The Beginning of the End

With the money I just spent, I could have bought:

- A really nice TV and home theatre system
- A PSA 10 Gem Mint 1986 Fleer Michael Jordan rookie card
- The platinum travel package for next year's WrestleMania in Detroit for myself and the people who went with me to WrestleMania this year

Instead, I bought this:



The things you do for love...how much head is this worth?

A Bad Omen?

From the "It Can Only Happen to Erwin" files:

Question: What are the chances of being about to leave a bank and running into an old friend who you haven't seen since his wedding day three years ago and him telling you that getting married is the worst thing you can possibly do?

Answer: Pretty high if you're me and you just went to the bank to send your very first bank wire to pay for an expensive piece of jewelry...like an engagement ring.

That's right, folks, you've read right - I sent my first bank wire!

The Move

After three plus years of imagining it, thinking of it and talking about it, the wait’s finally over – like a shady Albanian drugging an under aged girl that he met on Myspace and then having a one night stand with her in a Kane costume, the Erwin and Cathy Far From Scenic Please Be Uneventful Road Trip Short of Hell (also known as “The Move”) has come and gone. Let’s break this road trip down parte dalla parte, shall we?

Far From Scenic
With all the places we stopped for gas, our drive from Washington State to Chicago could easily have been called the Erwin and Cathy No Name Town Tour:

Ellensburg, WA
Kingston, ID
Custer, MT
Billings, MT
Clearwater, MN
Beach, ND
Fargo, ND
Hixton, WI
Rockford, IL

How I Did a 36 Hour Drive in 30 Hours #1 – Over 2,000 miles and the only things worth noting are crossing the Continental Divide twice and driving past an aluminum structure in North Dakota that proclaims to be the largest in the world – a foil eye.

Please Be Uneventful
I wonder what would have happened if I listened to the wifey and turned my head to look at a cave as I was driving through curves down a mountain going about 90 miles per hour.

How I Did a 36 Hour Drive in 30 Hours #2 – I’m pretty sure I averaged 90 – 95 miles per hour from start to finish. So much for the cops being out on 4th of July weekend.

Road Trip Short of Hell
The trip did have some memorable but infamous moments:
- Having to drive slowly through a section of highway where an accident investigation scene was ongoing with the bloody chalk outline of someone killed still on the road.
- Being unable to see through my rear windshield for pretty much the entire trip because one of the vacuum compressed bags that Cathy used to keep her clothes had filled with air.
- Eating breakfast at a McDonalds in Montana and overhearing a conversation among a bunch of 70 and 80 year old elderlies:
“I bought a bed at the flea market yesterday. It only cost me $9.”
“Did it come with a vibrator?”
- Driving on the first day of the trip from five in the morning to eight in the evening on only three hours of sleep and getting to our planned destination only to find out that all the hotels and motels in this Podunk town were booked because of a K K K biker rally and then having to stay at the only place that had vacancies – a hole in the wall motel/casino called the War Bonnet.

How I Did a 36 Hour Drive in 30 Hours #3 – Before the trip even started, I was told not to stop in Idaho while I was in Chicago, then I was told not to stop in Montana while in Washington, and then I was told not to stop in North Dakota while in Montana. Was it friendly advice or maybe a warning that colored folk just weren’t welcome?