Yes, it’s the wild and wacky holiday season be it Christmas, Hanukah, or Kwanza…whatever the hell that is.  Personally I do Christmas.  There was nothing like being a kid on Christmas Eve…not being able to sleep…wondering when Santa was coming…waking up at 5 in the morning and wondering why my parents were so tired…didn’t they go to bed the same time I did?  Anyway as you get older, Christmas can lose some of it’s luster as you are no longer in school and don’t get any 2 weeks off anymore, or you get stuck working a retail job and having to put up with an insane amount of people and just wishing there was no such holiday.  But truly the worst thing about it all is traveling.  Traveling around Christmas can be insane as I have learned, and as you shall now read about if you’ve never experienced traveling during the holidays.  So sit back, relax, and prepare to read something I like to call –

I moved from Nashville to Austin, Texas, in 1998 due to the computer boom out there.  Basically if you knew how to use Microsoft Word somewhat, you could land a pretty good paying gig.  When I moved out there, it was me driving a 17’ U-Haul with my car being towed behind.  Wow, what a fun trip that was.  There is nothing like going through downtown Dallas where tons of highway construction is going on while driving something like that.  Anyway, Christmas was coming up and I bought a plane ticket to fly home.  Seemed like a pretty simple trip, right?  Wrong.  Before that year, I lived maybe a little over an hour away from the parents, so it wasn’t a big deal driving out there for Christmas day, but now it was about 14 hours between us so a quick trip was sadly not a possibility.  The morning I got up to fly back, a freak ice storm had moved through and there was a 35 car pile-up on the interstate to the airport.  I barely made it.  We pull out towards the runway and stop because the wings need to be de-iced.  I was getting a little worried now because I was landing in Houston next and needed to switch planes and the time in between my scheduled landing and the next plane’s departure was only 35 minutes…and that was rapidly changing because of the delays.  I ended up in Houston with ten minutes to go.  I was doing my best OJ Simpson running through the airport (not killing people) and made it just in time.  I get stuck next to some old woman on the plane who is wearing the most horrendous perfume I’ve ever smelled.  I’m stuck next to her for the next two and a half hours and it felt like my sinuses were literally about to explode.  So I get to Nashville and basically spend the next couple of days getting people ticked off at me because it was my first trip back and this person wanted to do something and that person wanted to do something and I was only there for three days.  I vowed the next year’s trip would be different…as in zero stress.  The next Christmas rolls around and I decide to make the drive.  Yep, 14 hours by myself in a car.  I spent several days making tapes of various CD’s (no player in the car yet) and this time took plenty of time off work so everyone would be happy.  It was a great trip.  The weather was clear and the highways weren’t crowded at all.  I broke it up by staying at a hotel in Arkansas and made it to Nashville with no problems.  I got to see everyone I planned on seeing and basically had a pretty good time.  Driving back to Austin was smooth sailing…I even made sure the hotel I stopped at in Arkansas coming back had TNT so I wouldn’t miss Monday Night Nitro.  In fact, that Nitro was the debut of Sean O’Haire...fascinating, huh?  When I got back to Austin I told myself “yep…no more flying back for Christmas…that drive went well” and sat back congratulating myself on being such a genius.

