(From my travel journal)
Sign outside a Louisiana restaurant: “Eat here are we both go hungry.” (Yes that's are.)
Another Louisiana restaurant sign:
Daiquiris and Beer
Drive through
In New Orleans
Huge neon sign over a restaurant:
DAIQUERIS
[below, very tiny print] fresh seafood.
In a store window:
Children’s Books
Voo Doo Dolls
Another store window:
Formal Wear Rental
Bike Parts
You see lots of signs in the south advertising “Deer Processing.”
On Alabama hotel marquee: “Prayer Works We have Dippin' Dots”
In restaurant menu: “Our special light breading will make your tongue slap your gums.”
It was very difficult to find healthy food. Some menus contained almost nothing that wasn’t fried. A few especially interesting menu items:
Fried alligator
Fried potato salad
Fried dill pickle chips
Fried corn kernels in tapioca
[on a breakfast menu] Fried Bananas Foster Cheesecake
At a Ft. Morgan State Historic site, signs referred to the Civil War as “the War for the Freedom of the Southern States.”
On a Florida restaurant menu, in four languages: “In the United States waiters and waitresses are paid a substandard wage. For this reason we suggest a tip of 15%.”
Showing posts with label travel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label travel. Show all posts
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Saturday, October 17, 2009
A Few Entries from My Travel Journal
(Last week I travelled to Michigan to visit my brother and his wife.)
Oct 7
Flying into Lansing, I thought about all the people down below, affected by the noise of our plane. Maybe some wouldn’t notice. Maybe some would be annoyed: “I have to stop talking because I can't be heard over the noise of that plane.” Little kids might look up and think, “Crash, crash.” or folks like me might pray for our safe landing. Thus I felt a connection with all these people I'd never know and who'd never know me.
Oct 8
At the Lansing Days Inn the elevator had a handmade sign posted inside: “If the door doesn’t open, push Door Open (Bottom Button).”
Oct 9
At Village Market, they put our groceries in an orange plastic bag decorated with pumpkins and bats and this message: “Use this Bag for your Halloween Treats”
On the other side of the bag, sideways, in the tiniest of print: “To avoid danger of suffocation, keep this plastic bag away from children.”
Oct 12
Driving with my sister-in-law, we passed a cemetery. Robin said, “The people who live around here can’t be buried in this cemetery and do you know why?”
“No, why?”
“Because they’re not dead.”
Oct 13
Sign outside a store--TAKE OUT CHICKEN ICE CREAM CONES.
Oct 14
Back at the Lansing Day’s Inn, they offered a free breakfast. JR went down to get some, but came back disgusted.
JR: The coffee sucked and when I tried to get juice, only water came out. They had plenty of cereal, though, provided you like Raisin Bran.
Later I went to check out, and the lobby was empty except for a woman wearing plastic gloves and a man in a suit (the manager?) I heard him complaining to her that the juice dispenser didn’t work.
She got all mad: “Well I put juice in there! This is what happens when Irene doesn’t show up.”
(She saw me and asked what I wanted.)
Me: I’m ready to check out.
Lady:(pleasantly) Oh I can do that for you. (As she processes the papers) How was your stay?
Me: Fine, except my husband tried to get juice out of the dispenser this morning and he only got water.
Lady: (mad all over again) “Well, I put plenty of juice in there!”
Oct 7
Flying into Lansing, I thought about all the people down below, affected by the noise of our plane. Maybe some wouldn’t notice. Maybe some would be annoyed: “I have to stop talking because I can't be heard over the noise of that plane.” Little kids might look up and think, “Crash, crash.” or folks like me might pray for our safe landing. Thus I felt a connection with all these people I'd never know and who'd never know me.
Oct 8
At the Lansing Days Inn the elevator had a handmade sign posted inside: “If the door doesn’t open, push Door Open (Bottom Button).”
Oct 9
At Village Market, they put our groceries in an orange plastic bag decorated with pumpkins and bats and this message: “Use this Bag for your Halloween Treats”
On the other side of the bag, sideways, in the tiniest of print: “To avoid danger of suffocation, keep this plastic bag away from children.”
Oct 12
Driving with my sister-in-law, we passed a cemetery. Robin said, “The people who live around here can’t be buried in this cemetery and do you know why?”
“No, why?”
“Because they’re not dead.”
Oct 13
Sign outside a store--TAKE OUT CHICKEN ICE CREAM CONES.
Oct 14
Back at the Lansing Day’s Inn, they offered a free breakfast. JR went down to get some, but came back disgusted.
JR: The coffee sucked and when I tried to get juice, only water came out. They had plenty of cereal, though, provided you like Raisin Bran.
Later I went to check out, and the lobby was empty except for a woman wearing plastic gloves and a man in a suit (the manager?) I heard him complaining to her that the juice dispenser didn’t work.
She got all mad: “Well I put juice in there! This is what happens when Irene doesn’t show up.”
(She saw me and asked what I wanted.)
Me: I’m ready to check out.
Lady:(pleasantly) Oh I can do that for you. (As she processes the papers) How was your stay?
