From the 28th state ...

... this summer. Not bad, eh?
I'm in Maryland, spending a week with Eleni & Co. before she leaves for Greece. We should be going to Ocean City later this afternoon, or I'll be heading to D.C. to meet up with Mama and Mini Slaj, who are looking at colleges there. I keep telling Mini Slaj not to go to college. She doesn't listen.
Kids today ...
So where did I leave off? We spent Wednesday morning in (or, I guess, just outside) Nashville, looking for the Grand Ole Opry. It's hidden so far within a Gaylord convention center that we had to take a break from looking so we could eat breakfast at Cracker Barrel. We eventually found it -- across the street from an Old Navy -- and just did a drive-by, we were so disgusted.
It's a legend, and it's part of a goddamn strip mall. Oh, America.
We drove through the rest of the day and all night to get to Connecticut. Through Kentucky, through West Virginia (which, surprisingly enough after all the hick jokes I've made and heard, looks a lot like New England), through Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania and New York. We crossed the West Virginia border three times.
Delirium set in after 12 or so hours. A conversation:
"They took our jobs!"
A semi truck passes. On the back is a headshot of an extraordinarily creepy man.
"He looks like a serial killer."
"Like he killed someone and is wearing their face."
"He took our face!"
"He took our face!"
"He took our face!"
And so on.
But we made it, and Thursday afternoon drove a merciful two hours to Great Barrington, Mass., where our friend Cait works at a YMCA camp. We spent the night drinking Jack in a state park before passing out on her cabin floor.
She wants me to come work at camp for a couple weeks next month. I don't know how to handle kids, I've never been to camp, I'm not especially crafty ... but I'm sure none of that's a problem. We'll see.
And then to Greyfox, a bluegrass festival in Ancramdale, N.Y. We went and camped with the IT-type guy from the newspaper, a middle-aged guy who's been taking is family and all his friends to the festival for many, many years. They gave us food, alcohol, and access to their campsite (just a minute walk from the main stage) and their chairs (in the second and third row).
Charmed life.
Now that was a good time. It's up in the Berkshires, so it's beautiful. There are 4,000 campers (compared to Bonnaroo's 80,000), they don't search your bag or your car, and for days you hear nothing but banjos, mandolins, guitars, basses and cellos.
The people we stayed with are at least 25 years our senior, and they drank us under the fucking table. The first day I drank endless beers, a few shots of blueberry and vodka, a shot of Patron and ate a fistful of moonshine-soaked cherries.
I puked all night. I did not drink the next day.
Whoops.
But the bands we saw on stage, and the random jam sessions that went on throughout camp all night, made up for it. We saw Crooked Still, Dry Branch Fire Squad, Stringdusters, and Red Stick Ramblers, among others, and they were all amazing.
Red Stick Ramblers played at the dance pavillion Saturday night. Eleni and I danced for hours. There was much kicking and down-hoing. And not nearly enough plaid.
And let's see ... that's about all I feel like sharing for now. Oh, and I bought HP yesterday. In true nerd form, finished it today. Eleni sent me into another room when I kept gasping and getting so shocked I had to stand up and spin around.
Pretty good ending though, until the super-cheesy epilogue. That J.K. Rowling, she's a crafty one she is.
More soon. I'm sure a night or two drinking in Ocean City will yield more stories, if not appropriate blog fodder.