Christmas 2000 is near and once again I was going to drive.  It was gonna rock too – I had a new car that I had owned for only a few weeks and finally had a CD player for the car.  I packed up and headed out.  You know what my favorite part of those drives were?  The stops.  For some reason when I would make a stop for food or gas and realize I was so far away from where I lived, by myself on the open road…there was something kind of adventurous about it.  Now you might think that 14 hours in a car by yourself can be boring.  I beg to differ.  There's all sorts of way I would pass the time...and they all involved talking to myself.  One way was to think I was a master actor, musician and all-pro football player who just happened to score the game winning TD of the Super Bowl and was on some interview show...another would be to pretend someone like Henry Rollins was in the car and we spent time discussing the virtues of Black Sabbath.  Hey, no one is around, I can do what I want, right?  I took off about 8 in the morning and was in Belton, Arkansas at around 4:30 in the afternoon.  The trip was going just fine at this time, just like the previous year.  This time, I wanted to see how far I could push it that first day before I was too worn out and planned on driving close to Memphis if possible.  While I was driving it started to rain a little…nothing major at all…but after a little bit I noticed that ice was hanging off my side mirror.  Me being the meteorologist and scientist that I am deduced it must be the result of the water on the side mirror being blasted with the cold air being made colder because of the car moving, because it appeared to only be rain hitting my windshield and decided to press on.  I’m coming down a hill on the interstate and see about eight cars all off to the side of the road and people standing around.  I hate rubbernecking, but I was going to have to slow down because some of these people were standing dangerously close to the road.  I start to lightly hit my brakes and the car starts fishtailing.  I’m like “what the hell?”.  Before I knew what was going on, the car was literally doing 360’s as I slid down the hill.  I got to the bottom of the hill and the car stopped spinning, righted itself pointing forward and I kept driving…mainly because my hands and feet wouldn’t move due to the 8 heart attacks I had just suffered.  I pull off at the next exit and stop for gas, plus I needed the bathroom to check to make sure I hadn’t crapped myself after that little 360 episode.  I get out of the car and notice it isn’t raining…it’s freezing rain.  I get gas and decided Belton would be my home for the night and checked in to a Best Western.  Man, that place was pretty nice.  One of those suites with the little office and stuff.  I ordered a pizza, watched football, drank some rum (always take a bottle on road trips…never know when it will come in handy as you will see here shortly) and chilled out.  The next morning the roads were clear, the sun was shining and off I went.  The rest of that drive was fine so I figured I had my one slightly bad experience and that would be it, right?  I get to my parents’ house and told them about the freezing rain in Arkansas.  My dad tells me “that was nothing, a major winter storm is about to blow through there”.  Uh-oh…problem.  See, it was now Sunday and I needed to be back in Austin no later than Friday.  Why?  A girl of course.  This girl I knew had a sister who was coming into town, and every time she came into town we had a good time, and she was leaving on Saturday.  “Ah, no big deal” I told myself…after all I was doing highway travel and they always clear that stuff off quickly.  My plan was to stay at my parents’ until Tuesday night, then head over to a buddy’s place to stay for that night and hang out, and take off Wednesday to be back by Thursday and maybe hook up that Friday.  Monday the storm hits the Midwest and Arkansas gets a ton of ice and snow.  That was fine, I still had two days before I’d be going through there so the highway would be cleared.  Tuesday morning I get up and the news says the storm was worse than they thought, highways were closed and thousands of people had no power.  Me being the selfish moron I can be sometimes wasn’t concerned about people with no electricity during a winter storm, I was only ticked off because now I was being inconvenienced…after all I had a chick to see.  Well, it was becoming obvious my timetable would need to be altered, so I put off leaving for one day.  Wednesday morning I check the news, and they say the highways are clear…awesome….great…I can still make it back by Friday.  I say good-bye to my parents and head up to my friend’s place.  As an aside, it was weird staying with my parents…you see in movies when someone goes home to see the family, they stay in their old room that’s still filled with the stuff from their childhood and everything.  My parents bought the house they’re in after I moved out to be on my own…so when I go there, the room I would sleep in was basically a bed and a dresser…never really feeling like you’re “home” or whatever.  Anyway, I go see my friend, and after sitting around playing video games and stuff, we run out for some food around 11:00 at night.  Now over the past few days, I had slept a lot.  I don’t know if it was because I ate so late or because I had slept so much over the previous few days, but when we got back to his place I tried to go to sleep but couldn’t.  Of course when you are TRYING to go to sleep, you just can’t…at least that’s how it is for me.  One in the morning becomes two, two becomes three, three becomes four and still I haven’t slept at all…I am WIDE awake.  I cut the TV on and double check the weather and everything looks fine.  I laid down again and still nothing.  