It was imperative to go back to Dutch Haven the next morning before we left Lancaster. Crybaby Henry wanted to get a piece of shoo-fly pie and Chooch and I wanted souvenirs for our peeps. Plus, I like to look at the windmill on top of the store.

“How many pictures of that do you need!?” Henry cried when I went out front to take another picture. AS MANY AS THE DUTCH GIRL INSIDE OF ME DESIRES, OK FATHER?

I almost bought this Amish bonnet for Andrea because she said she wanted Amish shit, but I just couldn’t decide which one would make her look like the best Chaste Candlemaker. So I got her other Amish shit instead which of course I haven’t mailed yet, because I have a Lazy Sender reputation to uphold.

Chooch so badly wanted a t-shirt of a bunch of cats on the beach. It said “Beach Bums” and the back of the shirt was a picture of the cats’ asses. We literally fought about this shirt in the middle of the store because hello, I’m not buying some stupid beach t-shirt when Lancaster doesn’t even have a beach! Get a courting candle or GTFO kid!!

He ended up getting a little Amish doll magnet — for his TEACHER whom he loves more than me.

Of course, he managed to lose the magnet during his spring break.

Thank god for the Roadside America app or else we would have gotten home about 4 hours earlier than we actually did. There is a ton of tacky shit to see and do along the historic Rt. 30, so I was pretty thankful for our bent wheel keeping us off the turnpike.

One of the things I desperately wanted to do was take a tour of a Shoe House in Hellam, PA. I emailed them a few days beforehand to see if anyone would be around to give us a tour and they said NO. I flew into a rage that night at work. DON’T LIVE IN A HOUSE SHAPED LIKE A SHOE IF YOU’RE NOT GOING TO BE AVAILABLE TO GIVE A TOUR, YOU MOTHERFUCKERS!

I mean….maybe next time.

On our way to Lancaster the day before, we kept seeing signs for Smittie’s Soft Pretzels but never actually found Smittie and his soft pretzels. Near Gettsyburg, the signs began popping up again, but unless Smittie was selling his wares from inside a broke-down van from 1983 (one of the signs was propped up against its hood), there was no sight of any damn pretzels.

Miles later, I screamed, “THERE! ANOTHER SMITTIE’S SIGN!” Henry pulled over down the street and there it was — the elusive pretzel van.

The pretzels were eh.

“They’d be better if they were warm,” Henry lamented. Yeah, what’s up with that, Smitty? Maybe he should have my co-worker Cheryl send out an email for a pretzel warmer contribution drive. She’s really good at collecting money, on par with the paperboy from “Better Off Dead,” at least.

Fuck you and your room temp pretzels, Smitty. You cunt.

Of all places, Henry was the most adamant about stopping at Mister Ed’s.

“Is it going to make us miss Mister Ed’s?” he interrogated me when I mentioned casually some of the other awesome tourist traps I wished to visit. Then I figured out he probably just wanted to see if they had any old-timey candy from his childhood.

We were going to stop there the day before, but they were having some gigantic Easter egg hunt and there were millions of screaming kids and their asshole parents milling about, so we kept on driving and felt extremely thankful that Chooch was sleeping in the backseat, else we’d have never heard the end of it.

So, the story is that Mister Ed has been collecting elephantine things for his entire life, for no good reason. Except that if I had watched the video playing in the small museum, or read any of the signs on the walls, or cared enough to Google, I would probably have way more information to enlighten you guys right now. But the truth is that I stopped reading when I got to “over 5,000 elephant items” because really, what else do I need  to know?

Wait! Lies! I’m telling lies again! I did read that Mister Ed’s had a fire a few years ago and over 2,000 of his elephant thingies perished. He ended up receiving OVER FIVE THOUSAND more in the mail from kind-hearted hoarders all over the world.

Mister Ed’s is basically just a roadside candy & gift shop with way too many stuffed animals for Chooch to beg for. Henry was mad at us for some reason that I forget now so he wouldn’t even stand near us inside the store. We even let him buy himself a Mallo Cup, but he was still being a total Hoover. Then he got mad because I bought a maple cake even though he mumbled, “You’re not going to like that.”

Well guess what? He was right. It was disgusting. But still!

I know. Don’t say it. This is going to be Chooch as an old man, but with tens of thousands of cat curios.

The actual elephant museum was only one room, but it was still worth it. Mister Ed even had the same elephant table as me! Except that his is elephant-colored, not pink. I bought a small Hindu-esque elephant from the gift shop and now I don’t know where I put it.  I also bought a Mister Ed’s magnet and lost that, too.  I always happen to LOSE STUFF after Henry cleans the house.

Ugh, I wish this was for sale!! I’ll just get Henry to make me one, I guess. In lieu of an engagement ring, maybe.

l-r. elphants.

Henry, being miserable. Even in a pachyderm paradise.

That elephant was supposed to talk, but it did NOT.

I was actually able to pay attention to the rest of the tour now that Andrea’s picture was planted, but shit — I was tired of listening to organ music and Dick’s scripted adages. Furthermore, I realized that there was not a single wheelchair in Chuck’s collection. (Excuse me while I pause here and Google “German wheelchairs.”)

(OMG German Shephards in doggy wheelchairs – abort mission. ABORT MISSION!!)

One of my favorite parts of the tour happened about 2 minutes after I took this picture, and that was when Dick started bitching about his failure to wear suspenders that day while hoisting up his ill-fitting pants.

Classic Dick.

Then we listened to a machine that some fools consider to be a “calliope.” Don’t be an ignorant asshole, OK? It’s a band organ. If you don’t know the difference, then get off my fucking lawn.

Calliope. Morons.

Meanwhile, Shelly was  right behind me, sitting at one of the 87 bars, making me all self-conscious and completely paranoid. So I folded my arms and mimicked the facial expressions of the Shoulder-Baring Know-It-All to make it appear that I was Really Into It and hadn’t just committed reverse theft.

The completely-wasted, superfluous wine cellar. When having a wet bar in every room of your house just isn’t enough.

Dick didn’t point out the bottle of Mad Dog this time,which proves he only did that last December in hopes that Andrea would shout, “Mad Dog? Why, that’s my jam!” and then he could take her (and the bottle) up to his creepy, cordoned-off Bayernhof bachelor pad.

The weird, man-made cavern secret passageway that leads from the basement to the indoor pool area is the money shot of the tour. Talk about saving the best for last.  Fuck all those weird fake Calliope things!

I wonder how many of Chuck’s old party guests fornicated down in there.

Shit, son!

I can’t express how badly I want to swim in this pool. I might even write some poetry about it.

Um, of course there’s a gnome-covered bar in the pool area.

Yeah, that’s what I thought too, until Dick caught me giggling, sighed tiredly and said, “They’re shoeing a horse.”

At the very end of the tour, Dick had Shelly pass out a basket of comment cards.

“And if you’d like to volunteer and do what Shelly does, please leave your contact information on the back of the card,” Dick added, and I practically pushed people into the pool in my mad dash for a comment card.

Like there was going to be any shortage.

At first, I panicked when I realized every single person was filling out a card, but I think I was the only one awesome enough to volunteer my door-shutting, eagle-eyed services.

“You sure you want to do this?” Shelly asked, and I jumped a little, not realizing she had sidled up that close to me.

“Why?” I asked, with a nervous laugh, half-expecting her to clamp some kind of edelweiss-branded handcuff on me and hauling me off for questioning, where I would be forced to admit my picture frame deviancy while fake calliopes blasted out my ear drums from all angles.

“Well, some people can be annoying,” she whispered and then just as I was sure she meant me, she smiled and I realized she was clearly referring to Shoulder-Baring Know-It-All.

But…probably Dick.

Shelly ended up being pretty cool. I know this because I shook her hand and it was pretty cool.

***

Later that night, I was excitedly telling Henry about my dreams of spending more time at the Bayernhof, getting to know the real Dick (his name is apparently Tony, who knew? I guess everyone who was actually paying attention), and just otherwise immersing myself in weird German crap.

“Yeah, until he finds that picture and goes back and watches the tapes,” Henry said smugly, dashing my dreams.

