I’m driving my life away..

I think that in general, the place most of our time as people is spent, is probably in the car.  Or maybe in line at the grocery store, but we’re not even going to get into that.  We have to get to and from work, to entertainment, to appointments and tons of other stuff. So it’s only natural that a lot of funny things happen when I’m in my car by myself.  I also have taken several long drives over the last few years, and I  can tell you that six hours at once is pretty much the longest stretch that I can do without starting to go bonkers.  When I drove to Memphis which is 12 hours, I was so sick of driving, so over it with the music I was listening to, and also sick of talking to myself. I have been known to have some pretty epic conversations with myself while driving, and working out some things that have been bothering me as well.  There is something really therapeutic about the road to me.  I enjoy the way an open highway makes me feel, and sometimes miss it if I haven’t travelled recently.  When I set out on a road trip, I will usually make a super fun playlist that is geared toward the trip.  When I went to Memphis the list included lots of Elvis and Jerry Lee Lewis, as I was going for a concert, and to Graceland.  I recently took a trip to Alabama on a whole Hank Williams themed trip and there were tons of great songs on that list.  You see the goal- make myself amped about the trip that’s coming, and give myself something to sing along to while I drive.  Most times I start out pretty quiet and then it becomes a karaoke session in the Doozer Mobile.  I also will have a few rockstar energy drinks to increase the fun, and even refer to my car at times as the Mobile Command Center.  Just because I’m a fool really.

Those are all instances of when I am in the car for extended periods of time.  There are also the run of the mill drives to the grocery store or dinner that can get interesting too.  My version of road rage is to call people JERK FACE and to also say things like “Thanks for the turn signal SIR”  I also will make up stories in my mind about where the people in cars are going, just to entertain myself.  There is also a pretty good flow of me singing at the top of my lungs to a variety of music, depending on the mood I’m in.  This was one of the reasons I needed to get my windows tinted.  Who wants someone watching while they angrily rap in their car? Not me, I like to do that mess in peace.

This weekend while I was off work, I was driving down the road, going to meet someone, and I heard this thumping coming from my trunk.  Now, I’m gonna hope that you are all familiar with the scene  in Goodfellas where the guys are all in the car and they hear the thumping only to find out that the man in the trunk was not actually as dead as they thought he was.  So there I am, driving along thinking..well I don’t THINK there is a dead person in my trunk, or a not so dead person incidentally.  But as the blocks went on, I think to myself, what is that?  Did someone put an almost dead person in my trunk??   So I pull over at a gas station, and I stand to the side of the trunk, figuring that IF there was someone in there and they tried to jump out, I didn’t want to be directly in front of them.  I also had pepper spray in my hand, you know just for good measure.  So I stand there for a moment, to build up the courage to open my trunk and BOOM..nothing is in there but some water bottles that I never drank during the Hurricane. They were rolling around each time I slowed down or sped up.  So that solves the mystery of the thumpy trunk, and I even thought, whew.. THAT was close, when I got back in my car.  The only thing that makes this story any funnier than it already is, is that when I arrived at my destination I said to my friend “sorry I’m late, I thought Billy Batts was in my trunk!!”

So if you happen to come across me in my travels, know that you will hear some loud music coming from my car (the people I work with say its loud anyway) and that there is something fun happening.  Whether it is me calling people names for not using a blinker, or me thinking that I may or may not have somehow acquired a dead mobster in the trunk.  Either way, stop and say hi if you can, and share some of your fun driving stories too! Until then, I’ll be on the road again..