was 1000 degrees out and I can’t climb steps that are so exposed like those ones. NO FUCKING WAY. Turns out, all we had to do was pay some Mexican guy in the arcade $2 each and then another Mexican guy wordlessly ushered us into an elevator and hit the button. As soon as we began our ascent, I nervously laughed, “Haha, it’s a lot higher than I thought.” Our elevator chauffeur politely smiled but I’m sure his mental FMLs we’re currently embroiled in a steamy affair with Henry’s mental FMLs.

Yeah so then we arrived at the brim of ye ol’ sombrero and I proceeded to have an internal panic attack because I just can’t play the heights game anymore. I start hearing nuts and bolts popping in my head, and that slooooow squeak of bending metal, until whatever suspended platform I’m standing on snaps and I’m plummeting to my death along with whatever other idiot tourists are with me, and next thing you know there’s a new addition on Roadside America: “Former location of giant, roadside sombrero that hadn’t been inspected since 1984, where tragic tourist disaster occurred.”

Something like that. I’m writing this is in an un-air-conditioned house and occasionally black out.

Henry enjoys waiting until the last minute to book a hotel room. And for the rest of our vacation, “hotel” will be used loosely.

Half past bustling traveler’s mecca, more toward cesspool of sadness.

“What’s that? Oh just the sound of all my time & money being punted off the brim of a giant sombrero.”

It doesn’t seem that high, but it felt like I was standing on the shoulders of Andre the Giant while he was standing on the shoulders of Lady Liberty. Oh god, I just had a flashback and my legs did the jello thing again.

Still trying to book us a “hotel.”

Before we left, we stopped in a convenience store across the street called The Pantry, where I was certain we were going to get shot by two suspicious young men who came creepin’ on ah come-up. I didn’t say anything though because Henry gets really annoyed when my “unfounded paranoia” rears its ugly head-in-the-crosshairs. I had the whole thing scripted in my head though, right down to the Erin RIP Glenn that hopefully someone would be uncouth and crass enough to create.

There’s some local ginger ale maker in the area and I wanted to tour the factory but Henry either said nein or “it’s closed” or “go to hell”, either way it was probably Henry’s fault. It’s called Blenheim and thank god, so blessed, the convenience store sold it in glass bottles which is my dad’s favorite way to drink carbonated beverage. He’s kind of an enthusiast. So I figured, golly I better knock one back in my dad’s honor.

I chose the “hot” variety, which was smirk-worthy for Henry.

“Do you even know what that means?” The words fell from his patronizing lips like crumbs from the testosterone sandwich he was eating at the Mans Rule World, Gurlz Dumm convention he’s perpetually attending in his head. “It means it’s extra ginger-y. You’re not going to like it.”

Yeah, well, guess who liked it, motherfucker? Ten kicks to man’s universal ballsack for all womankind.

Continuing on through South Carolina, I learned that Henry knows that #SPOBY means Spencer and Toby from Pretty Little Liars, which is sad and hilarious to me all at once. I was going to buy him a limited edition SPOBY shirt that Spencer (you know, the broad who plays Spencer) was selling on Instagram for charity but either my order didn’t go through or I’m about to have 6 of them delivered to my house in Henry’s name.

We stopped at Smith’s Exxon in Santee, a plain-named store that apparently boasts a wide array of local ciders, and Henry, suddenly a connoisseur of the jugged juices, was excited for maybe the second time of the whole trip. The southern gas station clerk behind the counter gave us samples of the peach cider and then taught us about muscadine, which is basically some kind of grape thing, I wasn’t listening. We sampled that too and Henry was making sex sounds so I knew he was going to buy a jug of each. (And he did. And just so you know, I never even got to drink any of it!)

How you know you’re not in Pittsburgh anymore. ^^

Chooch was so sick but I was like, “Son, I recognize that you are ill at the moment but please sit down and let me take your picture on this Cheerwine bench as proof that we are wherever we’re currently at.” Also, Cheerwine, nothing to Q-tip your dickhole over.  (But I don’t really like soda-type beverages to begin with, so.) Before we left, Henry cleaned out the car and threw out my ginger ale bottle which I was planning to save as a souvenir!

“Oh, we’ll get another,” he said.

“There will be plenty more places selling it,” he said.

