Two Jews and a Pitbull

We got on the road at 9:00 a.m. on the morning of July 17th. Dan took the wheel, I took the ipod and the map, and Zoe took cuteness.


She wasn't actually as scrunched in as she looks in that picture. She just felt left out when she stayed on her big pillow so she'd frequently rest her head on top of the luggage separating her from us. Sometimes, when I was lucky, she'd rest her head on my shoulder or arm. I'm in love with this dog.

It took us 9 hours to get to the border crossing near Laredo, Texas. The drive through Mexico was absolutely, stunningly beautiful. We drove through unthinkably flat deserts and craggy, bald mountains for hours. The trees on the side of the road (I think they may have been joshua trees, but I'm not sure) were really funky and cool and the sky was enormous and filled with clouds so perfect that they almost looked fake. It was fantastic.



















Anyway, after around 9 hours we crossed the Rio Grande and I entered the United States of America for the first time in five weeks. The Rio Grande was relatively unimpressive (not so grande) where we crossed at Columbia.


This did not deter Zoe and Dan from being extremely excited to be back on American soil...



We made it past Austin and nearly to Dallas by the end of the first day -- a trip of around 875 miles. Texas was a fun time. We ate Whataburger cheeseburgers for breakfast at 9 the next morning (beginning an epic day of disgusting eating) and took off for our second destination: Memphis and Graceland. Here's a taste of Texas...





No relation, I'm sure.

We stopped for lunch at some roadside BBQ farm, which was delicious. Zoe especially enjoyed the leftovers. We also got into the habit, now that we had nice American rest stops available, of stopping intermittently so Zoe could get some exercise chasing tennis balls around. She's really just an absurdly awesome dog. Here are some photos, action and not. In the heat, she'd get really overheated and pant ridiculously, which also merited some photography...






We arrived in Memphis relatively early and got on line to eat at Rendezvous, Memphis's most famous rib spot. My buddy Ryan from Guatemala helped us out with some telephonic directions and other information (thanks, Ryan!). The food was delicious. Behold some nauseating before and after pictures.







We crashed in an Econolodge near Graceland, sneaking Zoe into the room as we'd done the previous night. She's a cuddly roommate...




The next day, we went to Graceland. Here, I must pause to provide some information from the previous evening in order to make the most of an event that occurred in the Graceland parking lot. At Rendezvous, while we were waiting for our table (about an hour), Dan and I had noticed a pair of attractive but...age-challenged...females. Dan particularly took a fancy to one of them. The two (let's just be generous and say 16 year old) girls were with their parents and a grandparent. Dan eyeball-stalked the blonde for the duration of our wait and that was that. We figured we wouldn't see them again. Ironically, however, as we were pulling into the Graceland parking lot at 9 in the morning, we saw the very same family getting out of their car two rows in front of us. It was hilarious and we were cracking up and making jokes. As Dan turned the car off and opened his door, he continued with his commentary on the girl, forgetting to lower his voice to compensate for the absence of thitherto blaring music. His door open and his voice extremely loud, Dan declared: "I'm telling you! It is my destiny to [edited] her [edited]!" I immediately slid down in my seat fearing the worst and said "Dan..." He, not believing he'd done anything wrong said "Oh, it's fine" as he looked up and saw staring at us from the next row of cars a middle-aged woman who'd just gotten out of a minivan with Texas plates. Just as he made eye contact with her, she exclaims "Oh good lord!" in a fantastic, shocked, southern accent. We commenced hysterical dissolution, hiding our faces and crying with mirth. It was classic. Anyway, this lady finally starts grinning too and basically tells us to get over it and get out of the car (as her family's getting out of the van grinning and wondering what we said). We clambered out, made our way to the ticket office, and found ourselves confronted with the line. There were two parties in it: the Jailbait Family and the family of the Texan mother. We resolved to wallow in our shame and got on line. As we approached, I told the Texan "He's very sorry" with a grin, and she replied "Oh we know you love it" with a wink. Which was kind of scary. Anyway, it was hilarious, and Dan continued to stalk the blonde teenager throughout Graceland.

Graceland itself was, as you can all imagine, really really classy and glamorous. Hehe. Honestly, one of the weirder places I've ever been. The very first thing that struck us was the close resemblance of Elvis to our friend Louis...


Admit it, Louis: it's freaky. You're obligated to dress as Elvis for Halloween. If I can do it, you certainly can.

The rest of the tour was funny and interesting. His house is ridiculous, especially the velvet-lined bar room and the funky fabric-walled pool room. I was also excited to see his martial arts uniform since I'm a big proponent of the "All Techniques Into One" philosophy. Rather than go through the audio tour on my blog, here are a lot of pictures (since this post has been so picture-light). Note the white, fur-lined bed with the built-in, angled mirrors and sound system. Hot. Also, the TCB lightning bolt over the couch is pretty sweet. Oh, and I love his turquoise-handled pistol and that the only two books on his desk are "Gods From Outer Space" and "The Warren Report." Ridiculous person...
























It was an interesting experience. He was an interesting guy. Anyway, we grabbed Steak & Shake for lunch (mmmmm) and headed out to get as far as we could towards DC. It was a late start to the day because of Graceland, but we made it pretty far nonetheless and ended up turning in for the night in Natural Bridge, Virginia, just a couple of hours from DC.


We got up early the next day, grabbed lunch in a nearby diner, and headed towards our nation's capital to have lunch with our buddy Pete. It was good to see him (I hadn't seen him in years) and fun to see DC, even if from a distance, after such a long, international drive...


From DC to New York was a piece of cake after what we'd done. We were back in the city by 6:30 on July 20th. Before we entered the city, though, Dan wanted to fill up on gas in New Jersey (since it's cheaper) and I wanted some coffee (I'd gotten used to it in Guatemala) so we stopped at one of the last rest stops on the Jersey Turnpike before New York. I walked in, got on line at the Starbucks, and glanced to my right and this is what I saw.

For a moment I was taken aback, but then I just smiled. I'd come a long way and had quite a few adventures, but I knew then that Guatemala would stay with me, if only in the random things that would make me happy. With a grin, I got a venti of the daily brew and headed back out to the car. We hopped in, shot to the bridge, and I was home...



I've been in town for four days now. It's been nice seeing folks, but I'm looking forward to hitting the road again. Tomorrow evening, I'll be flying to Thailand. See you there.