The upstairs is where shit really gets crunk. Taxidermied birds singing in a cage? Random, out-of-place collection of baseball caps? Humongous Hummels and remote-controlled bathtubs?

All upstairs, baby.

Corey, up to his eyeballs in Bavarian sights.

Kristy, procuring decorating tips for her Zombie Lounge.

This guy would rather be drinking micro brews while listening to Gaslight Anthem.

The balcony from which Andrea contemplated swan-diving last year.

The game room!

This one girl in our group (pictured above) reminded me so much of Andrea because she had the face of a person contemplating suicide. Her male companion was equally solemn, but later I heard them ambivalently mumble to each other about how the Bayernhof was cool, so that was when I realized they were actually just hipsters.

Dick didn’t seem nearly as enamored with the Andrea Knockoff. In fact, he didn’t even force her to take a fortune from the fortune teller machine like he did to Andrea last year.

Speaking of Andrea, in the French-decorated guest room, I pulled the framed picture of her out of my purse and contemplated leaving it on the dresser I was standing next to, but then I made eye contact with Depressed Teenager. Before I had a chance to slip it back into my purse, Dick turned off the phonograph that was holding everyone enrapt, sending everyone’s attention back toward the door, and I was forced to carry the picture with me into the master bedroom.

I noticed a security camera in the corner of the ceiling, pointed right at me, so I was too afraid to put the picture back in my purse for fear of it looking like I was stealing, but carrying it around in my hand looked just as suspicious, if you ask me. I really wanted to leave it on the bedside table, next to the photo of Chuck and his buxom German fraulein, and so I planned it that I would be the last to the leave the room when Dick led everyone into the master kitchen/bar.

However, Shelly the Muscle slinked over to the doorway of the master bedroom and leaned up against it, Roadhouse-style. I was convinced that she had made me her mark, so now I was starting to perspire slightly on top of darting my eyes around in a paranoid fit.

I filled Kristy in on my plan right before we climbed the steep staircase to the Bayernhof observatory. (Corey mentioned later that he felt like he was in a game of Clue and I just can’t imagine why.)

Shelly followed us up to the observatory too, I guess to make sure no one tried to steal the $20,000 (and probably 20,000 lb) telescope. I actually wasn’t aware that she came up there with us until she apparated from nowhere to Vanna Whitely gesticulate at something Dick was going on about.

Her mere presence was making me fidget with the picture frame until I eventually snapped off the flap on the back. I tried to whine to Kristy about it, but it was at the exact moment we were walking past the 87th bar inside the house, so unless I was saying, “Do you want that on the rocks?” I don’t think she was listening.

In the master bathroom, Shoulder-Baring Know-It-All made some kind of racy comment about having a party in the bath tub, and according to Corey, a brief sign of life flashed across Surly Hipster Girl’s face in response. Of course, I missed all of that because I was too busy silently melting down over where to place Andrea’s picture, and HOW.

Meanwhile, Corey got the giggles and I was trying to stave off my innate desire to gang-laugh with him.

After Dick gave us enough visuals of Chuck’s bathtime routine to produce a Kubrick-helmed cinematic saga  in our heads, he pulled on a long floor mirror which opened to reveal the first of several secret passages, which is of course my favorite part of the house and momentarily distracted me from my photo-placing panic.

Chuck’s Nixon-centric office. I don’t remember this lady in the photo, which means she must not have been annoying.

Shelly didn’t follow us down the secret staircase into the office! I thought I heard Dick mumble something about her having to go and pick up her husband, so I became extremely hopeful and even unclenched a little.

I was the lucky one who got to descend the secret staircase from the office into the boardroom right behind Dick’s ass. We entered the room and Dick found that one of the closet doors was open.

“Chuck must have been in here again,” Dick said with a laugh.

Oh shit, I wanted to murder him with ghost questions, but everyone else had filed into the room by then, and god forbid anyone interrupt Dick’s meticulously memorized spiel.

I have no idea what everyone is looking at because obviously I was too busy taking pictures. I do love how everyone has their arms folded accordingly.

After learning about how the boardroom was essentially one collosal waste of money and space considering Chuck didn’t even have a board, we exited through another secret doorway, into the basement bar.

Attached to the basement bar room is a small canning room, full of industrial cooking equipment which Chuch only used once — to make sauerkraut. Dick let everyone pile into the room while he stood near the doorway, rambling on about the specs of the room, yet conveniently leaving out the part about how it was used to butcher people.

With Shelly nowhere in sight, and me being the last one to exit the canning murder den, I figured this might be my best chance to dump Andrea’s likeness. I quickly conferred with Kristy and Corey who agreed that I should just drop it like it’s hot.

So I did, but not without first clanking it against that glass straw holder and fumbling to make it stand without the aid of the little flap I broke off earlier.

When I emerged from the claustrophic canning room, I saw that Shelly had returned. I’m sure that if she or Dick had asked me a question at that moment, the word “Guilty” would have blurted out of me like the “cuckoo” from a clock.

Shelly squeezed past me and headed straight for the canning room. I held my breath, expecting her to come marching out with Andrea’s portrait, shaking her fist in my face, getting Dick so riled up that his suspenders break. When I imagine Dick losing his temper, and I immediately think of the Caterpillar from Alice In Wonderland.

Turns out Shelly didn’t even go inside the canning room; she was just closing the door.

Total adrenaline rush for the rest of the  tour. (Yes, there’s one more part. Sorry!)

Apparently, whoever lived in this cell was well-behaved enough to be given his own TV, what the hell?

After getting a load of the maximum security North Hall digs, the cells in the “moderately bad guy” hall almost looked livable. According to Wiki, “[t]he fate of the prison was sealed in a 1986 ruling by the West Virginia Supreme Court which stated that the 5 x 7-foot  cells were cruel and unusual punishment.” Nine years later, the prison peaced out when all the inmates were moved to a larger facility in a nearby town.

Volunteers got to be locked inside the cells. Of course, Chooch was all over this. I only wish they’d have kept him longer.

The guide told us that on one of her tours, a man was taking pictures of his wife and daughter in one of the cells, but every time he looked at the pictures on his camera, the cell was empty.

The guide said she saw the pictures herself and could confirm that his wife and daughter were not appearing in the photos. A girl in our tour group lunged for that cell immediately after hearing the story, but the phenomenon must be particular because she showed up in all of the pictures.

Ghost shit never happens when I’m around!

Another outdoor area where the general population criminals could exercise and, I don’t know, mill about? Lay on their backs and look at the clouds?

There’s a chapel out there, and a bathroom, the wall of which had to be knocked down after an inmate was killed in there.

Entrance to the Sugar Shack. This was an area in the basement where the inmates could go during inclement weather, but they entered at their own risk. They were completely unsupervised down there, and even though there’s no record of anyone actually dying, it’s still considered the most haunted area of the prison, due to all of the violence and suffering that occurred in there. We didn’t get to go inside during our tour, which means I’m going to have to go back and take one of the ghost hunt tours, so if anyone wants to join me, holla atcha girl.

Old Sparky! I think he speaks for himself.

The museum room was fascinating. I think I want to decorate my future invisible house with prisoner art work. I mean, I already have a small collection thanks to my death row pen pal’s penchant for abstract water coloring.

(I shouldn’t be concerned that he painted a nude of me, right?)

Next possible Christmas card in the series…

Chooch seemed particularly interested in the weapon wall. Go figure.

My favorite part of Moundsville is its connection with Charles Manson.

Manson grew up in this area, and his mom was even imprisoned there when Manson was a kid. So he wrote a letter to the warden, asking for permission to be transferred so he could be closer to his childhood home. He also thought he would be treated better there.

The warden’s response was a simple yet effective, “It’d be a cold day in Hell.”

Can you imagine how different Moundsville’s history would be if Manson’s wish was granted? He would have taken control of that prison right off the Aryan Nation and god only knows what would have happened next.

Anyway, I pointed to Manson’s picture and asked Chooch if he recognized him. He looked at me like I was a dummy and said, “Um, yeah. He’s the guy on your cards.”

That night, Chooch watched some of Manson’s interviews on my phone. It was a really awesome bonding moment for us. Thank you, Moundsville!