GUESS WHO NEVER GOT ANOTHER BOTTLE?!

More driving.

We made it to Savannah around 9 and realized that we hadn’t eaten since The Creamery in North Carolina, so we went to the Waffle House next to our “hotel,” which is lame to go to chains, I know, but it was either that or get frustrated with Yelp and then wind up going to bed with an empty stomach and a heart full of hate.

At least the southern Waffle Houses are way better than the ones in our area. We had a super nice waitress and I got to stuff a waffle in my maw, and Henry had his cherished grits (seriously, what’s the backstory with Henry and the Grits?), and Chooch actually ordered something and ate it all.

“Father, might I take a sip of my milk now?”

Afterward, Chooch made a cat friend in the parking lot, and then we found out there were like 6 more where that one came from so we quickly left before Chooch got too attached.

And then I willed myself fall asleep, totally hyper about finally meeting Octavia the next day!

And on the fourth day of vacation, Henry expressed a barely audible modicum of joy when he spotted F-15s in the air.

****

Wednesday morning, a/k/a The Day Before My Birthday, was our officially check-out day from King’s Creek. Chooch and I were sad, but then Henry held up our timeshare starter package as a silent reminder that we’ll be back.

Again.

And again.

And again and again.

THE LAST TRIP DOWN THE SIDEWALK. :(

Being a travel day, my plan was for us to be leisurely about it. We didn’t have plans with Octavia until the next day, so there technically wasn’t much rush to get to Savannah anytime soon on Wednesday.

Which is a good thing, considering that Savannah was twice as far away from Williamsburg as I originally thought! I was super pissed though because I thought we were going to be passing through Norfolk but Henry explained that we were taking a more dumb and Henry-esque route through the middle of all the states.

“We can’t get to Savannah by going that way,” he said as I whined about Norfolk and all of the things I found on Roadside America that now were not going to be anywhere near us.

“Yes we can!” I cried, showing him a map on my phone.

“THAT IS ALL WATER. THOSE ARE NOT ROADS,” he yelled, so by the time we arrived at a rest stop in North Carolina, we were all miserable and hating each other, which only got WORSE when Henry copped an attitude when we had the AUDACITY to ask for beverage from the vending machines! Oh, I’m sorry. Maybe give us an allowance then so we can purchase our own beverages!

“He hates us,” I hoarsely whispered to Chooch as we power-walked in anger out of the rest stop. But then I was all, “Ooh! A thing! Let me photograph you by that thing!”

Chooch leaning against a thing.

Turns out, that thing is a WHIRLIGIG and there was an entire PARK full of them somewhere “down the street” in Wilson, NC. I begged and begged Henry to take us there since he had previously ruined our day by being a tight-wad motherfucker.

I looked at my map on Roadside American and determined that the exit for Wilson, NC, home of the Whirligig Park, was straight up ahead. What I failed to mention was that the actual destination was another 20 miles or so from the exit ramp. Henry hates being lead astray and was unreasonably irritated about whirligigs. Who could be mad about these sharp metal sculptures of joy?!

Also, I failed to note that the park is not yet open. We rolled up and saw a dirt lot, a backhoe in action, and a small sprinkling of whirligigs. That was good enough for me! Henry slammed the car into park and mumbled something about “you two assholes can get out and look; I’m staying here. Fuck a whirligig.” Even Chooch was being ungrateful and uncaring about the whirligigs and I was pretty disappointed. Here we were, parked across from a national treasure (debatable, but still) and these two were trying to ruin it for me.

I pulled Chooch out of the car and into the blazing heat and made him be a good tourist with me.

The whirligigs are the creation of artist Vollis Wilson, and are currently in the process of being relocated from some museum to the park-in-process in Wilson, NC. Wilson is, how can I put this delicately, a real dump of a town, so the hope is that this park will help with the revitalization project that’s currently underway, and I can definitely get on board with that.

I might start creating whirligigs to decorate the Law Firm. The ceilings in the partnership center are tall enough to accommodate art of this stature. BYE BYE GENERIC ITALIAN ART, HELLO ERINGIGS.

Maybe it’s nuts, but I love these road trips that we take so much because I am fascinated more by small, unknown towns than actual big cities. This was why I tried in vain to get people to guest blog on here about their hometowns, because I want to know all the insider, townie scoop. (Still looking to feature people, just saying.)

