Fourth stop - Nashville. Contact: Simon Jay and Emily. Duration: 2 nights. Goal: To hang out and show Haley Music City.
Arriving early in Nashville was great. There was however, one exception - my boy, Simon Jay, was on a hot date and was late, which meant we were stuck outside his parent's place until someone got home. Really not that big of a deal, but it was made better by the text messages I was receiving from Simon. My favorite was "Sorry, she's so hot." It was great. Had she been ugly he would have been there, but due to her being attractive he couldn't pull himself away, even with his friend arriving in town. And the truth is, I totally understand, and I would expect nothing less. How can you not be happy for him? That is a great feeling.
Luckily, his father, Dr. John, rolled in a few minutes after we got to the door and was more than hospitable. I had met John, a brilliant MRI researcher and teacher at Vanderbilt, back when he came to visit Simon in South Africa. I had also gotten to know him further when I spent two weeks with the Gores in Nashville a few years back. Dr. John has a great sense of humor and is a lot of fun to hang out with. After we cleaned up from the long drive, he offered us some red wine and we sat in the living room of their gorgeous Victorian house and caught up while we listened to Dylan's "John Wesley Harding." We talked about the economy, their new bathroom (with the best shower ever), Simon's hot date, which Simon was keeping secret from his parents. I only knew the basic details (see above), and their recent trip to Malaysia during the holidays. John, an emigrant from England thirty or so years back, kept us very entertained with his English wit that I've come to love.
It was good to be back in Nashville.
Simon rolled in around 8:30PM, and it was as if nothing had changed. There are some friends like that. No matter how much time goes by things are just the same. It's like riding a bike. There are never any awkward silences and always something to talk about, or something to think about.
Simon met Halearious for the first time, and we all sat around drinking a glass of wine, catching up before we went out on the town.
Simon thought we should hit off Bosco's for some drinks and he would get some food too (she was obviously too hot to eat in front of). I called my friend from Brown, Emily, and told her that was the initial plan, and she was more than happy to meet us there.
Bosco's is your run-of-the-mill establishment. It could be anywhere - any city, any town, any country - and you'd be happy to go there. Clean. Smelled good. It was crowded. Halerious and Simon were going to get the Bloody Beer - a combination of a Bloody Mary and beer. I decided on the Spiced Russian - basically a white Russian with spices. Simon also got a burger, and Halearious and I decided to get the ahi tuna tacos to split. A good decision indeed, as they turned out to be surprisingly delicious.
Remember when you were a kid and you were putting on sun tan lotion, and it was creamy and smelled liked delicious coconuts and you wish you could drink it? No? Were you not fat growing up? Well if you answered yes, then you should go to Bosco's and order the Spiced Russian, because that is exactly what it smelled like, and I was stoked. It took a few sips before the Vodka smoothed out my taste buds and it became easy drinking, but when a childhood dream comes true, unexpectedly at that, you must dive in headfirst.
Emily walked in with James, her boyfriend, shortly after we ordered and they made themselves at home. It was so great seeing Emily. I hadn't seen her since our five-year reunion at Brown, and she was always one of my favorites there. Beautiful and shy and the nicest person you could ever meet - not a malicious bone in her body. James was just like her, but a he, and it was good to meet him. They ordered beers and we all got to know each other telling stories of South Africa, Brown, where we grew up, Halearious's excitement about outfit changes along he road trip - you know as if you were Mariah Carey and you had to sing "Honey" after you sang "Emotions." Obviously, you can't be in the same outfit. We laughed. We cried. We ordered another Spiced Russian. We left.
On to downtown Nashville, or something like that - right near the Grand Ole Opry, or I should say, the old Grand Ole Opry - bright lights, cowboy hats, covered country songs, covered pop songs, cheap beer, girls in too much makeup, and my sunglasses, which come out when all these things come together and I want to look famous. Halearious couldn't stop it no matter how hard she tried. Some forces pull too strong.
It was a good night. Simon was in rare form. Fired up and right at home in Nashville. Halearious and I tried to keep up. Emily and James called it an early night for fear of too much Bud Light and too many bad versions of cover songs.
We got home during the wee hours of the morning and realized that we needed to call to be let in - you see we were being responsible and left the car at Bosco's and cabbed it around Nashville. Somewhere along the line we forgot that the keys were also with the car, which meant we had no way of getting into the house when we arrived there. Joyce, Simon's mom and dear soul, was a sport and woke up and let us in and then went back to bed. We however, were making our way into the kitchen for some delicious homemade leftovers and thought provoking discussions (i.e. why after drinking so many beers and in taking so many calories are you hungry?). Bedtime.