Me: Fine, except my husband tried to get juice out of the dispenser this morning and he only got water.
Lady: (mad all over again) “Well, I put plenty of juice in there!”
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Adventures, Travelling with My Mom.
FYI: When you agree to catch a 5 AM flight, it means your mother calls to wake you at 2:30 AM.
We rushed like crazy to get to the airport by 3:45 and found...the check-in clerks hadn’t come to work yet. A very long line of tired-looked passengers stood in the dim light. Nothing was open, not an employee in sight. I worried. Would the airline clerks ever show up? Had anyone notified Someone In Charge that all us customers were waiting to check in for our flights? But I did nothing, just stood waiting stupidly like all the other Zombies.
My only comfort was watching a longer line of people forming behind us.These were the folks who slept in till 3 or 3:30: A red-headed couple shivering in Hawaiian shirts. A huge Cambodian family. A plump young woman applying mascara.
Just before 4, a harried-looking man rushed in and set up the system. (I imagined him getting up at 2:30 every morning of his life, rushing down in the dark to deal with several hundred people who hadn’t had their morning coffee.)
The long line inched forward. When we were about ten people away from check-in, Mom asked me to help her get her driver’s license out of her wallet. I said, “You don’t need it yet.”
She kept fumbling with her wallet. “They’ll want us to take these out.”
Finally I said, “Here give it to me; my fingers are younger than yours.”
At that point a clerk said something. I couldn’t take the license out and listen at the same time.
“What did he say?” I asked.
“Everyone who didn’t check in online needs to move to this other line.”
Before I could budge, everybody—shivering Hawaiian shirts, Cambodian family, Mascara Girl-- rushed into the other line. We, who’d almost been at the front, were now at the back of the line!
I wanted to scream at Mom,” If you hadn’t been so stubborn about getting your stupid license out, I would have heard the clerk and we wouldn’t have lost our place.” She stood clutching her license like it was a life jacket.
Mascara Girl was now right in front of us, chatting with her girlfriend, obviously glad they were ahead of us losers. I thought, a decent person would notice me and say, “Oh you were in front of us, why don’t you go ahead?” But she didn’t, which made me want to yell at Mom all the more.
At some point I realized the real problem: every time I go on vacation, I get scared because I'm leaving my safe home and going off into the unknown. (Mustn’t make a mistake or we are doomed.) When Mom gets anxious it reminds me of my own anxiety. Damn.
(As always, once I connected with my stupidity, I felt a peace and calm undreamed of in normal life.)
Well, the good news is we finally got to check in, we made it onboard on time. Now I sit peacefully in our quiet little cabin in the Michigan woods. Life, Life, you silly old thing.
We rushed like crazy to get to the airport by 3:45 and found...the check-in clerks hadn’t come to work yet. A very long line of tired-looked passengers stood in the dim light. Nothing was open, not an employee in sight. I worried. Would the airline clerks ever show up? Had anyone notified Someone In Charge that all us customers were waiting to check in for our flights? But I did nothing, just stood waiting stupidly like all the other Zombies.
My only comfort was watching a longer line of people forming behind us.These were the folks who slept in till 3 or 3:30: A red-headed couple shivering in Hawaiian shirts. A huge Cambodian family. A plump young woman applying mascara.
Just before 4, a harried-looking man rushed in and set up the system. (I imagined him getting up at 2:30 every morning of his life, rushing down in the dark to deal with several hundred people who hadn’t had their morning coffee.)
The long line inched forward. When we were about ten people away from check-in, Mom asked me to help her get her driver’s license out of her wallet. I said, “You don’t need it yet.”
She kept fumbling with her wallet. “They’ll want us to take these out.”
Finally I said, “Here give it to me; my fingers are younger than yours.”
At that point a clerk said something. I couldn’t take the license out and listen at the same time.
“What did he say?” I asked.
“Everyone who didn’t check in online needs to move to this other line.”
Before I could budge, everybody—shivering Hawaiian shirts, Cambodian family, Mascara Girl-- rushed into the other line. We, who’d almost been at the front, were now at the back of the line!
I wanted to scream at Mom,” If you hadn’t been so stubborn about getting your stupid license out, I would have heard the clerk and we wouldn’t have lost our place.” She stood clutching her license like it was a life jacket.
Mascara Girl was now right in front of us, chatting with her girlfriend, obviously glad they were ahead of us losers. I thought, a decent person would notice me and say, “Oh you were in front of us, why don’t you go ahead?” But she didn’t, which made me want to yell at Mom all the more.
At some point I realized the real problem: every time I go on vacation, I get scared because I'm leaving my safe home and going off into the unknown. (Mustn’t make a mistake or we are doomed.) When Mom gets anxious it reminds me of my own anxiety. Damn.
(As always, once I connected with my stupidity, I felt a peace and calm undreamed of in normal life.)
Well, the good news is we finally got to check in, we made it onboard on time. Now I sit peacefully in our quiet little cabin in the Michigan woods. Life, Life, you silly old thing.
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