This is why I decided that Wilson was where we were also going to eat lunch that day.

Just…not here though.

We stopped down the road at The Creamery, which has been serving Wilson since 1946.

That man sitting next to Chooch ordered two large jugs of sweet tea. NORTH CAROLINA FLAVOR!

I already mentioned this in my birthday post, but they had cabbage on the menu! I ended up ordering okra though because I love me some okra. It came deep-fried, and I am used to eating it steamed or boiled or whatever Henry does to it (maybe I don’t want to know), so that was different.

Another cheerful family lunch!

While we were there, Hot Naybor Chris called Henry. Henry took the call out in the parking lot, leaving me to sit at the table and panic because WHY WAS CHRIS CALLING WAS OUR HOUSE ON FIRE AT LEAST WE DON’T HAVE PETS ANYMORE TO WORRY ABOUT!? He knew we were on vacation so it must be something tragic and devastating! It reminded me of when we were on vacation in Ocracoke years ago and had some sort of gas situation at our house and my mom and Janna kept calling us about it and we thought it was OK but then it wasn’t, and we ended up leaving early because I was so freaked out that our house was going to explode and also I hated the people we were vacationing with, so win-win….?

Turns out, a package arrived for me, air mail, and Chris just wanted to let Henry know that he took it off our porch so it wouldn’t get stolen. After Henry came back in and told me this, I cried, “WHY DOESN’T HE EVER JUST TEXT YOU THESE THINGS!?” Jesus Christ, I was worried sick.

I wasn’t going to liveblog on the way home but let’s face it: what else is there to do when I’m in a car with Henry?

8:47: Henry is acting like a goddamn martyr because he has been doing all of the driving. We still have 7 hours left of the trip (we left Savannah late yesterday and drove to Charlotte, NC) and we’re all kinds of DONE. Henry didn’t even feed us dinner last night! I HAD CHEX MIX. :( Also we have been looking for a post office since we left Savannah yesterday.

8:48: Chooch: Where are we doing for breakfast? Henry: the post office.

Seriously though we spent so much time driving in circles yesterday because I typed “post office” into google and it told me to go to Orangeburg, SC. So that is how we ended up driving all around an industrial park in Orangeburg, SC looking for a post office so I could mail my postcards only for Henry to realize that my inability to read maps, or properly Google things for that matter, had led us straight to the Industrial Packing Supplies building. “Here it is!” I announced triumphantly. “THIS ISNT ANYWHERE CLOSE TO BEING A POST OFFICE, ERIN” Henry spat.

Ladies and gentlemen, Orangeburg.

But we got to see a rainbow!

9:20: we’re at the Tupelo Honey Cafe and Henry is currently not speaking to us.  lol forever.

This is definitely the type of place you come with people you enjoy talking to over brunch and HENRY IS NOT THAT PERSON LOL. Oh well, at least I have my backup: Chooch.  

Henry’s omelette came with a flower on the plate and now he’s even surlier. I had a delightful sweet potato pancake with peach butter and soysage and Chooch had eggs and homefries and actually ate the whole thing. I love this place but Henry is like exploding with hatred right now. He hates how all the men here are dressed in the same brand of strange-hued, fitted yuppie shorts.

10:05: One of the guys in yuppie shorts was asked to leave a few minutes after they got there because his female yuppie-partner was so drunk that she was laying across the table and the chairs and Henry said her dress was like wide open. They were walking back to their yuppie car in front of us and she was definitely drunk. It was a good example for me to show Chooch that rich people act like trashy assholes sometimes too. He’s learning lots on this vacation!

10:10: I enjoyed my time at the Tupelo Honey but Henry did not. “My food wasn’t from scratch!” he just whined. “The mushrooms and peppers in my omelette were from a CAN! That’s not FROM SCRATCH. They LIED.” Maybe a Bloody Mary would have helped him not notice.

11:22: Just left the Dale Earnhardt Headquarters, lol. I was like WE HAVE TO GO TO MORRISVILLE and Henry was all YOU HATE NASCAR THO? I just wanted to go and laugh.  

Me: Do you think they’ll have Tony Stewart stuff here?

Henry: THIS IS DALE EARNHARDT’S HEADQUARTERS WHY WOULD THERE BE TONY STEWART STUFF HERE.

