03-11-11 It’s a beautiful Morning…ah!

03-11-11
“It’s a beautiful Morning…ah!”
Auburn to Atlanta
Woke up around 6am to chirping birds and warm sunshine. Clear skies all over. The night befoe had been overcast and cold. I plied the new blanket, tarp and foam mat into service. It was a good test and a good result. A few more things to pack up but it all went smoothly..
Went to the local McDonalds to use wifi and check the best gas prices on Gas Buddy (a recent necessity) and call my friend Chuck in Atlanta to get directions to meet up with him. I’d had his address but my PDA had gone dead (through not charging it soon enough) so all my contacts there were lost.
I drove to Opelika to find gas at $3.39 and headed into Georgia on a full tank.
After stopping at the Georgia Welcome center and crossing the Chatahootchee River (for the first of many time in that state) I was passing through the city of West Point when I saw an off ramp sign that seemed odd to me. KIA Parkway.
I was thinking to myself “What the Hell? Killed In Action Parkway?
Then I passed it - .The Kia Motors factory.
Hey, It was still 8:00 am to my body (I’d just lost an hour passing the Georgia border - from Central to Eastern time ) - and I still hadn’t adjusted.
Entering Atlanta was like many of the big metropolitan area…endless distances of concrete landscapes and confusing interchanges. We were set to meet up at a shopping center off Howard Mills road. Three interchanges and two near accidents we met up and then went to a local park to give Mischa a chance to stretch her legs. It was good to see Chuck again after too many years.
We’d met through a theater group in Wilmington, NC when I lived there in 1988. We started working on perhaps producing some of the scripts he’d written. Then I moved to Orlando while his marriage fell apart. We’d stayed in touch over the years. He moved to
Atlanta, re-married, raised their daughter and worked in Theater, teaching and his church. We exchanged letters, Christmas cards and Facebook message over the years. So when the opportunity to go to Georgia arrived, he was first on the list to contact.
At the park we talked about how things had gone over the last few years for each of us and who my Journey had begun and progressed.
At times I wished I’d had my tape recorder running as he was talking about the very types of information I was looking for in the interviews - with an insight into the Atlanta market.
He called his wife, Denise and arranged to meet up around 5:30 at a local famous eatery called “The Varsity”.”
Between that then and our dinner gathering, Chuck settled me into a motel in Marietta. He wanted to put me up in an extended stay hotel that would have cost $200 for two nights once taxes, service & pet fees were all tallied. Chuck had offered to cover the cost of my stay which was extremely generous and unexpected. But that was way to extravagant. At the Georgia Welcome center that morning I’d picked up a couple of magazines with coupons for discount’s on hotels/motels. We found one for a much lower rate one off ramp north and I settled in there.
We took Chuck’s car and he proceeded to give me a tour of many of the notable sites around Atlanta. The Georgia Dome, Margaret Mitchell’s house, Centennial Square, CNN and The Weather Channel, TBS Studios; the Downtown, Midtown area’s and many other places.
We got to “The Varsity” about the same time as Denise & Carly. They were delightful to meet after all these years of reading about them.
The Varsity is like a huge version of Carney Dogs in Hollywood with a little bit of Canter’s Deli attitude and just of pinch of Farmers Market LA atmosphere. But it’s still totally unique. You go to the counter to order from the waiting attendants who are yelling ‘Whatcha Have?” whenever they are free for a new customer. They have lots of deadly fried foods. I got the chili burger & dog combo , onion rings a coke (hard to get Pepsi in this town - home of Coke!) and was convinced to get a Peach Pie (read turnover).
It was tasty, but the chili was dense and less “liquid” than I had expected. It was more like a chili paste or relish.
I introduced Denise & Carly to Mischa - took some photos (and Denise shot some video) against the Varsity sign and the Olympic torch model.
I got back to the motel and Chuck and I talked a bit longer before he headed home.
And then the long day began to take it’s effect on me. I typed a bit and then went to sleep watching …well, nodding off to some TV show around 11 pm.