The warden and his family used to occupy the top floor of this section, and supposedly the ghost of some broad is sometimes spotted in one of the windows. (OUR GUIDE HERSELF HAS EVEN SEEN IT, WHAAAAT.)

For only being the beginning of November, it sure was fucking nipply up in that pen. I never knew this, though it seems pretty obvious, but there was no heat or A/C for the inmates in this prison. They roasted like pigs in their tiny cells during the summer and turned into frozen predator pops in the winter. However, a new cafeteria was built shortly before the prison closed for good. It was part of a deal that the Governor struck with the inmates during the last hostage-situation riot that took place there in the 80s: the new cafeteria would be the only room in the prison with heat and air conditioning. Danny Lehman, president of the bike gang the Avengers and the inmate responsible for striking the deal, was murdered in the North Hall by the Aryan Nation before ever getting to see his cafeteria completed.

Our guide talked about Danny Lehman A LOT. I think she had a crush on him.

(I looked up his picture. He was pretty OK looking.)

The new cafeteria has some pretty sweet paintings upon its cinder blocked walls. They were all painted by the same inmate, who was color blind (shout out to my color-stupid brother!) so he had another inmate mix the paint for him and included his name on the paintings, too. Sounds kind of un-prisonly to me.

Who knew jail birds could be fair.

The guide let us explore the kitchen area without her, so that tells me either there is nothing to note in that area, or the paranormal perils are so plentiful that the guides are like, “Y’all go on ahead and poke around in there if you want while I stand out here close to the exit.”

Anyone who knows me knows that I have this condition where I need to write my name everywhere, on everything, all of the time. Restaurant place mats. Scratch paper at work. In Henry’s underwear. On sidewalks in chalk. Under the mattresses of the people I stalk. I think it’s called megalomania. Solipsism. Egocentrism.

Maybe a pretty perfume of all three, with notes of narcissism.

You best believe I dirtied my finger in that prison grit to leave behind my name.

If I was a tattoo artist, I’d sign my name to everyone’s motherfucking skin.

Bitch, try and stop me.

View of the yard through the cafeteria window. Apparently, nothing of note ever happened in the new cafeteria, but they had emergency tear gas running up through the rafters just in case shit got cray.

Tried to get Chooch to eat this.

We got to check out the yard after poking around the cafeteria.

All the way back in that corner was a tiny bullpen set up for the inmates who were in protective custody, mostly murderers and rapists of children.

Attention: Parents of Young Kids! If you’re not ready to broach such heavy topics, perhaps a tour of a penitentiary can wait a few more years.

The words “rape” and “rapist” were slung around so much during this tour that it’s a fucking miracle Chooch didn’t raise his hand and ask what the fuck it means.

Hopefully this doesn’t mean he already knows.

The blue building is where some of the inmates got to make a month making license plates.

Some of them would smuggle parts of the machines out, like tiny screws and stuff, and then throw them over the fence at the maximum security inmates out in the bullpen playing basketball with each others heads. Then those guys would do ungodly things to be able to sneak their newly acquired weapon-making contraband past the guards.

Some would even cut their arms and slip this shit in there, oh my fucking god.

But I guess at that point in your life, what’s a little prick, right?

Ninety-four men were executed in Moundsville. Eighty-five of those were hanged from 1899-1949, and the other nine were electrocuted after one of the inmates constructed an electric chair for the prison. (He then had to be put in protective custody. Duh.)

Hangings were viewed by a public bleacher section until 1931, when the rope decapitated its victim. Can you imagine dressing little Susie in her Sunday’s best and sitting on bleachers eating Cracker Jacks while some fucker was lynched in front of you?

Actually, I kind of can.

And that fucker is Henry.

Chooch has been obsessed with prisons thanks to season 3 of The Walking Dead, so I thought it would be fun to take him to the old State Pen in Moundsville, WV last weekend for a tour. Henry acted all put-out about it, but you know he was in there flexing his fake muscles during the tour, fantasizing about being a prison guard.

This was one of the bloodiest prisons in America, and all those paranormal shows have had episodes revolving around it. The prison itself offers ghost tours, which is what I really wanted to do but figured I would start out with the historical tour so that my 6-year-old doesn’t get too fucked up.

I took a ton of pictures with my phone and camera, so this is going to have to be done in parts.

Entering the North Hall.

North Hall: where the most savage inmates were kept. Chooch is absolutely obsessed with two inmates, Red and Rusty, who were held in this hall. Red was stabbed 37 times by Rusty in 1992.

Even in broad daylight, with a group of about 15, you just couldn’t shake that foreboding sensation. I lingered a few times while taking pictures, and then did a super-frantic scramble back to the group.

I think Chooch sat in every cell.

It’s hard to imagine spending 23 hours a day in that tiny cell. I’m fairly positive I wouldn’t last a night. Especially not without my PHONE, god forbid.

I have a pen pal on death row in Florida. It makes me wonder what his cell is like. I don’t think I ever asked him in the 10 years we’ve corresponded!

If Henry was a prison guard, he’d be the first son of a bitch to get shanked in a cafeteria riot and you know it. And let’s not even think about his fate as an actual inmate. Can you imagine how fast he’d wind up as some hick biker’s Mary?

Actually, he’s probably felt like an inmate for the last eleven years now that I think about it.

Part of this door was turned into a shiv after an inmate patiently worked on it with a cigarette lighter. (Seems kind of stupid to me that they were once allowed to have lighters on them, but hey — what do I know.)  Inmates are the worst kinds of MacGyvers.

Ha-ha-ha, glory hole! (Glory triangle?) Apparently, two North Hall inmates were pretty intimate with each other. This was my favorite part!

Can you imagine all the Jonny Craig graffiti I’d have in my jail cell?

The door to this cell had to be cut to accommodate an inmate in a wheelchair. On the day he was being transferred to a new facility, he got up out of his wheelchair and walked out.

The Wheel House — a large iron-barred revolving door in the Administration Building used to transport prisoners from one area to another. This is basically what Chooch looked like during the whole tour – he never stopped moving. For a change though, he wasn’t being too annoying. He was just super stimulated and interested in everything the guide was saying.

Still, I was thankful that our guide seemed like a kid person. Chooch kept ditching us to walk with her.

There was definitely something different about the New Vrindaban community when Seri and I left the Temple, and then it hit me: the grounds were empty. There weren’t any kids on the playground or climbing all over the giant plaster elephant. No one was milling about in the courtyard or strolling along the lake.

It was just us.

And the 18 pounds of food playing Tetris in my stomach.

We sat underneath a lakeside gazebo for a few minutes, admiring the view and hypothesizing if we could ever get Henry and Pete to come back with us and rent one of the cabins on the edge of the woods.

Because that’s not a horror script that’s been written 87 times.

The lake was so serene. There was a swan at the other end and I tried to focus on that and not the 30-foot dancing acolyte statues in the distance, which were sincerely making me nervous.

Jonny Craig was there, too!

I was afraid that if we sat there any longer, we’d end up seeing something we wouldn’t be able to unsee, like a murder, so I suggested we keep walking. We kept hearing loud plops along the edge of the lake, and I was so sure it was a large frog so we both edged our closer to the water JUST IN TIME TO ALMOST STEP ON A LARGE SNAKE AS IT SLITHERED BACK INTO THE WATER. And then Erin and Seri, as animated by Hannah-Barbara, screamed and did their best unintentional cartoon run back up to the path.

That might have been my most religious moment there.

Shaking off that disgusting brush with nature, we continued walking down the path—albeit with our hands on our hearts— toward the large gazebo-like structure on the lake.

“Can we go in there?” Seri asked, but I was already trampling down the gravel-path to the door. I figured, as honorary Hare Krishnas, we were allowed to open any door we pleased. [Cue Pandora’s Box parable.]

I actually screamed a little when my eyes adjusted to the darkness and I saw a big ass swan boat staring back at me.

There was a throne-type structure built above the seat of the boat, which made me think this was reserved for special occasions, like Anglo-sacrifices. Boxes of fireworks lined the boat house walls, and I considered snagging some but with my luck, the swan would spring to life. Meanwhile, Seri was trying to get inside the boat and I very honestly said to her, “Look, if you fall in, I can’t promise that I’ll come in after you.”