Me: Do they have the car he crashed in?

Henry, appalled: NO! I HIGHLY DOUBT IT!

WHO KNEW?!

Chooch: Where are we again?

Henry’s favorite part!

Me: Do you think they have the outfit here that he died in?

Henry, mumbling at this point: Probably not.

At least it was free! Chooch got a souvenir penny but selected by mistake Dale Earnhardt Jr’s signature to be imprinted on it. I’m going to add an extra Jr to it so it’s like the band. (Even though they changed their name to Jr Jr a few weeks ago.)

I’m pissed because I wanted a magnet to boast that I was there but the gift shop didn’t have anything specific to the headquarters. Not even a Dale Earnhardt Headquarters is For Lovers t-shirt. I ended up getting some dumb NASCAR-ish photo magnet so I can just put my picture with Chooch in it I guess. Sigh.

Chooch’s main takeaway from this joint is that Henry looks like Dale (negative) and that we’re shitty parents who took him on the worst vacation ever because we wouldn’t buy him a notebook with Dale Earnhardt’s racing number on it. Cry it out, bro.

11:50: I think it’s safe to say that Henry reaaaaaallllly hates the Roadside America app. Also, my postcards were mailed. I know you were concerned about how that was going to play out.

12:07: Just accused Henry of not having any fun this whole trip and he said “I never said that. I’m just sick of you two.” BUT THEN HE SORT OF SMILED A LITTLE. So I took that as my opportunity to demand iced coffee.

2:02: We just left Mt. Airy, NC, the home of Andy Griffith and a Mayberry shangri-la.

Chooch was like “This is great but who the fuck is Andy Griffith?”

We skipped the actual Andy museum tour, but there was a free Chang and Eng gallery in the basement that we were able to quickly access.

Roamed around Main Street for awhile and then visited Wally’s Service which is where you can take tours of the town in an old Mayberry squad car.

I went inside to get my dad a coffee cup and to also snag some postcards since we had previously driven past the post office so I could easily mail them. Chooch almost made it out of the store without incident but right as I opened the door to leave, he barely touched a toy car on a shelf with one finger tip when the woman behind the counter snapped at him to not “play with the cars.” OK BITCH BROAD. HAVE A NICE FUCK YOU.

There was a replica of the jail next door so we stopped over there for some photo ops. Chooch took this one of me and then posted it on Instagram without my permission but luckily the cell bars and my layers are blocking some of my fat bulges.

Encountered a rude bitch lady in there, too. She was just a tourist like the rest of us so I don’t know where the superiority was coming from.  
And now Henry is pissed because we’re back on the highway, stuck on accident traffic and Chooch and I keep unplugging the GPS in orde to charge our phone/Nintendo DS.

3:02: Still sitting in traffic approx. 5 miles away from Mayberry. The Hells Angels are with us, though!

3:52: Henry made us pee at idiot Love’s, a gas station that was infested with people who, like us, had been sitting in traffic for over an hour, but of course they were all way more annoying than my perfect family.

Also, we’re currently in Virginia. Henry has said that he hates approx. 87 times today. I said I was sorry for breathing and he laughed sardonically and cried, “No you’re not! Who are YOU kidding?!”

And then his idiot self bought Chooch CANDY. Yes, that makes sense.

Chooch just asked if today is August 1. Like, get a fucking calendar.

5:06: Octavia recommended a pit stop in Pulaski, VA so that’s what I’m making Henry do right now and he’s pissed. He has reached the point where he only communicates in head shakes and moustache twitches.

But first, this overlook thang!

5:33: Huge fight because Henry wouldn’t stop anywhere “downtown” Pulaski and then some guy came out of nowhere doing about 70 almost wrecked into us, Earnhardt-style, but now we’re sitting quietly at Tom’s Drive In while a big table of locals talk in hushed tones about Chooch’s hair.

 The man standing is really excited because he went outside to buy the newspaper and it was from TOMORROW! A paper from the FUTURE and it only cost A DOLLAR!

Ah, local flavor.

5:57: Thought Chooch was staring at one of the younger girls this whole time but eventually realized it was the OLDER GIRL WITH PINK HAIR. She came over before she left and said, in the perfect drawl, “I like your hair…” And Chooch’s face almost burst into flames.  

