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| On the road again.... |
Monday, December 26th 2016
LONG ride to Dixie
The day after Christmas, Ellie and I piled into our rental 2016 Impala and pointed the nose southward once again. We were off to see our family down South for the holiday. As it turned out, every licensed driver on the east coast decided to ply the same stretch of interstate as we did. We left about 8am on 12/26/16 and, from about half way between Baltimore and Washington until about 10 miles North of Richmond, the traffic moved at roughly 8 miles an hour, stop and go. What should have been about a 10 hour trip give or take a few stops, was 14 hours.The saving graces were two: my daughter's good-natured sense of humor and the fact that the Impala was an automatic transmission. Had I been in the Redbaru, we would have turned back around Quantico VA.
We arrived our our excellent friend's Maria and Dan's house in Charlotte right about 10pm. After some short hugs and how are yous, we fell fast asleep.
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| Part of the 14 hours.... |
Tuesday, December 27th 2016
Off to Monroe!
Somewhat refreshed the next morning, we headed to Cafe Amelie. A true French Bakery within two miles of the house. Croissant and Baguette sandwiches, coffee and tea and we were ready for the day.
We headed over to my sister Kathy's workplace, the Veterinary Hospital. After a visit with her and the animals we scooped up my niece Kylie and lit out for lunch in Monroe NC with cousin Sandra.
Sandra recently injured her driving foot so we stopped by and picked her up and off to Spiro's Hilltop. I had a southern style lunch with fried chicken, okra, mashed taters and iced tea. Ellie, still full from the big French breakfast, picked at some shrimp. It was pretty delightful to have lunch with the ladies! Sandra, Kylie and Ellie...three of my all time favorites of course!
After a nice visit, we took Sandra back home then dropped Kylie off with Kathy and headed back to Charlotte.
After a brief recharging, Dan, Noah, Jackson, Ellie and I headed off to a fancy theatre to see the new Star Wars Story, Rogue One. It was a very good Star Wars film although I didn't think they needed to [spoiler alert] kill everybody off. Also, the 20 minutes of trailers before the film were, almost without exception, the loudest, darkest, most violent trailers I've ever seen. Not called for and violence as entertainment is just plain wrong. I said it.
It was a fine film however and the kids enjoyed it too!
Post movie, we trolled the neighborhood looking at some truly amazing Christmas light displays. Call crazy but I really liked Dan and Maria's light-up pig!
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| Some Pig |
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| The winner! |
Wednesday, December 28th 2016
Touchdown in the land of Kinfolk and BBQ
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| Amelie's |
After some downtime back at the house, around noon we headed to Concord to meet Grandpa for the best BBQ anywhere. Kathy and Kylie met us and as always, it was a lovely visit with my favorite 93 year old! He gave me a few more pictures and stories as well. I would love to see him, Sandra and my sister and her family more than twice a year, but 600 miles separates us as well as jobs and travel expenses. It is amazing when I do see them as I love them all VERY much.
It certainly warms my heart to see Ellie sitting across the table sharing a meal with her Great-Grandfather. I know how special and rare that is and savor, savor, savor every moment.
I walked Grandpa to his car and patted his knee and told him I loved him and he reciprocated warmly before closing the car door and jetting into traffic on good old Church St.
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| Troutman's |
The smell of BBQ still on my fingers and the taste of cherry-lemon sun-drop not quite out of my taste buds, we headed over to West Concord Cemetery to see Mom and Big Mommie and all our other ancestors. It was a bright, sunny day and Ellie and I spent a few quiet minutes with them. Uncle Tommy and Uncle Virgil and Uncle Jesse and Aunt Louise and Aunt Rosie are all there along with Mom and my Grandmother. It is very important to me that Ellie know the names and stories of her other people. I've been endeavoring to keep that alive since she was wee.
It was nice to "see" Mom and everybody. I am quite sure she knows when I'm there and looks down on Ellie and smiles. Grandpa mentioned more than once how much she looks like Mom. I see it every day. Every day. We also took a spin past my former middle school which is now something other than a public school but it was unclear what exactly.
Concord is an alternate universe I sometimes visit when I can.
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| The former Concord Middle School |
We headed back to Charlotte and after another brief break, we headed out to dinner at The Improper Pig. The BBQ was good but they also had LOTS of other things and everyone got something different. I paired my BBQ, Black-Eyed Peas and Collards with an Old Mecklenburg Brewing Dunkelbrau; it was perfect!
Breno, (the Brazilian exchange student who is staying with Dan and Maria,) finally opened up and we had lovely time.
Thursday, December 29th 2016
Homeward Bound
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| Durham scene shot by Ellie |
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| Caitlyn and I |
Our next stop was miles and miles and hours away but we weren't going to pass Richmond without a stop at our favorite Richmond restaurant. Kuba Kuba is amazing in every way and we ate to our hearts content. Beef and pork and plantains and black beans and rice and veggies and sweet, sweet leche coffee. The miles flew by and Ellie was back to Blue Bell by dinnertime. Along the way, we heard lots of cool podcasts and Ellie curated a hilarious, musical A to Z via the cloud. Our phones talked very well to the 2016 Chevy.
Incidentally, it did have some git up and go with it's big 6 under the hood. That was also a nice treat....
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| Kuba Kuba, lunch of my dreams.... |
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| Richmond scene, shot by Ellie |
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| 1,362 round trip |
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