Not now that I knew there were snakes in that water.

Leaving the boathouse, I finally realized what this place reminded me of. “The Wicker Man.” And not that shitty Nicolas Cage remake, either. Yes, everything was beautiful, but it came with an artificial, uncomfortable quality.

Plus, it was in the hills of West Virginia.

And teeming with Hare Krishnas.

Just then, we noticed that the peach-robed conch-blowing priest was standing further down on the path, watching us.

“We didn’t do anything wrong!” I said to Seri. “Just act normal.” Which means we continued walking with suspicious mannerisms illuminated by a beacon of guilt.

The peacock enclosure was next, so we were distracted by that for awhile, until I turned around and saw that he was following us at this point. So we continued on, across a small bridge, right smack into the feet of the dancing acolytes.

Are you kidding me?! Tell me these things don’t come alive at night.

This is basically what everything there looked like up close: cracked, broken, decrepit. What was once meant to be a flourishing testament to their gods and Swami was now grossly depreciating. Even the boathouse was full of cobwebs, and the swan boat was chipped and looked more scary than regal. It wasn’t hard to imagine this being the setting for tragedy and murder in the 1980s, when Swami P-dawg’s successor had fanatic cult members commit murders for him. Twenty years later, and it must still be hard for the community to shake that stigma, considering that’s the reason why Henry wanted no part of this little day trip. Of course none of this stuff is mentioned during the tour, though.

Chugging the blood of sacrificial white girl lambs, it’s what keeps them pacified.

And then Seri called Pete to tell him that we were being chased by who she thought was the Dalai Lama, who at that point was meditating in the grass by the boat house. I was actually offended that he wasn’t really trying to chase us down to convert us. Who wouldn’t want two nervous white girls? Seri could arts-n-crafts that bitch up! And I could….eat their food? Start a New Vrindiban blog? Teach them about Jonny Craig?

At that point, we had been there close to 4 hours, so we mutually agreed it was time to leave. Rather than backtrack and have to walk past the meditating priest, we opted instead to climb a hill back to the main road. It was a great ascent with my food luggage in tow. I didn’t want to die at all.

Somehow, we still managed to spend another hour back at the Palace grounds, admiring the rose garden and sitting by the lotus pond. On the way back to the car (to grab my unicorn mask; Seri promised she would pose in it!), we passed the cashier from the gift shop who exclaimed, “You girls are still here!?” Which made me realize that it had been about two hours since Henry had last heard from me and it didn’t occur to him to check in to make sure I hadn’t been slain. Thanks for loving me, Henry.

On the way back to Pittsburgh, we both agreed that this was totally worth it and that we would definitely return. Probably with more animal masks.

***

The next morning, I received a voicemail from someone named Jay Sree of New Vrindaban, claiming to have found my wallet, which I didn’t even know I had lost. She described it as “black, with a heart that has a picture of a young girl in it.” Definitely sounded like my iCarly pocketbook. I called Henry to tell him and he immediately got all disgusted and spat, “You were probably pick-pocketed!”

Luckily, I had my debit card at the bottom of my purse, because I’m so lazy when it comes to putting it back in my wallet. Ugh, all that zipping and tucking? So exhausting. So the only thing in my wallet that I really needed was my drivers license. When I returned the call, I spoke with a man at the Palace who sighed and said, “Yes, it is here in Lost and Found.” He sounded disappointed in me, like an Indian Henry.

It arrived in the mail several days later, and I was crestfallen to see that they didn’t slip in any religious pamphlets or sign-up vouchers. WHY DON’T THEY WANT ME!?

 Swami P-Dawg, chillin’ in the Temple. Seri swore she saw him breathing.

I almost needed rolled across the yard into the Temple after winning the blue ribbon in my Lunch Buffet Bender Championship, in which I competed against no one. I couldn’t even stand entirely erect, so I’m sure all the community residents were thinking, “Sri Krishna, get a load of this lazy white American, how disrespectful that she comes here and demoralizes our cuisine with her trash-mouth and then slouches in your presence.”

Which is still worlds more respectful than the time my friend Brian took me to this tiny but intense chapel called the Burning Bush and first I got all resistant when I saw that I had to take my shoes off, and then I laughed out loud at a man lying prostrate on the floor in front of the altar; Brian kindly asked me to wait outside. Afterward, in the parking lot,  I realized I left my keys inside the chapel. Brian physically blocked the door with his entire body and hissed, “No! I’ll get them. YOU WAIT OUT HERE!” This is a story for another day.

Like the Burning Bush, we were asked to remove our shoes before entering the Temple. This time, I did so without acting like a Riot Grrl. Look at me, getting all mature!

Inside, a little Indian boy ran over to me and shoved a yellow flower in my face.

“Aw, thank you!” I said as I started to take the flower from him.

He snatched it back and said, “No! Just smell it,” and stuffed it back into my face, which still had Indian spices seeping out the pores. Thanks for making me feel like an asshole in front of all of your gods, kid.

And then of course I sniffed it like I was doing a bunny bump of Special K (which is probably the only way I’d ever make it to India); Krishna-forbid I do anything gracefully.

There were only a handful of worshipers inside, watching a peach-robed Hare Krishna fan the tableau of deities with peacock feathers while chanting the official Hare Krishna mantra, the words of which can be found all over the grounds. (But I still, to this day, remember it after learning it in high school.

) There were other words to the chanting as well, but we couldn’t tell what he was saying. It was monotone, yet fascinating. We followed the example of the other visitors and sat Indian-style on the cold floor.

Seri kept asking me questions about what was happening, and I was like, “I don’t know. I’m Catholic.” I know it’s hard for her to believe that I don’t actually know everything, and that’s one of the many reasons I keep her around. I’m practically her Swami.

After he was done with his prayers, he blew numerous times into a large conch shell. It was equal parts horrific, annoying and completely captivating. I felt all spiritual and cleansed. Except that my stomach still felt like an Indian food clown car.

“What do you think that means?” Seri asked when he finally ran out of breath on the last shell-blow.

“I don’t know. I’m Catholic,” I reminded her gently, making a mental note to add Hare Krishna for Dummies to her Christmas wish list. Where was our Palace of Gold tour guide when we needed her? (Taking a joy ride on an ATV, we’d later find out. It was probably bought with donations guilted out of us dumb Christian tourists.)

(I can’t believe I just called myself that.)

I do not know what these crazy anime-looking things are, but if I was promised shit like this to look at, I would definitely start going to church more often. (Scratch the “more often” part of that last sentence.)

While we were permitted to take pictures inside the Temple, there were signs everywhere that asked us to please not stand with our backs toward the deities.

“Are we supposed to walk backwards when we leave then?

” Seri asked sincerely. Good question.

Nowhere inside the Palace of Gold lobby could I find even a footnote about the cafeteria. I thought this was pretty strange, because eating is important, especially since we were in the hills of West Virginia and would probably have to skin a groundhog or worse – a Miley Cyrus fan – if we wanted to replenish all the energy we exerted being faux-spiritual in some dead Indian’s palace. What kind of establishment doesn’t post all kinds of ephemera directing visitors to their cafeteria?

I wasn’t leaving that joint without having my fat, heretic mouth fed the food of Krishna. I waited for the annoying redneck with the baby oiled-hair daughter to suck up by donating $10 to the repair fund, and then I sidled up to our shorn-headed guide and, in a tone reserved for a man inquiring about a happy ending, asked, “So, where’s the cafeteria?”

She seemed slightly surprised, I guess because most whities get their fill of the Palace and all of its splendors and then go back home to eat real food at McDonald’s. But not these whities. We didn’t just drive 80 miles from Pittsburgh for a 30 minute tour without ingesting some sort of edible souvenir.

“The cafeteria isn’t located in the Palace. It’s down by the temple and lodging,” she explained.

“Ok,” I replied, not about to be deterred. “Is it walkable?” She said it was only a quarter of a mile down the street and come on, this is the #7-ranked Walking Challenge Specialist in Pittsburgh, PA. A quarter of a mile ain’t shit.