 It smells weird in here and there’s no a/c but it was worth it for the people aspect. The two young kids working here are super personable.  

Cheapest meal on the whole trip, not counting the CHEX MIX DINNER I had last night.

6:52: We’re stuck in traffic again! Henry pointed out that we still have five hours to go before we’re home. “it’s like we made no progress today. It’s like we went BACK IN TIME” and now he’s muttering. Then Chooch asked him what our next vacation is going to be; Henry turned around and breathed fire into Chooch’s face.

7:34: Listening to a Koo Koo Kanga Roo podcast where someone said “follow your dreams.” Chooch freaked out because he thought they said Paul Eugene. Now he’s calling us Ma and Pa and I’m freaking out.
9:24: Three hours from home but at least we’re in West Virginia now! Stopped at a gas station in Mt. Nebo for refreshments; it had the cutest diner attached to it.

 West Virginian coffee station. I was pissed when I learned that there was a Sheetz down the street. “Why,” Henry sneered. “You hate their coffee too.” It’s true, but really it’s just their iced coffees. They just always taste so gross to me, like they use Lip Smackers for their flavoring.
  
The bathroom was sketchy upon initial entrance, but the stalls were surprisingly clean and provided great reading material. 

 THREE MORE HOURS.
Idiot Chooch got a bag of BBQ chips and is eating them with open-mouthed panache. YELLING AT HIM HELPS NOT.

9:52: Chooch is sleeping! FINALLY! I’m so excited that I licked Henry’s arm!

10:42: Henry just sped up at the same time someone was creeping up on us from the right lane and I screamed, “STOP TRYING TO RACE HIM! OH GOD, HE MIGHT SHOOT US.”

“Why is he going to shoot us?” Henry (kind of) laughed.

“I don’t know! Maybe he’s in a gang!” I defensively reasoned.

“The pick-up truck gang?” Henry sighed.

IT’S BEEN A LONG DAY. So long that Henry just deliriously whispered, “Bye bye, Guy from Ontario” when some car that Henry recognized as one that passed us twice while we’ve been on this this highway in WV, drove away down the last exit.

10:53: KNUCKLE PUCK, CARRY US HOME. I just want to wash my face. For hours.

11:22: Pennsylvania just welcomed us. One more hour!! I hope henry doesn’t think I’m going to help carry anything into the house. Lol.

11:45: Fuckface Henry stopped “to get gas” at Sheetz so now our arrival has been pushed back to 12:45. WHYYYYYYY, TONYA HARDING???? WHYYYYYYYY? Anyway, I went into Sheetz to pee and Talking Head’s  “Psycho Killer” was playing. I got really paranoid.

12:18AM: Carly Rae Jepsen and her sweet pop sensibilities carrying us down the home stretch.

12:44AM: OK WE’RE HOME GOOD NIGHT.

After acting like moderately civilized humans during the 45-minute tour of Nemacolin Castle, Corey and I were cracking up at the motherfucking wind blowing. I knew that the evening was about to spiral down a giggle hole when we sat in Janna’s car and I read Yelp reviews for local Brownsville establishments that weren’t meant to be funny but were giving us gelastic seizures. We had our heart set on the Chuckwagon because it had wood-paneled walls and looked like the sort of place where the townies would congregate, but they were closed, along with what seemed like every damn restaurant in Brownsville. Then Janna remembered some place she had eaten before near California, PA, which was nearby. She said it was on a hill and overlooked the shitty river, so Corey and I decided that this was the place we were meant to be, and Janna blindly got us there with only one incident.

“How do you know about this place?” I asked suspiciously as the car crunched to a stop in the near-empty lot.

“I don’t know,” Janna shrugged. “I used to be friends with someone who lived out this way and we ate here once.”

I DO NOT EVER REMEMBER HEARING ABOUT THIS PART OF JANNA’S LIFE. So I decided that Janna had a secret life in which she sold drugs in California, PA and then Corey and I cracked up at the thought of Janna rolling around with a beeper. Janna just frowned and didn’t seem to find this funny, probably because it was so close to the truth.

It’s amazing she didn’t push us over this cliff.

We walked into the Highpoint and immediately felt like outlanders. There was one table occupied by two old women, slurping their soup and eying us curiously over top of their spoons. One or two men sat at the bar, and a miserable, middle-aged waitress came over and sat us at a table in the corner. I did not get positive vibes from her and hated Janna for bringing us here. Luckily, though, we had a different, younger, friendlier waitress.

