Thursday morning we headed to the Des Moines airport just before 7 am, stopping at the
5 & Diner pretty close to the destination. Des Moines, Memphis, and Birmingham are probably three of the friendliest airports in the country. Perhaps I only noticed this because my last flight involved lengthy delays at both LaGuardia and O'Hare. Memphis also has some very decent barbecue, which I experienced first-hand in the form of a mountainous pulled pork sandwich. I couldn't quite finish the potato salad, but that might be due to the half-gallon of sweet tea that came along with it.
Both plane rides and the bus were uneventful. After procuring some local soft drinks and some Waffle House, Brian drove us from Birmingham to Starkville. Friday afternoon I took a short, self-guided around the Starkville, my only chance to drive a stickshift for the foreseeable future. Most notable was the proximity of one of the town's larger bars, impishly named
Mugshots, is just a block away from the county jail. Not sure what to make of that. Before dinner we hit up the
Mississippi State Cheese store, where I was baffled by the sweet potato ice cream, though I suspect the sweet potato coffee may be an even greater curiosity.
Kirk Herbstreit makes great claims for
Lil' Dooey's, a local barbecue joint, but I wasn't able to taste a big distinction between it and the rest that I got. Then again, I certainly didn't have bad barbecue anywhere either. We tried to catch part of the
Magnolia Film Festival, which had a few interesting short subjects running, but it was sold out by the time we got to the box office. Instead we got me an MSU t-shirt and retired to Brian's apartment to watch
Feeders 2 and
Superbad.
Saturday we sought out a record with which to test Brian's turntable, since he hadn't used it in Mississippi yet. The thrift store's haphazard collection contained a polka album by master accordionist Myron Floren. We gave that a spin before heading over to
campus for the basketball game against Arkansas at
The Hump. Apparently student tickets are free (and football is just $3), quite a bargain for SEC athletics. I believe the game featured more attempted dunks than any I've ever seen live, and probably televised as well. It was a relief to see a
high-scoring game like this after watching Iowa beat Ohio State two weeks earlier where neither team managed to break 50 points.
After dinner we made our way to a juke joint in the next town over. Five dollars for a large dinner (BBQ, of course), various forms of entertainment, and some truly adventurous DJing. They eventually closed up shop and we listened to records (eg
this prog-folk masterpiece) at a fellow grad student's house.
Sunday we drove out to the
Noxubee Wildlife Refuge and took in the views of wetlands, prairie, conifers, cypresses, etc. There were a few frisbees tossed out there and back in Starkville when we were grilling some hamburgers.
Monday I experienced some fried green tomatoes, which I liked but were maybe a little bit too strong for my taste. Preparations were made for the next day.
Early Tuesday we drove straight into the eventually blinding sun back toward the Tuscaloosa bus station. I got to Birmingham in plenty of time, and after a cab ride, two flights (one of which featured Delta's seatback trivia game, which I enjoyed except that the touchscreen wasn't always accurate), a trip on BART, and a rainy uphill slog I found the hostel. Holly showed up a few hours later and we found Thai food and a bit of the local nightlife.
Wednesday:
Union Square, a tea demonstration in
Chinatown,
City Lights Books,
Washington Square Park/North Beach/
Golden Boy Pizza, (the
view from)
Coit Tower,
Fisherman's Wharf, and a trip back on the
cable car from which we viewed the
lunar eclipse just above the Transamerica Pyramid.
Thursday:
Golden Gate Park including the
Japanese Tea Garden and
de Young Museum, then Haight-Ashbury including
Amoeba Music, burritos, and
Noc Noc, where they were having a
Springboard promotion from New Belgium.
Friday (Legs
One and
Two): We started out near downtown with an astoundingly good breakfast at
Dottie's Cafe and
SFMoMA, then bussed over to the northwest edge of the city. We hiked above the beach in Lincoln Park for a while; eventually I got down to
sea level, and then we headed back uphill through the golf course and over to Park Presidio Boulevard, where we caught a bus to the Golden Gate Bridge (here's an
aerial view). Before hitting the Italian restaurant and heading to the hostel, we circumambulated the
lagoon at the
Palace of the Fine Arts.
Saturday, after I nearly couldn't open the safe in which I'd stashed my important documents, we picked up the
rental car and headed across the Bay Bridge and north. It started raining soon and didn't really let up for six to eight hours. This was why we didn't take Hwys 1/101. At Redding we stopped in to the mall for lunch and a mini-to-mini plug for the iPod.
Mt. Shasta looked as if it would have have been impressive if we'd been able to see more than 100 feet up. There was some sleet and snow in the higher elevations, but after we got to Oregon the weather was not so bad. After another stop in Roseburg, OR, or thereabouts we made it to Oregon City. Returning the rental car was uncannily easy; the guy just told me where to park, scanned the barcode on the window, and printed out my receipt from his belt.
Sunday we saw the
Hawthorne District, the
waterfront, Rocco's ($1 pints of PBR) across from Powell's, where I stocked up on David Foster Wallace, and some
doughnuts. We also saw the Oscars.
Monday we looked in vain for the end of the Oregon Trail (possibility: it moved!) but found the recently crowned
Best Picture and a game of Scrabble.
Tuesday we traveled by rail to Seattle and that was it.