But first we stopped at the gift shop, where the middle-aged cashier was talking to her friend on the phone the entire time (Seri said they were talking about someone having a mistress; I was too busy trying to keep my eyeballs from aooga‘ing over all the baubles) and had the audacity to ask if I could pay with cash instead of credit because she didn’t want to get off the phone. That doesn’t seem like something Sri Krishna would want his peoples to do.

I paid with my credit card.

Seri and I got matching bracelets to celebrate our independence from our men-folk! The only man for me is Swami P-dawg, anyway.

We walked the short distance down the street, passing nothing but fields, and then cows, before arriving at what I guess was New Vrindiban’s city center. We had to ask about the cafeteria one more time before finding it on the other side of the Lodge and a small playground occupied by happy Krishnan children. (Krishnan is probably completely incorrect but it sounds so, so right.)

Finally, we stumbled upon the open-door to Govinda’s Restaurant and walked in RIGHT BEHIND MY INDIAN ENEMY from the tour. God, I would have thought he had been halfway home on his high horse by then.

We walked into the cafeteria and were immediately met with a strong sense of awkward. The West Virginian red necks had probably bailed on the cafeteria in favor of Jeb’s pig roast, so that just left me and Seri as the outsiders. But I refused to be chased away by racial discomfort. Not on an empty stomach, anyway.

Turns out the secret mystery food of the Hare Krishnas is your regular Indian fare. How did it not occur to me that this was just going to be Indian food? I’m not sure what I thought it was going to be, but I was definitely hoping for some gold-plated pudding at least.

Still, I could be content with Indian food, especially since the last 87 times I suggested it to Henry, I was denied. What’s a girl gotta do to suck down some curry?

Drive 80 miles and consider converting to a new religion, apparently.

Seri, not being a big fan of Indian cuisine, was not as content with the Hare Krishna offerings, though. However, there were traditional American items on the menu too, for all the honky posers who are driven there by the power of George Harrison’s seminal hit “My Sweet Lord;” things like pizza and grilled cheese.

There was no organization to the ordering system, so we just kind of stood in the middle of the cafeteria like two maladroit dummies, until I finally had the foresight to approach the counter. Seri followed me, for I am her leader.

Too bad INDIAN DICK  beat us there and proceeded to naan-block us while scribbling out his family of five’s order. (There was a teenage boy with them who evidently skipped the tour of the Palace in favor of sexting his boo. WWSP-DD?)

(What Would Swami P-Dawg Do? Obviously.)

But then I made eye contact with the guy behind the counter who had a head tattoo. I wasn’t about to piss around with the menu so I just ordered the lunch buffet. Since Hare Krishnas are vegetarians, I felt confident in my decision. Finally, I could eat the shit out of a buffet without accidentally biting into bull testicle.

Part of the buffet had just been taken back into the kitchen when we arrived because I think they were getting ready to switch to the dinner selections, so Head Tattoo told me, “I will just prepare plate for you.” You don’t argue with a man with a head tattoo, even if he bears an uncanny resemblance to Aziz Ansari. (He totally didn’t. I just wanted to see if your Racism Bell tolled.)

While we waited, Seri watched a man eating alone behind us. “What’s that?” she asked me, pointing to a plate in the middle of his table.

“I don’t know. Maybe like some kind of pot pie or something?” I shrugged. It turned out it was naan. In my defense, my eyes are REALLY BAD.

Head Tattoo came back with two full trays. “Oh,” I started. “I ordered the buffet for myself—”

“No! It’s OK. I’ll take it,” Seri said as she retrieved the tray. When in New Vrindiban, eat like New Vrindibanians. I was infinitely proud of her for that.

The non-head-tattooed cashier told me there was a $10 minimum for credit cards, so I told her to add a mango lassi.

“How do you know what that is?” Seri whispered.

“Because I’ve eaten in Indian restaurants before,” I whispered back, hoping that she wouldn’t expose my Caucasian roots.

“Yeah, but how did you know to order that?!” she persisted.

“Because I saw it on the menu!” I hissed under my breath, so INDIAN DICK wouldn’t catch wind of the cracker bitch trying to play like a seasoned lassi drinker. God, that was all I needed was for him to smirk at me.

Indian food is some of the most visually disgusting slop this side of homemade baby food. But Krishnadamn, is it good. And Seri appreciated the nod to the Western World the buffet gave by providing a vat of pasta. Our naan order was up at the same time as INDIAN DICK’S teenage son’s. Seri said he tried to argue with Head Tattoo because our plate had four pieces as opposed to his two-piece plate, at which point Head Tattoo gave him a lesson in counting. “That’s because THEY have TWO buffets,” he supposedly said. I say “supposedly” because who knows if we can believe Seri. We go to the high school track at night and she thinks she sees armadillos and crashing planes.

INDIAN DICK, above the Pepsi can. Even blurred, I can still tell he’s a dick.

“I COULD LIVE HERE,” I moaned, shoveling food into my fat mouth with my naan-shovel. Seri ate slowly and like a normal human not competing in a speed-eating contest. I envy that about her. But the one thing we had in common in that cafeteria is that our faces were both melting off above that tray of food. Hot flash city.

“I’m never leaving!” I texted Henry.

“The Palace?” he replied.

“No, the CAEFETERIA.”

And Seri tried everything on her plate and even liked most of it! (You’re welcome, Pete.) As usual, I ate faster than my stomach could handle and wound up pregnant with paneer and rice. What a stinky baby that would be. Halfway in, my stomach was expanding and the waistband of my jeans were waving the white flag, but I still kept eating because I drove 80 miles for this and by George Harrison, I was eating my fill even if it meant perforating my stomach lining. I really thought I was hungrier than I actually was.

Seri kept trying to rush me out of the cafeteria, probably because she knew I was 2 spoonfuls away from having my stomach pumped, but I was like, “Hello, can I finish my mango lassi? Krishna!”

In the temple afterward, not only did I come close to gilding a deity tableau with my vomit, but I apparently donated my entire iCarly wallet as well.

When making weekend plans with Seri, we tossed around the idea of going to the craft store, maybe a cemetery.

Or!

We could go to Prabhupada’s Palace of Gold in West Virginia, I hinted.

My suggestion was met with a resounding “Yes.” A day at an Appalachian Hare Krishna compound? Who could say no to that?! (Don’t answer that.)

The Palace is located in its own town of New Vrindiban, just outside of Wheeling; it’s reached by a series of seemingly infinite winding country roads, the kinds with curves so sharp it makes you think you’re going to plummet into a gorge if you do anything more than 15 MPH. (In other words, do not drive while receiving BJs on this stretch of asphalt, my friends.) It was farm house, cemetery, church, farm house, cemetery, church, farm house, cemetery, church for 8 miles. But it was OK, because I made a CD full of Chiodos, Circa Survive and Sade especially for this trip.

(You’re welcome, Seri.)

My gas light went on literally right as we passed what would be the last legit gas station for miles and miles; I was a little worried, but for most of the drive we were behind a rusty pick up truck, the bed of which was occupied by a lawn mower and a teenage boy, and I was sure they had a gas can in there somewhere, too. (I mentioned at one point that I thought the kid was pretty hot, and Seri rejected my opinion.) The further along this road we traversed, the more sure I was that we weren’t going to be stumbling upon a gas station any time in the near future and once we broke down, probably all of the men in the pick up truck were going to eschew rescuing us in favor of raping us and making us cook them sloppy joes for the rest of our lives.

Eventually, the curvy country road turned into a pot-holed path coiling through the wooded hillside; we promptly lost service on our phones right after Seri called Pete to see how long we could sustain with the gas light on.

(For the record, he told us we were fine, but I think that’s because he wanted to laugh at us after our ride home to Pittsburgh in the back of Henry’s juice van.)

I decided to defy Pete and turned around in the gravel driveway of someone who certainly had at least two decomposed bodies propped up on milk crates in their basement and was definitely sitting in stretched out underwear on a stained futon, skinning a possum for tonight’s pot roast, and drove back to the first curvy road where we had passed a small, no-name, one-pump gas station.

(You’re welcome, Henry.)

It was the kind of gas station where the overall-clad attendant blows into a ram horn to alert the nearby hill-dwellers that city folk are on their way, get yer slingshots ready and yer inbred dicks lubed.