When we all ordered coffee, she smiled and said, “It’s a coffee kind of night.”

Corey waited for her to walk away before spewing laughter. And then I caught the giggle bug, so we sat across from each cracking up at a statement that wasn’t meant to be funny, while Janna continued to scrutinize the menu. After she brought our coffee, I decided that a picture of them was in order, but I waited too long and the waitress was walking back to our table. I panicked and took the picture in haste, not realizing until the last second that the stupid flash was on, so our entire table was illuminated just in time for her to take our order. It was pretty embarrassing, because I totally looked like some douchebag food blogger who was making mental notes to deduct half a star for differing coffee levels in the cups.

I used this picture when I checked in on Facebook, and Corey kept going back to look at it, getting angrier and more disgusted each time.

“I just hate this picture so much,” he said about 30 minutes later, totally changing the subject when Janna was telling us some serious story about her job. “You didn’t even move the straw wrappers!”

“I’M SORRY, BUT I WAS RUSHED!” I cried defensively. I mean, I’m sorry, but I think we all know I can style a fucking Instagram photo of coffee mugs. This wasn’t my best effort! I regret it! If I could have a do-over, I would turn the flash off and clear the fucking table, maybe add a Polaroid frame and some heart bokeh, OK?!

Picture of the loo for Alyson.

I did, thanks.

There was some mystery birthday party going on in a separate dining room and I made Janna go and peek through the door. She said it looked boring, and that people were just kind of walking around and talking to each other. How can I be sure she really did peek in though? THAT’S THE THING. One of the party-goers was an older broad wearing the skankiest boots this side of the Bunny Ranch and I blatantly tried to take her picture before she disappeared into the mysterious dining room.

“Oh god, you didn’t even TRY to hide what you were doing,” Corey gasped. I really didn’t, either. It was almost as though I was drunk, but the last time I checked, my coffee was free of Bailey’s. The picture was blurry anyway, so I guess that’s what I get for being an obvious dickhead.

I ordered from the kids menu, because GRILLED PB&J. The waitress said she didn’t blame me one bit because it’s delicious as fuck. And then sometime after our food was served, I started to choke on this damn sandwich because Corey and I both succumbed to full body mirth-convulsions. I literally had to hold my breath at one point, because every time I laughed, a fat wad of masticated sandwich lodged itself deeper in my throat. I honest to god thought it was about to be a really bad situation, but then I managed to work it back up into my mouth until the laughter subsided. I was turned away from the table and hunched over, my whole face buried in my hands, tears running down my face, while Corey’s bombastic laugh echoed around the near-empty bar and the old women at the next table were probably gawking at us, I’m sure, but luckily Janna was blocking my view of them so I’ll never have to know how disappointed they were in Corey’s and my restaurant etiquette.

Janna just kept eating her dinner like nothing was going on, by the way.

“Janna, you should guest post on my blog,” I suggested.

“No, that’s OK,” she mumbled.

“You can write about what it’s like to hang out with me and Corey!” I cried happily, and then Corey made the restaurant jump with his loud outburst of laughter. Janna sighed.

After dinner, we made Janna drive us through a small cemetery. It was OK.

But the real climax of the night was when Janna needed a nickel at the toll booth and we just lost our fucking minds over it and started Instavid’ing her and taking pictures and she started laughing too after the toll was adequately paid, but she seemed to not really understand what was so funny. I bet she was doing that “If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em” tactic.

#JannaPaystheToll #INeedaNickel

“What made us almost choke on our dinner, anyway?” I mused out loud after we had settled down somewhat.

Corey and Janna said they couldn’t remember and then about an hour it came to me, so I texted Corey: “It was because Janna was talking and I called her an idiot!” and then I started cracking up all over again, except by this point, I was home and Henry was glaring at me.

Last year, Corey and I were going to tour this place about an hour south of Pittsburgh called Nemacolin Castle, but they were closed for Christmas decorating on the weekend we wanted to visit (so we went to Narcisi Winery instead! Whaddup Broad and Roberto!). A few weeks ago, I remembered that this place existed and Corey was like fuck yes, let’s do this. Janna expressed interest too so we reluctantly let her come with us. (Ha-ha, j/k Janna.)