Banged up, but alive, we woke up the next "morning" at 11AM CST. We moved slowly and with our eyes opened slightly. We showered (separately). We went and tried to find breakfast through the gray skies and long lines.
After a few unsuccessful attempts, we arrived in historic Edgefield in eastern Nashville, an up-and-coming part of Nashville where the artists and cool, but poor people live - a.k.a. where I'd live if I lived in Nashville - at a restaurant called Sky Blue (skybluecoffee.com), and there was no wait. It was music to our ears.
Sky Blue turned out to be delicious and fun. The food was cooked perfectly and had an amazing homemade feel to it. The had Trivial Pursuit on the table. Halearious and I ordered the same thing, egg white veggie omelet - we've already spent too much time together, only a matter of time before our cycles match up - Simon ordered the Brisket Benedict. It all surpassed our wildest imaginations.
After breakfast, we rolled on to Grimey's music (grimeys.com), a famous record store that is still going strong. Halerious picked up a new shirt, and both Simon and Halerious were convinced by yours truly that it was time to collect records, and both bought their seed purchase record.
See, sometimes for something to happen, especially a dream, you have to make a purchase that reminds you of that dream, and keeps it alive in you, and will force you to follow through on your dream and make it a reality. I call these seed purchases. To start a record collection when you don't have a record player, speakers, receiver or anything else you might need (i.e. money), you must start with a record. A single record, or a couple of records that will always keep the dream alive. For Halearious, the seed purchase was both Bon Iver and Camera Obscura. For Simon, the seed turned out to be a Psych Funk compilation album that was playing on the radio at the store. I have no doubt, that they will reap what they have sown - a great record collection in a few years.
After Grimey's, it was time to do some boot shopping. Halearious and Simon were thinking about getting some. I have boots. And they're great. It took an iguana or two to sacrifice, but it was totally worth it. I've had them for years.
We started off at Ranch Dressing, which is a great store, but didn't have what we were looking for. So, it was on to the mall. Opryland. The place is built outside of Nashville, and is built around the new Grand Ole Opry. It has a hotel. The mall is a single floored monstrosity that bends back on itself, and even has a fork in it where you can veer left or right - overwhelming. And the place was packed. It was Christmas on Valentine's day, and people were out supporting the economy, or at the very least checking out some high school ass. But either way, it was overwhelming. Simon got his boots. Kickass. Halearious got boat shoes. In Nashville, I know. I got a pair of running shoes, cause my old ones were dead from walking too much. I don't run. We were exhausted. It was time to go home and get ready for dinner.
Dinner turned out to be a treat from John and Joyce. They took us to an Indian dinner a few minutes walk from their house. The meal was great. Simon and I taught John the intricacies of the 3-4 defense, and how offenses work in football. Halearious tuned us out and sang Mariah songs in her head. We talked about the greatest movies of all time. Nota Bene: When eating dinner with an English emigrant and talking about greatest movies of all time probably not the smartest idea to say: "Braveheart." I learned. We had fun. Upon learning that I had never gotten a speeding ticket, John advised me that I wasn't trying hard enough. I think he's right.
When dinner was over, we met up with Emily and James and spent some time at their house and talked about stories from the past that made us laugh. It was great.
After an hour or so, we decided to check out the Station Inn's Sunday night bluegrass jam session. It was relaxed and chilled. We were all beat from the night before and had only one drink while we relaxed and kept ourselves entertained with the quiet noises of bluegrass dancing around the room. We called it an early night. It was on to New Orleans early the next morning.
We woke up the next morning to snow on the ground. I swear the reason I went south in the first place was to get away from the snow, but Mother Nature obviously didn't like me calling her a slut in an earlier post. A slight inconvenience, but couldn't stop our momentum.
The drive to New Orleans was a nice one, and in comparison to our first 11-hour drive was a short 8 hours. Halearious decided that not being hungover on long drives was "way better" than being hungover. I agreed. She even drove a good portion of the drive. Somewhere in Alabama, I thought we were in Georgia. We realized the red states might be rubbing off, because we were getting stupider. Somewhere in Mississippi, the weather got really nice. Somewhere in Louisiana, New Orleans rose up over the river and the lake.
We were close. The excitement began to rise. The anticipation swelled. Halearious took pictures. We were about to arrive at our next destination
-Groundswell
PS - the "Oh Shmallsh" (high pitched term of affection Halearious utters when thinking about her cat Smallz) count is at ~67 for the trip. Vegas has the over / under at 228. Please pray for the under.
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