Except that this gas station accepted credit cards. But that probably just means they’d use a phone instead of the rams horn.

The old lady clerk had to come outside and help me pump my gas, at which point the entire pump started churning and clanging, like there were tiny mountain men inside of it, peddling wooden unicycles to make the gas spurt out of the hose.

I should probably check my bank account at some point to make sure I didn’t get overcharged so some West Virginian gas shanty could buy a new sign for the shop.

Or, you know, a sign.

We headed back to the curvier, hillbillier of the two roads. This time it was four miles of trailer, forest , abandoned house, trailer, forest, abandon—OMG DEER!

, pot hole, trailer. (Roadkill is implied.) We were basically writing Tobe Hooper’s next movie for him.

(You’re welcome, Tobe Hooper.)

(Please get Elizabeth Olsen to play me.)

One last curve in the road and there it was, the Palace of Gold. We entered a door at the far end of some strange wall that looked like it belonged on a Spanish villa, not some Taj Mahal knock-off, and crunched across the long gravel walkway until we reached the steps to the palace.

And that was our first indication that the palace, while a gilded architectural fairy tale from the road, was actually in quite a state of disrepair.

It’s not like I have some vested interest in televisions, but going to the Early Television Museum seemed like a perfectly acceptable way to spend a chilly, overcast Sunday in March.

Even if it meant driving 3+ hours to the small town of Hilliard outside of Columbus, OH. Nothing weird about that, or the fact that Henry had to keep putting me and my petulant attitude in check, or the fact that nearly every one of my senses was drop-kicking me straight back into the hands of 2005.

I was just there to see some vintage fucking TV sets. Goddammit.

Our current TV is about three years away from being quite at home here.

Andrea would have hated this place because it was an unguided tour. The aging hippie at the front desk took our donation and was basically like, “I don’t give a shit what you do. Touch whatever you want.” And that is exactly what Chooch did — touched every button on every TV. (OK, I did too.)

I can’t remember the last time Jonny Craig sounded so loud in my head, even around the constant hum and squelch of vintage television.

Some buttons actually were off-limits. Thank god there were cameras in every room to make sure that we didn’t touch anything/anyone we weren’t supposed to be touching.

Oh look! It’s Henry standing amongst televisions from his own era!

“I like your shirt.”

“Thanks, I bought it after you quit talking to me.”

When I was five-years-old, there were only three TV channels and I ate sardines straight from the can! Henry to Chooch, who fucked around with his “new iPhone” all day.

For all my clown-lovahs out there.

World’s first clicker aka remote,  I think.

GERMAN TV!

PURPLE TV!

I was worried it wouldn’t be worth it. But it was worth it.

I was so distracted by all the relics from the past, that I forgot to even sign the guest book.

Seriously. Who actually LOVES Ohio? In either case, we had a nice day there yesterday. I’m very tired though & ruing the moment I gave Chooch my old iPhone so he can play Draw Something on his own.

Granted, it’s helping him with his reading and spelling, but he is SO HIGH MAINTENANCE about it and gets all pissed of when people don’t drop everything to guess his drawing immediately after he sends it to them. (omgitschooch if you want to play him.)

(He really is getting so good at reading and spelling though. Through the power of “sounding it out,” he was able to spell “piss” the other day. I’m proud and also extremely surprised that he started with such a PG word.)

At one point yesterday, we were at some playground in this small town outside of Columbus when he patted the pockets of his jeans and exclaimed, “Shit, where’s my phone?!”

Dude, you’re 5. Calm the fuck down and play with some Legos. And no, not a Lego app on your iPhone!

And no, I’m not referencing your cheating ex-wife’s vagina.

About a week before we left for Tennessee, I turned to Roadside America to help us map out a route. By the time I was done adding side-excursions all over the west side of West Virginia, our 8-hour drive had morphed into a 12-hour trek.

Henry was totally not OK with this. But I begged him, out of all the roadside attractions, to let me keep the Mystery Hole. It was on our route!

That morning of our departure, I was up by 4AM, packed, showered and rearin’ to go. Too bad Chooch and Henry didn’t wake up until 7. And then we didn’t even leave until 8. Henry argued that we could go to Mystery Hole on the way back home and I threw a substantial fit, pointing out that it was only open until 4 and how could he be sure we’d make it.

So we didn’t speak for awhile. I stared at my framed pictures of Jonny Craig to punish him. He hates when I openly lust like that.

But then Jessi texted me from the road (they had departed from Michigan but pretty much were looking at the same arrival time as us) a few hours into the trip and said they had been snagged by some traffic and weren’t expecting to make it to Gatlinburg until later than anticipated, so we should feel free to be leisurely and linger at any roadside stops we might pass on the way.

I read this text out-loud to Henry in my best “INYOURFACE” voice and then smugly said, “Mystery Hole. We’re going.”

And getting there was half the fun! And not just because Henry had to rely on my shoddy map-reading skills*, but because the town in which it’s located (Ansted, WV) is creepy as shit.

*(GPS is for losers. And couples who don’t like having incessant explosions of domestic  violence underneath the fuzzy car roof.)

I’m already planning a daytrip back to Ansted with props and costumes because it’s crying out for a photo shoot. The bus stops looked like open-air outhouses; there was a bar in an abandoned warehouse and you just know all brands of rape, animal sacrifice and baby-roasting goes on in the back next to the collection of scrapped, blood-soaked vehicles from unlucky travelers who get lost because they don’t use GPS; every other house was boarded up; tiny churches  sat flush against the woods. There was even a Civil War encampment.

In other words, there was nary a Starbucks to be found in Ansted.

But once we passed through “downtown” Ansted and started traveling up into the mountains, it got even better. Ramshackle sheds, confederate flags, cinder-blocked cars eaten by rust. Most of the houses looked unlivable and I’m sure each had a clothesline out back, pregnant with damp overalls. It’s the kind of place that makes you want to get out of the car and tempt fate, see if you can get chased away by a shotgun-toting hillbilly in faded camouflage stained with underarm sweat and Skoal-tinted slobber.

And then this appeared on the left hand side as we reached the top of a crest:

One of the tips on Roadside America warned that it was easy to miss. I hope they were being sarcastic. How the hell does someone miss something that looks like Sid and Marty Kroff spent too much time in the mountains subsisting on little else but Moonshine, mushrooms and sardines and then vomited all over the side of a Quonset hut after plowing into it with their VW? The whole compound was a fluorescent host for tetanus.

Just how I like my roadside attractions: colorful and deadly.

For Chooch and me, this was a real feast for our eyes, a nice break from all the mountains and nature bullshit we had been subjected to. But Henry, who I’m pretty sure is color- and fun-blind, didn’t seem fazed by this wondrous explosion of Flower Power.

“Now what is this supposed to be again?” he asked all curmudgeonly.

“Um, only the most awesome place in the world!” I exclaimed in my teenaged “duh” tone. He kept looking at me though, waiting for a real answer, until I mumbled, “I don’t know, it has something to do with gravity or something.”

Real Talk: I only really wanted to go because one of the Roadside America tips likened the proprietor to the Soup Nazi, saying that he denied her entrance because she kept her camera in her coat pocket instead of returning it to her car, even after his wife laid out the rules of the land for her. So the woman’s husband took the camera back to the car, leaving his wife to be continuously chided by the Mystery Hole gate keeper and he still refused to let her enter because she BROKE THE RULES.

I had to see this guy for myself.

I also wanted to see the unbelievable.

Tickets for the tour were $5 and we purchased these inside the technicolor gift shop. The woman at the register, whom I can only assume is Mrs. Mystery Hole herself, ran down the list of rules to us and never once cracked a smile.

“And no large purses,” she finished, giving me a hardened stare. I took my purse back to the car. I was totally not trying to get kicked out of the Mystery Hole like some emasculated husband in the doghouse. (All of these photos were taken post-amazement of the Mystery Hole tour.)

Not a huge fan of Mrs. Mystery Hole, I gotta say.

We had around 10  minutes to kill before the next tour (“We’ll ring the cow bell,” Mrs. Mystery Hole monotoned, not even a smidge of personality slipping through. Broad made me shudder.), so we enjoyed the scenic overlook, and by that I mean Henry enjoyed the scenic overlook while I screamed, “OMG CHOOCH DON’T FALL OVER THE EDGE JESUS CHRIST HENRY HOLD HIM!”