We made Janna drive.

The simple act of signing the guest book, which was displayed on the porch, had Corey and I giggling like idiots, just as the front door swung open by a young woman dressed in period attire (no, like a pioneer dress, not a maxi pad suit of armor). I thought to  myself, “I’m going to make a complete ass of myself in this place, motherfuck.”

“Are you here for a tour?” she asked beneath her bonnet, and we all nodded. Janna was completely normal, but Corey and I were basically giving each other psychic pep talks. IF WE DON’T MAKE EYE CONTACT, WE CAN GET THROUGH THIS.

But then the girl began the tour with a brief history of the Bowman Family, who moved to Brownsville from Maryland, and one of the sons name was NELSON, I almost lost it because the night before at work, stupid Jeannie decided to have an ironic Nelson concert in her office and it was so annoying and then we had to teach TBD Amber about Nelson because she’s too young to know, ugh. So yeah, in my head, I blurted out, “NELSON BAHAHAHA” and had to dig my fingernails into my palms to keep from laughing outright.

The gist of her information was that the mansion started as just the tiny room we were standing in. It was a trading post, and then the Bowman’s came in and made a shit ton of money and just kept building off it. Nelson was the one who added the opulence and the tower. Of course it was Nelson.

The Bowmans were wildly prominent in their day, and were big ballers in the banking industry. Right before the last surviving member of the family died in the 1950s, she asked that the house be turned into a museum, and so the doors have been opened to the public since the 60s. Thank god!

When the intro was finished, we were handed off to an older woman, also in pioneer garb, who led us up a narrow, uneven staircase to the second floor. There were two other people in our group: a girl in her 20s and a 6-year-old boy who was way more well-behaved than my 8-year-old would have been up in that piece. I hope Santa brings that kid lots of presents this year.

The first room we saw was the maid’s quarters. It was really tiny and our guide, whose name I found out later was Bonnie (Corey knew this because he apparently had been obsessing over her the entire time) kept making really strong eye contact with me, like I was the only other person in the room and we had known each other forever, like perhaps she was mom, even. It wasn’t stern at all, like, “I know you’re just some asshole from the Big City coming here to mock my small town.” No, it was actually really friendly, and kind of comforting. But it was here that I accidentally looked at Corey and then I had to turn around swiftly and pretend to be overly-interested in the wavy glass window.

All of my mature, adult friends and Henry will be happy to know that this was the one and only time that Corey and I almost laughed. Because something magical happened after we left the maid’s room: We realized that this was actually a super interesting house!

This bitch was modeling more period clothing.

All of the rooms were decorated for Christmas and, this is saying a lot coming from me, it was really beautiful. Like, every single room took our breath away. I was so into being interested in trundle beds and chimney closets, that I found I didn’t even have time to mock Janna! Not once!

We learned that Brownsville, back in the day, was considered to be the gateway to the west. When Pittsburgh started to become settled, everyone laughed and said that Pittsburgh would NEVER amount to much in terms of big city standards, being so close to the thriving and popular Brownsville and all.

Sorry Brownsville. You lose.

This room was used for wakes! Dead people have laid in this bed!

#bedroomgoals

The story about this bed is that Nelson was in New Orleans visiting someone but I forget who because my attention span is………………………………….

Anyway, whoever it was had this beautiful bed and Nelson, being totally Nelson-ish, was determined to have one of his own. So he hired some bed-maker person and said, “Make me a bed to match this one in terms of stateliness and splendor” (I mean, I imagine he probably said something very similar to that, right?) And because Nelson was a rich sumbitch, he got his damn bed and then put it in a spare bedroom that was reserved only for the Bishop. Nelson, you’re a fucking idiot.

Of course, Nemacolin Castle—named after the area’s Indian chief at the time—is haunted. They offer ghost tours in October. The little boy on our tour kept whispering, “This isn’t scary. When will it get scary?” and his mom or whoever she was kept saying things like, “They had to piss in pots, isn’t that scary enough?”

She didn’t really say that. But I wish she did.

Elaborate light fixtures all up in that hizzy. Don’t worry, Henry: I’ve been storing all of these wonderful interior design ideas in my head.

The piano did not start playing on its own, unfortunately.

