Albany. Oh, where to
begin?
Regular readers know a lot about me, probably too much. What
the heck - I'm only going around once, right?
Here's one thing you know about me:
Yesterday I drove to Albany by myself to join the SNHU cheering section
to watch my son and his lacrosse team crush division II conference rivals the
College of St. Rose. They're not my
son's team's most ardent enemy (that would probably be Merrimack College after
SNHU knocked them from the NCAA playoffs last season with an unexpected
victory), but it was an important conference game for both teams. Besides, I like taking game photographs and
posting them to the Laxpower website.
The team can live on in Cyberspace for all of eternity if it were solely
up to me.
Let me walk you through my day because reliving it over and
over and over surely must be some kind of Hell for me, and lord knows I don't
want to be there alone. From the
beginning (and not in an Emerson Lake and Palmer kind of way)…
I have already printed out my route via MapQuest, packed
food and drinks enough to keep me awake and alert on the trip home, programmed
the GPS with the comedian who tells me such things as "Turn around when
possible -- It is advisable to turn the whole car around, not just yourself in
the front seat," gassed up the tank, gotten lots of $1 bills for tolls,
packed extra coats and gloves and socks in case of weather changes, juiced up
the cell phone battery, and cleaned the car windshield.
In short, I am ready; just me and Billy C, my GPS.
Oh, and Floyd.
Just so you know, if
anyone starts singing "I Enjoy Being a Girl" from Flower Drum Song, I will hunt you down
like a wild dog and put you on a spit over a raging campfire. Just so you know, I mean.
I decide to skip route 290 through Worcester, figuring
Saturday traffic plus the start of a long holiday weekend in Massachusetts (and
Maine) along with the state's April vacation, probably means clogged
lanes.
I get on the Mass Pike, I-90, in
Westborough, which is only an additional six miles (remember that magic number,
six miles) and maybe sixty extra cents, and get a very nice toll person. No, I do not have a FastPass because I used
to have one, but the transponder kept double-charging me if there were a line
of traffic at the tolls, so I yanked it off my dashboard and sent it back to
the state with a very nasty note. I'm
sure I'm on the DOT watch list. While
grabbing my toll ticket, a gorgeously restored red and white Mustang Fastback
comes trolling through in the next lane, and the driver taps the gas out of the
gate. The noise its engine makes is
nothing short of magnificent. The toll
taker and I both drool and say the same thing at the same time: "Niiiiiiice car." With a laugh, I'm on my way. So far, so good.
Floyd reminds me that he's still in control of my plans, so
I stop at the Charlton service area and make a pit stop. No EMT's needed yet. I debate buying something salty to eat and decide that I really have packed enough
food to survive a month on the road, so I'm back out on I-90, which is
surprisingly empty.
I realize that I've forgotten my MP3 player (don't judge
me! I'm not an Apple supporter), so I
start flicking around the radio stations.
Eventually I find the Red Sox game broadcast via some station I've never
heard of before. I must admit that much
as I like Joe Castiglione, he doesn't add much drama to the game. Half the time I don't even realize the inning
has started because his voice is as monotonous when he's just chatting as it is
when he's calling the game. As I climb
into the mountains, I lose the station several times and resort to skimming
channels like I'm surfing the television.
Mostly I get a lot of static. The
hills apparently are not alive with the sound of music out here.
I skip the Ludlow and Blandford rest stops, but I pass by
the area of I-90 where years ago coming back from the Am-Can Junior Judo
Tournament we passed a very old man on a motorcycle wearing a v-neck white men's
t-shirt and riding through the rain. The
one thing we noticed then was that his flabby arms were flying backward from
the bones, creating a soaring effect, and we nicknamed him Bat-Wing Man. I smile as I drive through, westbound and
away from the rocky cliffs that line the eastbound lane. Aha, I
smile to myself, Bat Wing Pass. Good times, good times. I realize as I near Lee that I should
probably give Floyd another check, maybe gas up the car before I cross the
border to pay god-knows-what for New York prices.
