i've split myself in two

I've said a few words about my visit to the Carolinas, but here are a few more.

I've gotten into the intermittent habit of visiting the tourist information center as I cross each state line. The man at South Carolina's (how do you get that job?) was insistently helpful, and pointed out that a scenic route up to Asheville would only cost me 15 or 20 minutes, so I decided to take him up on it.

And the road through the mountains was very pretty. It also taught me that South Carolina roadside stops are a good place to buy hot boiled peanuts, and a bad place to find public restrooms.

Once I crossed the North Carolina border, I stopped at the first gas station and general store I found--right by the library--where I discovered my new favorite food product: Home-Baked Pecan Cake In A Jar. Mmmmm.

The morning of the wedding I went wandering around downtown Asheville, vaguely destined for an internet cafe and bookstore, which I found. It almost goes without saying that as soon as I found net and coffee, Dave showed up.

The wedding itself was really lovely. It took place way up in the mountains, just over the border in South Carolina, in an ancient-looking stone chapel which sloped down toward the altar and no back wall. So the whole ceremony took place against a backdrop of most of South Carolina, or North, depending on which way we were facing.

And the ceremony, designed from scratch for Dave and Kendra, was beautiful too, delivering exactly the combination of humor and sentimentality that I'd been primed to expect by a recent viewing of The One With Chandler And Monica's Wedding.

nashville

Music for the drive west into Tennessee: Everything I had with me by Bill Frisell.

The drive to Nashville was the scariest part of the trip (so far). Post-hurricane wind and rain were battering Tennessee and pushing my car around like an air hockey puck, only louder. Eventually I had to stop off at a Shoney's and eat eggs for a while as I massaged my tattered nerves back under my skin.

When I finally made it to cwage's apartment--where, drenched and speechless, I met the whole Belmont University sociology club--I still thought I was going to go out to an open mike that night. I got almost all the way out of the driveway before realizing that more driving that night would be insane.

So the next day Chris and I went wandering around downtown Nashville, which was great, and to the Bluebird Cafe. The Bluebird has one of those open mikes where there's time for twenty people to play, and fifty people show up. So now I have a ticket that will actually allow me to play next time I'm in Nashville. I don't expect to be back there for a couple of years, but it's okay, because it'll take me a couple of years to write a country song.

i long to hear you

Virginia was the first Eastern state on this trip that struck me, from the interstate, as beautiful.

Everything from Louisiana to North Carolina was pretty, and there were breathtaking moments, like Lake Pontchartrain and the chapel in the mountains. But Virginia--the part that I-81 runs through--was beautiful through and through.



Part of this is natural--rolling hills, mountain ranges, rivers--but the built landscape is great too. Lots of farms, with red barns and colonial houses and horses roaming around on the hillside.

All of it looks old--in a good way--perhaps because of Virginia's general attention to history and preservation history. But the period-piece look isn't limited to the 1700s. Much of downtown Roanoke--as creepily deserted as any science fiction city--looks frozen in, oh, the 1940s? I don't know architecture, but I know what I like. And there's a wall full of old ads, restored in the 90s and now fading again.



Downtown Roanoke is also home to Tudor's Biscuit World, a cafe restaurant whose entire menu consists of, yes, biscuits, with optional stuff on them. Let me clarify: Heavenly, to-die-for biscuits, with anything you could want on them. For breakfast I had three.

Later in the day I thought I would head over to Shenandoah National Park--home of the folk song--and head up Skyline Drive, rejoining the interstate near the Maryland border. But Hurricane Isabel had thrashed the whole park, and it was closed to through traffic. So here's my view of this scenic byway:



It's just as well, though. The interstate was scenic, too, with not nearly as far to fall.

(a brief interlude in the present)

Today I ate at a "raw food" vegan restaurant, saw at least four people riding recumbent bicycles, visited a community co-op grocery store, and was nearly run down by a swarm of women on motorcycles. Minneapolis is more Bay Area than the Bay Area.

oh yeah, and

Local magazine The Rake has a good interview with Al Franken about the Wellstone Memorial and other stuff.