Before I know it, it’s seven in the morning and still no sleep.  I decided to go ahead and hit the road.  I was wide awake, so I figured I’d make it as far as I could and when I needed to stop, I would stop for the night.  To keep me awake on the drive, I would stop every hour and buy two 20 ounce diet cokes – one I would gulp down in the parking lot and the other I would drink on until I stopped the next hour.  This ensured two things – one is that I would have caffeine being continuously pumped into me and second, I would have to piss so bad there was no way I could fall asleep driving.  It was working great.  I hit Memphis and was getting ready to cross the Mississippi River making good time and feeling alright.  I knew in a couple of hours I’d be in Little Rock and figured I would stop there.  I come up to the bridge and traffic is at a stop…a complete stop.  It was the kind of stop where people were out of their cars walking around.  Someone said there had been a wreck on the bridge.  All I could see was smoke pouring up from the bridge about halfway down.  I was a little nervous knowing that I’d run out of steam soon and really needed to be on my way.  I sat back in my car and it hit…I started getting tired…but then we started moving so I figured with more caffeine I could make it another two hours.  The wreck was nasty.  A truck coming in from Arkansas had driven over the top of a car and was now hanging halfway off the side of the bridge.  The car it ran over was crushed and all that remained was the charred metal frame.  That kind of stuff sticks with you when driving and you become a little more alert.  So I kept pumping the Cokes in and made it to Little Rock.  I thought about stopping, but decided I could push it one more hour and make it back to that Best Western in Belton.  That was one long hour, but I made it.  I pulled into the parking lot and sat there for a moment in a state of absolute pure exhaustion.  It was like my brain knew I was done driving and sent a signal to the rest of my body saying “ok guys, it’s time to shut down for the day”.  I was literally so tired now that I was seeing in 2D…everything looked flat.  I got out of the car and walked towards the lobby doors when I saw a handwritten sign on the door that stated “no vacancies”.  In the lobby there was about 50 people milling around.  I had to know what the heck was going on.  I go in and asked someone if there was some kind of convention nearby or whatever, and was informed that due to the winter storm, there were about 200,000 people in the state without power, and anywhere there was power everybody was flocking to those hotels.  Ever get that feeling of impending doom?  I went outside and tried not to panic…there HAD to be a hotel room somewhere nearby, right?  I walked next door to the Ramada Inn and saw another “no vacancy” sign.  I drove across the street to Comfort Inn and saw the same thing.  “Ok” I told myself…”You’re just gonna have to keep pushing on and try to find a room”.  I loaded up on more Diet Coke and was feeling nauseous from all the caffeine I had that day.  Exit after exit I had the same problem, no rooms anywhere.  Now if I had gotten any sleep the night before, I probably could have just pulled over for a nap and made the rest of the drive back if I had to.  However considering I was to the point now of collapsing from exhaustion, I needed a bed for several hours.  Hotel after hotel was full…and to add to the chaos I was getting gas and this dude goes “good thing you stopped here…after this exit every gas station is closed because they have no power”.  Wonderful.  While I was pumping gas, I noticed a Quality Inn at the top of the hill.  I thought maybe there was a chance because it looked a little tucked away and maybe no one could see it from the interstate…riiiight.  I make my way inside the lobby and there’s this old dude and his wife in front of me on the phone at the desk.  I asked if they had a room expecting a “no”, but I got some good news instead.  The lady at the desk had called the central office which could check rooms for about 100 miles around, and they found two vacancies!!!  The old dude on the phone was talking to someone at the corporate office to have one of the rooms held and I kept telling him over and over to say someone else needs a room and to not hang up.  He took friggin FOREVER!  Of course in my mind I’m thinking that while he’s babbling away, another operator is taking a call and my room is being booked.  I start getting mad at the guy insisting he tell the operator someone else will be taking the other room and for him not to hang up…he had that confused old man look on as if he didn’t know how a telephone worked.  Well, the final straw was when the operator needed a credit card number to hold the room and he was debating with his wife which card to put it on…so there I am nearing exhaustion while wired on caffeine and I told him “dude…would you just pick one???  If it’s that big of a deal I’ll pay for the damn room!”.  This must have registered because he ended his transaction quickly and gave me the phone.  I got my room booked and after I hung up, I had no idea where I had just booked a room.  The location was Hot Springs, Arkansas which was about 45 miles away off the interstate.  That meant I needed to last about one more hour.  I got directions and apologized to the old dude and explained my situation to him.  He said he was sorry for taking so long and all that, so it was all cool…I didn’t need ANY bad karma at this point, you know?  There was one catch however…I got directions from the chick at the counter and the old dude was gonna follow me.  I told him jokingly yet serious “ok man, but I drive fast and I’m tired…be sure to keep up”.  Did he?  Of course not.  