I think my favorite part of the tour, knowledge-wise, was when Bonnie told us that back in the day, if you didn’t have enough money to have a full-blown portrait painted of yourself, you could go to a place and literally flip through a rack of stock paintings, pick out one with a dress you like, and the artist would then paint your face and hands onto the generic canvas. This rustic ingenuity was strangely exciting to me. Corey hadn’t heard that part of the tour because he was too busy quilting a meticulous Snapchat story, and I was happy to reiterate because hearing myself say the facts out loud was hugely entertaining.

I am so tickled even right now as I type it on my Internet diary!

See? I can appreciate other people’s beautifully-decorated Christmas trees!

Before we left each and every room, Bonnie would ask, “Are there any questions?” and we’d all just stare at her like drooling dunces. I couldn’t think of a single thing to ask when put on the spot like t hat! I did ask in the beginning if we were allowed to take photos though, because I didn’t feel like undertaking a covert photo shoot on that day. Clearly Bonnie said yes because none of my pictures have parts of my hand or purse in them.  I will say that it was hard to get my dumb iPhone to focus in some of the rooms because of the dim lighting and Christmas lights.

We walked into one of the rooms downstairs and I was like, “Oh my word, it smells heavenly in here!” — if I spoke like a classy Southerner. Instead, I whispered something akin to, “DAAAANG, it stinks rull good in here!” Turns out, it was the WASSAIL that was waiting for us in the next room that was emanating a pleasing stench all through the air.

“Please, help yourself to wassail and cookies,” Bonnie graciously offered in her patented soft, sweet tone, and her eyes actually smiled along with her mouth. I thought smiling eyes were a myth! But Bonnie had them!

Anyhow, it turns out that I’ve been pronouncing wassail wrong my entire life and that also it’s just mulled cider. I mean, it’s delicious! But let’s just call it cider, you know? The cookies were of a Keebler descent, but even still, I regretted that I only took one and not one of each. I also regretted not finding a way to inconspicuously discard  my gum before attempted to eat a chocolate Keebler.

A collection of shit they’ve found around the property.

The tour ended after approximately 45 minutes, when Bonnie deposited us at the entrance of the gift shop. We all stood there awkwardly for literally another 10 minutes because the girl and her kid were blocking the gift shop, which is where the exit was, and Bonnie stood there with her hands clasped in front of her, smiling at us with those crinkly Santa eyes that kept somehow locking with mine so then I feel the need to ask her questions, like, “Is this place haunted?” (I mean, obviously) and make dumb-sounding statements like, “It’s funny that even with all of the additions, the house really….flows” and Bonnie sounded like she agreed with me but then made some comment about how it starts out so primitive on one side and moves on to utter elegance on the other end, which basically was her way of saying, “You’re a fucking moron, there is a clear and harsh distinction from one end of the house to the other.”

I was trying my best, OK?

I’m really glad we decided to give this joint a looksee because it definitely exceeded  my expectations. I don’t know what I thought it was going to be, something lame obviously. But it was actually really interesting and absolutely gorgeous—especially with all of those Christmas trees!

They also serve as a venue for weddings, and the girl on the tour with us was like, “ORLY BECAUSE I’M RECENTLY ENGAGED.” Shut your dumb engaged mouth. I was fine with her until that moment. Bitter McGreenEyes.

We finally got to leave and I wanted to take a photo of Corey and Janna holding their wassail but then Janna threw her empty cup away and when I tried to get her to take it back out of the garbage can, she cried, “But it was empty!” Ugh fine Janna. So I made her hold mine instead and then she was like, “But I wasn’t ready!” Yeah, well, either was your empty cup of wassail!

Nemacolin groupie!

I was so pleased with myself for not making an ass of myself during the tour, but once we outside and away from Bonnie’s smiling eyes, Corey and I acted like idiots and tromped around the property, trying to take pictures of ourselves with the tower in the background, making fun of Brownsville, and willing Janna to slip and fall down the wet hillside, much like she did in Dormont Park on the 4th of July, 2008 when she wound up with mud all over her pants and hand, and Corey and I begged her to reenact it so we could video it.

(She would not oblige.)

While the ghost of Nelson Bowman took this picture of Corey and me, Janna fell to her death in the background.

#jannatakesatumble #gonesoyoung