Mountains: still a novelty on Day 1

Still waiting for the elusive cow bell, I gave Henry a spontaneous hug.

He looked at me all wide-eyed. I never hug him in front of people, and there were definitely a few people milling about. “What was that for?” he asked skeptically.

“I’m just so happy to finally be here! I’ve wanted to come here since….” I quickly thought about how long it had been since I found it on Roadside America. “….last week.” Henry just sighed and walked away.

And then the cowbell happened! I grabbed Chooch’s hand and together we ran to the entrance like the uncoordinated idiots we are while Henry and an older couple walked like regular people behind us. I wanted to be in the front of the pack, up close to Mr. Mystery Hole (whose name is Bill, by the way) and his crazy “I collect soiled underwear” eyes. Bill, a slender man with an eccentric energy and slight mountain drawl (he and his wife are actually Michigan natives, if we are to believe my Internet research), reiterated the rules to us and then asked if any of us have heart problems. We all said no (Henry lied) and Bill asked me if I wanted to see a rattlesnake egg.

“Sure, why not,” I answered and cupped my palms for him to place a small manilla envelope, which immediately vibrated wildly in my hands and emitted a loud rattling noise, causing me to shriek and hurl it to the ground.

Everyone laughed at me because they’re assholes.

Bill retrieved the envelope and opened it up to show me that it was just some stupid rubberband-rigged gag, which I have totally seen before yet STILL fell for.

“Does anyone here know why there weren’t actually rattlesnake eggs in here?” Bill asked. The old lady in our group answered, “Because rattlesnakes don’t lay eggs.”

Smug bitch. I choose to fill my brain with important facts, like shit about music and serial killers, thank you.

“And by the way,” Bill said teasingly to me. “Your heart’s just fine.”

I kind of liked Bill after that.

He opened a gate and led us down a relatively steep ramp into the basement of the souvenir shop. Even moreso than outside, the interior was steeped in the stench of the ’70s. It smelled of moth balls, musk and the sweat on a paisley-print A-line dress after a long night of dancing to ABBA. It was also quite damp and there were probably impressive arrays of fungi growing in the darkened corners. Random memorabilia from the ’70s lined the walls and one small room even glowed with the power of a black light in case we weren’t comprehending that we had traveled back to the Me Decade. I’m sure it brought on a flood of memories for Henry the Elder.

And there were mannequins.

I wasn’t sure what any of this had to do with the Mystery Hole, which was actually the largest room down there. We had to enter it by walking up a ramp and then down a ramp, at which point we found ourselves unable to stand upright and needing to grip the wall to keep from falling. Bill instructed Henry, Chooch and me to sit on a couch, while the other two leaned against the wall.

Bill then walked with an extreme lean to the front of the room and began showing us a variety of gravitationally-impossible tricks, like balls rolling up a hill (which I’ve seen before in Laurel Caverns and sorry, Bill, but I do understand how that happens), water flowing uphill, and Bill being able to sit on a chair perched on nothing more but a small nail in the wall. He then had Henry, Chooch and me hold out our arms in front of us and try to stand up. We couldn’t, because while it appeared that we were sitting normally, the way the room was set up we were actually almost laying on our backs. (Henry would never have been able to do this even if he was sitting on a couch in a room with normal gravity. Because he’s old, remember?)

The old couple politely declined Bill’s offer for them to sit on the couch after we unsuccessfully struggled to get up.

According to the Mystery Hole website, those who don’t ask questions are the unintelligent ones. But when asked, none of the people in our group asked any questions (though Chooch had repeatedly whispered to me, “When are we leaving? This place is scary.”), so I guess Henry shouldn’t have been the only one I was calling “Dum Dum” all day.

Besides, I would have only inquired, “When do we get to see the basement?”

They had a guest book in the gift shop, which I happily scrawled “Stoked to be here!” after my name. Henry frowned. But in his own words: “It was pretty cool.” That’s a big deal for Henry to admit.

Bill was high energy, full of jokes and showed us some cool parlor tricks. Totally worth the slight detour and $5, and I would tell any one of you to go there and be amazed. But probably more by the tacky decor and crazy blue eyes than the actual “gravity defiance” show.

I was still riding a Mystery Hole high hours later in the car. “I didn’t think the tour guide was an asshole at all. In fact, he seemed to really like me. He paid a lot of attention to me.”

“I wonder why,” Henry smirked, lowering his eyes to my cleavage.

***

The next day, we were tromping around downtown Gatlinburg when I noticed Henry was acting weird and off-balance.

“What’s your problem?” I asked with my usual lack of compassion.

“I think Mystery Hole really fucked me up,” Henry moaned. “I haven’t felt right since we left there yesterday.”

Well, there is a disclaimer for that.

We didn’t have much time after eating breakfast at the Traveler’s Club International Restaurant (it doubles as a TUBA MUSEUM and was a great pick by our tour guides, Bill & Jessi) because I had this dire urge to see the world’s largest cuckoo clock in Sugarcreek, Ohio. Every time I brought it up to Henry, he tugged on his collar and looked around for diversions, chainsaw guys, ditches in which to push me.

I wouldn’t drop it, though, and continued down the list of merits I had made for the cuckoo clock.

By 2:00pm, we were on the road. We made a quick stop in Luna Pier, because seeing Lake Erie was another very pressing thing on my list. Sure, I’ve seen Lake Erie from Pennsylvania and Ohio, even took a boat tour in Cleveland (if you were me, you too could live such a thrilling life). But I really needed to see it from MICHIGAN.

That fruity red dot of menstruation up there is Henry.

This is the closest thing to a beach we’ve come to since that shitty fucktastic trip to Okracoke we took in 2006 with those asshole Civil War reenactors. Chooch and I kicked off our shoes and took off.

Henry’s feet never even touched the sand.  “It’s just Lake Erie,” he kept saying, while Chooch and I squealed and frolicked like Hansel and Gretel dining on the witch’s carcass. Spectators probably thought we had just been let out of our cage in the basement. Henry does resemble a grizzled captor. In fact, on our way to Michigan, I mouthed “help” to the girl in the toll booth. Thanks for all the help, whore.

After Luna Pier, A LOT of driving happened. I found religious programming on the radio and pretended to be holy for a good hour while Henry scowled and periodically asked, “Can we turn this now?” while Chooch read his comic books quietly in the backseat. Jesus music is calming. Or maybe it’s hypnotic. In either case, it zipped my child’s lips, so praise be to Jesus and his Lambs of Christ.

At some point in Ohio, we turned off the highway and found ourselves up to our ears in Amish. (Henry says they were Mennonites, so we argued about that for awhile.) We rounded a bend and an old Amish man was standing on the side of the road.

I screamed.

“What? He’s probably just waiting for a buggy,” Henry reasoned.

“He looked to me like he was cursing us bastard civilians,” I argued. And then, “What happens if you run over an Amish person?”

Henry averted his eyes from the road long enough to look at me in disgust. “Um, you go to JAIL. They are people,” he reminded me. “Not animals.” A minute passed and I heard him repeat my question under his breath, shaking his head in exhaustion.

I didn’t know if they utilized the same legal system as us, OK? Jesus Christ, Henry. I thought maybe they left it up to the Lord; chased you around the farm with pitchforks, Benny Hill-style.

Aside from Amish culture, other things that jack off my fascination are all things Bavarian and Swiss, hence my determination to see this fucking cuckoo clock. Some of my fondest memories  are from childhood trips to Europe, helping my grandparents pick out cuckoo clocks in the Black Forest and traversing covered bridges in Lucerne. Eating fondue and watching lederhosened men blow into those Ricola horns. That’s always been my favorite region of Europe. And since returning there is nowhere in my near future, making pilgrimages to chintzy, kitschy Swiss-American tourist traps is the best I can do to keep my heart full of Toblerone and army knives.

I regaled Henry with stories from these past vacations while he prayed the GPS on his phone wasn’t leading us to our fate of becoming shoo-fly pie filling.