No, most of the time was him going about 30 in a 45 zone which of course made my trip that much longer.  I could have just left him…but again…the bad karma.  I finally made it to the hotel and made sure to get in the lobby before him.  Why?  Because if there was any problems with the rooms I was the first one in so they would have to give me one before him.  I dragged myself into the lobby and with every bit of energy I could muster said “you’re holding a room for me” and gave them my name.  The dude goes “ok, we’ve got a slight problem” and I lost it.  I just started going “No no no…no more problems dude…come the hell on and give me my room”.  He was a little shocked.  He informed me that they had been without power for three days and it came back on about 3 hours before.  Once that happened, their computer showed they had all these vacancies when they really didn’t because people were coming in and getting rooms faster then they could record on their PC.  Basically corporate showed they had rooms they didn’t.  I said “then what the hell am I supposed to do?” and he told me they were moving around the employees that stayed there and getting them to double up to clear rooms out and blah blah blah…so I just said “Dude…bottom line…do I have a room or not?” and he said “yes, it will just take some time”.  I asked how long…hours?  He said about 30 minutes.  I actually started laughing…he must have thought I was insane.  While he’s taking my info down I gave him a quick synopsis of my journey and everything which amuses him…again the karma thing…these guys were trying their best to help so there was no need in getting pissed at them, you know?  After about 30 minutes, I had my room.  I go in, shut the door and climb right into bed.  You might think this is where the story ends….nope.  In my bed was this HOT looking brunette.  I couldn’t believe this!  And you shouldn’t either because I’m kidding…no hot brunettes.  What really happened was I laid down and closed my eyes….and I couldn’t sleep.  I had drank so much caffeine that day that my heart was racing and I was sweating a little.  It was at this point I started to cry like I was having a nervous breakdown.  I kept telling myself “dude…it’s only 6 at night…you don’t have to check out until noon tomorrow…don’t panic…there’s plenty of time”.  I thought maybe some food would settle my stomach a bit…and since all the places to eat were still closed due to weather, I opted for the delicacies found at the local gas station.  Yep…a microwave cheeseburger and a Diet Sprite.  I ate it back in the room and laid down to watch TV…yet my heart was still racing.  It was now around 9 at night and my body would barely move yet I couldn’t sleep.  Then an idea hit…remember what I said about traveling with a bottle of rum?    I decided to take several huge shots of rum to relax myself.  I go down to the vending machine to get another Diet Sprite to chase it down with and the can is warm because the machines hadn’t been back on that long.  No biggie, I would get some ice…hmmm…no ice.  The dude at the desk told me that there was a boil order on water so there wouldn’t be any ice.  So I go back to the room and start gulping rum down chasing it with a warm Diet Sprite while I’m exhausted and nauseous and with my heart racing.  After about an hour I FINALLY drifted off to sleep and kept waking up about every hour or so.  I woke up at about 5:30 in the morning and couldn’t get back to sleep, so I figured I’d get up and head out.  I was still tired, but not that bad…and plus I wanted to not only get back to Austin before rush hour, I wanted to make sure to see chick before she left.  When I was checking out, the dude at the desk gave me a shortcut to get back to the highway which I shouldn’t have taken because it was basically a two lane road that still had HUGE patches of ice and crap all over it.  Oh, and to add to the stress my “change oil” light came on.  Now I had an oil change right before the trip so I figured something was wrong...I had no clue the light came on every so many miles since I had only had the car for a month.  I’m picturing hoses leaking oil everywhere and some huge engine fire starting…me racing down the highway with flames shooting out from under my hood tickling the windshield and me screaming while swerving violently.  Oh, and the gas stations were still closed too and I coasted in on fumes to one that I found that was open where I dined on Keebler peanut butter crackers.  Later on I passed the hotel that I had stayed at the previous year when I watched Nitro and felt like crying…dreaming back to a simpler time…hahaha.  I made it out of Arkansas, went through Dallas, and finally arrived home in Austin around 3 o’clock.  I don’t think I have ever been happier to be home in my life.  My legs felt like rubber going up the stairs to my place and I fell onto the couch when I walked in.  I reached for the phone and called chick’s sister and asked if she was there.  Guess what…she was just leaving because she decided to catch an earlier flight.  Typical…so typical.  I then unpacked, changed clothes (since I had been wearing the same thing for two days) and hooked up some new videogames…had a few drinks…and knew I needed to figure out another mode of transportation for the next year…something like a pod I can step in and magically appear back in Nashville.  I opted for another route…I just moved back to Nashville the next summer (it was for a job…whole other story).

So there you go.  What's the moral of the story?  Ummm....none?  I just often find that in this life of mine that my strange experiences can be relayed to others strictly for entertainment so I go with it.  Have a very safe and Merry Christmas...and be sure to check back next week for the 3rd Annual Rum & Coke Buzz Year End Awards!