To: <snip>
From: Oliver Nicholas <bigo@ucsc.edu>
Subject: Oliver's Travelogue, Part 4
Date: Wed, 2 Jun 2004 21:19:35 -0400

Alibis and allies,

I must apologize for the long delay since my last travelogue entry. The truth is, I got lazy, and have written appropriately little since returning from my travels. But there's a story to tell, and I'd hate to leave it half-told. Plus I've got nothing to do this moment.

I believe we left off with the trailing end of The Savannah Story. We'll pick up along the road to New Orleans, aka The Path into the Dark Wood.

-----bloop. Bloop. Time warp. Again.-------------

Against a friend's suggestions, I paid off a parking ticket I owed to the city of Savannah on my way out of town. I didn't really want to do it, cause like when am I going to be driving through Savannah, GA again, but I decided it was wisest to just pay my $25 and leave it be. My contribution to the city, if you will.

I drove my way down through Georgia, in a kind of dipping diagonal across the state towards the western tip of Florida. Somewhere past Tallahassee I picked up highway 90, which runs parallel with I-10, basically hugging the Gulf Coast-line all the way to my destination. I made it to maybe half way across Alabama before I took a left towards "Gulf Shores and Orange Beach" and ended up in one of the weirdest, most expectation-defying places of my journey. It was Alabama still (I checked the GPS just to make sure), but there were palm trees and crazy high-rise condos and beaches and stuff. I understand now it's kind of just an extension of Florida's delightful Redneck Riviera, but coming up on it out of nowhere was...surprising. I ate at a Waffle House (bad idea) and crashed out at a campground (good idea).

Speaking of car-sleeping, I'm not sure I've described my in-car living space yet. I took out my passenger seat to free up lots of cabin space for the trip, figuring I wouldn't have many passengers and those I did take on could just chill chauffeured-style. It frees up that whole area so I can put my oversize map book, some food, CD cases, and maybe camera bag and tripod within arm's reach. Also it means when I just want to sit down and relax for a second, I can hop in the back seat and by sitting on the passenger side, enjoy an amazing amount of leg space to stretch out in. Generally I do this with the car parked like in a parking lot or something, but it's those other times when you realize how much of a friend your cruise control is.

Additionally, for sleeping purposes, I can simply fold down the back seat and prepare my bedding, rather than also having to slide the passenger seat forward and crank the seat back to a more upright or forward position. Now, I'm about 5'8". Unfortunately, with all the seats folded down, the space from the end of the trunk (where my feet go) to the top of the folded down seat (where my head and arms go) is like, 5'6". This makes for some creative sleeping positions, as well as patterns - I tend to sleep in a pose that causes one or more limbs to fall asleep quite regularly, and in order to avoid deep tissue damage from lack of oxygen, I must wake up at regular intervals and shift my weight. I have nonetheless found the in-car living quite comforting. It is, gloriously and undeniably, my own space. You'll understand why this is important on the road when I tell you about Florida hotels, next installment.

So from Alabama I drove the rest of the way to New Orleans, through Biloxi, Mississippi (I have the spelling of that state memorized in a sort of sing-song tone. In 3rd grade I had a terrible crush on a girl in my class who I had heard didn't like anyone who couldn't spell "Mississippi". That was a hopeless crush.). I overshot the city because I couldn't figure out where to get off the highway, and ended up on the raised (above a bayou) highway towards Baton Rouge, where there are no turn-offs and the bridge/highway/waterway extends into the horizon. Beautiful stuff. Eventually I was able to turn around, and in traffic on the way back I finally realized I should call Steve Quick, my contact in New Orleans.

I never really knew Steve Quick. He was a student at my high school, but is like four or five years older than I am and we were never friends. But we had mutual friends about equidistant between our ages, and they gave me his phone number and told me to hit him up. So hit him I did:

*ring*ring*
Me: Steve?
Steve: Yeah?
Me: Steve Quick?
Steve: Yeah?
Me: This is Oliver Nicholas. That mean anything to you?
Steve: Uh...no. Should it?

I knew things would be weird from there.

Stay tuned for installment Five.