“You weren’t even listening to me,” I whined as he consulted his phone.

“Yes I was, and I’ve heard all of those stories before.”

Bastard. What a fucking bastard.

Here are some of my tweets from the Great Cuckoo Clock Pursuance, to give you a real-time feel for the awesomeness of being in our car:

About the same time my phone lost service, we crossed the threshold for the town of Sugarcreek, Ohio’s Swiss Wonderland.

The bad vibes were immediate. Something made me feel uncomfortable; maybe it was the lack of people and how it caused the town to be quiet as a graveyard. I don’t even really remember many cars passing by, although we did see a cop idling in a parking lot with a book.

The downtown portion of Sugarcreek was quaint, charming. But also mostly deserted. There seemed to be some people in one of the restaurants, which has swiss steak on special. I wanted to go. Not to eat the swiss steak, but to see what the townies were like. Henry said no, of course. Why eat at a real restaurant when we can stop at a gas station and get hot dogs?! (Because that’s seriously what he did. And I got a Special K bar. Now there’s a real meal to say grace for.)

Henry’s GPS alerted him to make a left off the main road. A few feet later, I saw it.

And it was in pieces.

I didn’t tell Henry this, but a Roadside America user posted a tip saying that as of March, the cuckoo clock was out of commission for repairs. If I told him that, he definitely wouldn’t have taken the chance. But I thought maybe it might have been all bandaged up by then and ready to cuckoo. I needed to see for myself.

“You’re a fucking asshole,” Henry muttered. But we got out of the car anyway. Chooch and I went over for a closer inspection while Henry leaned against the car, texting his work boyfriend about what an awful lay his shitty girlfriend is.

Further research (which would have been helpful prior to making this ridiculous detour) informed me that pieces of the clock have been auctioned off, including the evergreens and little  Swiss people.

Shit, I thought driving through the town was creepy? Poking around this over-sized clock at dusk was even more spine-tingling. I had a distinct sensation that townies were watching us from their windows, sizing us up  for future cuckoo clock adornments. Can you picture a taxidermied-Chooch twirling out from the clock’s bowels every hour? Because I kind of can. I ushered him back into the car, ducking around Henry’s choleric glare.

“We should come back for the Swiss Festival in October,” I suggested, reading  from the town’s official website on my phone. I looked up just in time to see Henry vivisecting me with his mind.

Somewhere between more Amish arguments (which found Henry yelling, “Shoo fly pie is regional!”) and crossing the Pennsylvania border, two vultures nearly careened into (MY SIDE OF) the windshield.

Rainy Saturdays usually make me miserable and grouchy, but this past Saturday turned into one of those days where every single thing had me squatting in laughter. I really needed a day like that.

First, Blake and Janna joined Henry, Chooch and me for a quick jaunt to Bloomfield’s Little Italy Days. It’s essentially just a small street fair, with a portion of the road blocked off and stuffed with food vendors and craft booths.

Henry’s mood soured immediately when we passed a voter registration booth with clip-boarded volunteers doling out Obama stickers. Too bad for Henry, but the rest of us like Obama so we made an executive decision to slap supportive flair to our chests. Henry continued pushing Chooch down the block while we stood around and fraternized with the enemy.

It wasn’t until later that I realized they said, “Italian Americans for Obama.” I scoffed and said, “Great, we’re not even Italian!” but Janna said, “Well, actually, I am.” I don’t know why, but it gave me more incentive to make fun of her. And not because I’m some closet racist plotting to bomb Italy. I love Italy! I love those fiesty pasta-slingin’ peeps! It’s just that it’s Janna. And judging Janna is my #1 hobby. I think she has come to realize, after nearly 20 years, that this is her role in life. Which is why, later, when she asked for Splenda for her iced tea, I took it upon myself to make her a sweetener bomb (Splenda, Equal, and SweetnLow). And she drank that shit too. BECAUSE IT’S HER PLACE ON EARTH.

Henry wouldn’t buy us cookies or brownies and Janna wouldn’t buy me jewels, and the clouds were black and heavy with precipitation, but nothing, NOTHING could ruin Little Italy Days for me. And oh, the sights I would have missed had I let some unfortunate weather and stingy asshole furrow my brow!

I might have missed this sweetheart of a nun, with her adorable hell-damning visage. And then I would not have known such lovely edelweiss fashion still existed in these States.

Bloomfield’s own Elvis-Wayne Newton hybrid might have flown under my radar.

And I wouldn’t find out about Gene Simmons going marachi until VH1 decided to make a show about it. Also, that waving broad is exactly the type of classy dame I strive to grow into. Imagine the lamé she has packed in her closet.

And if I had let Henry’s conservativism cloud my personal sunshine, I wouldn’t have thought to subject Blake to yet another of my impromptu photo ops.

We only putzed around the streets of Bloomfield for an hour before Henry herded us back to the car. He later complained that he had wanted to stop and fill up on the many Italian concessions waiting to bloat bellies, and when I asked him why he didn’t indulge his pretty little desires, he muttered something about “all you damn kids acting like idiots” or some such completely absurd variation. I know it was the whole Obama sticker thing. He felt left out and out-numbered.

As we drove through the back streets of Bloomfield, I caught a glimpse of a scene so horrific, it forced me to shriek loud at a volume high enough to make every occupant in the car jolt in their seats.

“WHAT?” Henry shouted, probably wondering if he had driven over the unconscious lump of a homeless man blitzed from chugging turpentine in a boot.

“Something was going on back there. There were two army guys holding GUNS and approaching a house!” I cried.

“Are you sure they weren’t cops?” Henry asked, glancing in the rear-view mirror.

“No, they were definitely armies.” This made everyone laugh and I was angry because this was a very serious situation. “We have to go back there and save a life!” I screamed.

So Henry did. He actually turned around, but not without lip, until we drove past the street in question.

As I shouted, “THERE THEY ARE!” Henry, Janna, and Blake (in unison so harmonious it could have been sung by angels on high) groaned, “They’re playing PAINT BALL.” And we all laughed.

After that, we dicked around on Mt. Washington, taking Chooch on his first ride on the incline. It started raining really hard by that point, so we went to dinner at King’s, where Chooch burped out “Asshole!” with all the charm of a Tourette’s sufferer, and Blake and I reminded Janna repeatedly that she wasn’t a part of our family. It was more fun than doing a speedball in the Champagne Room.

To add a dollop of whipped cream to a day full of giddy antics and newly sprouted grays on Henry, Blake declared that we should make cookies.

“Oh, we should!” I encouraged. “STD cookies!”

Henry got all foot-planty and spat, “If I’m making cookies, then YOU’RE going to the store to buy what we need.” Thank God he sent Blake along to make sure I didn’t fuck shit up. You know me, send me out for flour and I come back with a non-descript bag of dildos.

So while Henry slaved away on the kitchen, Blake performed serious Google image searches on various STDs while I bossed around Janna and basically sat around being cute. Then Henry realized he didn’t have corn syrup or some shit for the frosting, so while he was out we had a tea party and it was awesome because it was yet another thing that Henry wasn’t invited to. During our tea party, Blake ridiculed Janna’s selection of Earl Grey by saying that, “Earl Grey is for assholes.” My selective hearing heard, “Let’s race for abstinence” which had me squatting on the floor, squeezing back pee drops. Of course, no one else thought it was that hilarious, which only made it harder for me to not need to slip into a fresh pair of Depends. At some point, we were talking about egg harvesting and I tried to convince Blake that it was as easy as lounging in a tubful of ice, wielding a melon baller, and then creating a Craiglist post. Hopefully, he will teach all the girls at school this method.

My mug, Skelly, indulges in some delicious diseases fellatio. Look for it in the December issue of Bon Appetit.

For my cookies, I mainly stuck with the theme of Vaginal Maladies, such as menstruation and yeast infection. This one, Popped Cherry with Lone Tear Drop (added for extra sentiment), was my personal favorite. Lost virginity never tasted so delicious.

Hey, there’s some yeast in your pink. Or perhaps a fresh load. Whatever whets your appetite.

Later, I laughed at the realization of what a great role model I must be. Send your teens to my house, Parents, where we make jokes of serious matters and look at pictures of diseased vaginas.