While I'm at the Lee stop, I realize that I'll be way too
early to Albany if I keep this pace, which would be fine normally, but now I'm
on Potty Alert because of Floyd. My
whole day is now revolving around toilet facilities. I decide to indulge my inner child and get
myself a small sundae from Mickey D's.
While sitting there, the Billerica contingency (well, half of it)
arrives, and the two women and I all join each other in the bathrooms and have
a good laugh about being ahead of time for the game. I refuel my car, but the receipt refuses to
print. I leave the station wondering if
maybe my debit card is now refueling everyone after me. Oh
well. Sue them later, if necessary. And I'm off again, just me, Billy C my GPS,
and Floyd.

Albany is reasonably close to Massachusetts, maybe
forty-five miles from the border, so I weave around I-90 and onto I-87. The exit I am supposed to take, though,
appears closed. There are Jersey
barriers seemingly blocking it, nothing is tarred, and there are signs posted
everywhere screaming, "DANGER! HIGH VOLTAGE!" So I miss the exit, which apparently was
passable (who knew?) and go north six miles.
SIX MILES. Remember how six miles
got me on I-90 without any problems?
Well, six miles will now be revisited.
The six miles I gained in the beginning are about to be seriously
lost. As I leave the toll both, there
are three possible routes I can take, and the GPS appears to be directing me to
all of them. They are all connected at
the beginning like a series of veins, and I have to guess. Damnit.
Um … I-87? Okay, I-87.
I pass by the Lee rest area, and this time I decide to
randomly stop in Blandford. I keep
reminding myself to clean the bugs off the windshield. Maybe I'll remember. By the time I park the car, I've already forgotten. All I can think about is the severe cramping
and the fact that Floyd may have beaten me this time. I admit I check the car seat expecting to see
a CSI crime scene beneath me. I run in
to the ladies room, saying a brief prayer and hoping for the best. I really should've taken some meds before I
left New York, but I forgot. I am,
thankfully, just in under the gun. No
arterial bleed this time, but I really need to get home. I probably shouldn't have left the couch
today. Oh well -- Far be it for me to
let a stupid thing like menopause ruin my day.
As I exit the bathroom stall, I see the Billerica
contingency again, the same ones I saw in the bathroom at Lee going westbound,
and we burst into laughter. Our timing
is impeccable. By the time I reach my
car, I am still chuckling. I open my
cooler, get out a soda, open a sandwich to have ready for the ride home, stop
and fuel up, and head back onto the highway.
I have, yet again, forgotten to take my anti-Floyd meds and clean the
windshield.
I few minutes on I-90 later, I realize that I do not have my
debit card. Damnit. Did I leave it in
the gas pump? No way, I know I took it
out and had it in my hand. Did I drop
it? I reach for the pocket where I
always put it when I am done with it if I don't have my wallet out. It's not there. I search the nooks and crannies of the car
while I'm driving. Not with my phone,
not with the toll ticket, and not with the food. I pull over to the breakdown lane, not an
easy trick with the divots they added to the side, and I start searching the
car. After panicking for about a minute,
I realize that the card is in my other back pocket. Idiot. Idiot, idiot, idiot. I get the car up to speed and pull back
onto the nearly deserted highway.
I make it home by 10:35 pm, three hours from start to finish
including stop-over time, and I start downloading the pictures from the
game. At 11:30, I realize that I am
asleep at the computer and decide to go to bed.
I remember to medicate Floyd, empty the cooler, and manage to crawl into
bed. Long day; long trip; successful and
eventful, as usual.
My life may not be standard fare, but it sure does make for
an interesting tale.
Besides, if I make it sound strange enough, maybe I can
convince a few of you to join me next time I decide to visit my new pals in
Arbor Hill. I'll be heading back there
in 2015 if all goes well. You guys bring
the munchies; I'll bring Billy C and Floyd.
It'll be a great time!