Strollin' in Savannah

After a long winter in Baltimore, with trips to Montreal and upstate New York doing little to thaw the bones or warm the skin, the prospect of a change of scenery with a few days down south was eagerly anticipated. The meatball and I wanted to do something a little special on my penultimate visit to Columbia this year, and as that final trek will be to celebrate her graduation (I’m so proud of her!), this was our last chance to get out of town for a day trip.

There was much to do before that, however, including ignore her while becoming engrossed with Friday Night Lights when we arrived at her house late Thursday night after my flight into Charlotte. My main complaint, unsurprisingly, is that there isn’t enough football in the show, but considering I walked into a house full of girls in the middle of the third season of a show I’ve never watched, I think I managed to follow along with the plotline fairly well. I think Tyra giving up on her college dreams to follow the cowboy into the wilds of Texas was a huge mistake, but what do I know?

We woke up Friday and resumed our rivalry at the university’s gym, playing spirited games of Around the World and one-on-one before challenging each other to free throw and three-point shooting contests. Gina then abandoned me to work on a project with classmates at the business school – and by abandoned, I mean I encouraged her to leave so that I could ask the guys on the practice court next to me if they needed another person to play a pickup game, which we did for the next hour and a half before calling it quits.

After showering and changing into something a bit less disgusting and sweaty, I picked Gina up and we made our way to dinner at Cantina 76, an excellent Mexican-inspired restaurant and bar on Main Street in Columbia. The chicken pesto, chicken teriyaki, and BBQ shrimp tacos I had were washed down with a Corona, and Gina just had a veggie taco and the chips and queso she split with me since she and her partners took advantage of the value menu at Wendy’s earlier that afternoon. Choices, choices.

That night we went to a soirée hosted by Gina’s friend, and the birthday boy, Owen, a very cool guy to whom I wish I could’ve gotten to know more in my visits to Columbia over the past few months, but the timing just hasn’t worked out. People got dressed up, to some extent or another, and it was a fun time filled with delicious cookies made by Gina’s roommate Kristy for the occasion. Instead of continuing the night downtown, though, Gina and I headed home a bit early with our expedition the next day in mind.

My hot date for the night!

There were really three choices for our trip – Asheville, North Carolina; Charleston, South Carolina; and Savannah, Georgia. I had some of the best few months of my life in the summer of 2012 as an intern at the Asheville Art Museum, spending many nights watching the sunset over McCormick Field and eating macaroni and cheese at the Southern on Lexington Avenue, but I also went back just last summer and Gina and I have our own plans for the mountains this summer. I’ve heard great things about Charleston, but as one of its most significant selling points is the beach and nothing but rain was expected that day, the desire to visit just wasn’t there. Selfishly, the minor league baseball team there didn’t have a home game that night, so that obviously ruled Charleston out for good.

In fact, the Charleston RiverDogs were playing a couple hours to the south in Savannah on Saturday evening, and going to Savannah also meant we could meet with a friend of mine from college who I hadn’t seen in a few years. Hannah just started working as the Catering Sales Manager at a fabulous boutique hotel in Savannah, the Mansion on Forsyth Park, and Gina and I made the two-and-a-half-hour drive from Columbia in time to amble lazily around Forsyth Park itself, taking in beautiful, leafy squares and residential side streets before meeting Hannah and her boyfriend Morris for a short tour around the hotel, followed by lunch at a noodle restaurant on Broughton Street, the commercial and retail hub in Savannah today.

Walking into Forsyth Park

 

We then bid adieu to Hannah and Morris for the day and walked to River Street, a bustling riverfront environment of restaurants, bars, and little shops today but was originally constructed as the docking site for the port that made Savannah one of the most strategically important cities in colonial America. Even today, Savannah is still home to the fourth-largest port for shipping container traffic in North America. Savannah has a fascinating history; it was first established in 1733 as the capital of the British Province of Georgia and later became the first state capital of Georgia. It was the birthplace of the University of Georgia, today located in Athens. It was home to the first Girl Scout headquarters in the United States.

Savannah City Hall

 
Savannah was originally built around four open squares each with eight surrounding blocks that allowed it to expand over time, and today there are 22 squares within the city. Gina and I didn’t get to see all of them, but we did stumble on what I later discovered was the first and largest of them – Johnson Square, which was named for Robert Johnson, the British colonial Governor of South Carolina and friend of James Oglethorpe, the British general who founded the colony of Georgia in 1732. Johnson Square, located just a couple blocks from Broughton Street, has two fountains and, most interestingly to me as a history major, a monument that contains the remains of General Nathanael Greene, a Revolutionary War hero and Rhode Island native who died just outside Savannah. Greene began the war as a private in the militia and worked his way all the way up the ranks to lead the American forces in the Southern Campaign and became the second-most important military commander in the Continental Army, under only George Washington.

Nathaniel Greene's monument in Johnson Square

After waiting in line for what seemed like an eternity but was probably only twenty minutes in reality, we gorged ourselves on ice cream at Leopold’s, which has been around since 1919 and appears to be something of a local tradition in Savannah, at least judging by the wait to get in. I had one scoop of honey almond and cream and another scoop of chocolate chewies and cream, and Gina had chocolate raspberry swirl.

Yep

This April day was perfect for ice cream, and Savannah is an ideal town to wander around the cobblestone and brick streets, cone in hand, and lose yourself in the sleepy pace of life that characterizes so many Southern cities. With that said, no amount of green space or shade could mitigate the brutally hot and humid summer days there, and no amount of ice cream could pacify me into living amongst the slow pace of life exhibited by locals and tourists alike, and their lack of any sense of urgency whatsoever.

Gorgeous streets of Savannah

We finished the night at Historic Grayson Stadium, which has been around since 1926 and is home to the Savannah Sand Gnats, a farm team of the New York Mets since 2007. The Sand Gnats were hosting the aforementioned Charleston RiverDogs, and I brought my handy notebook and three different-colored pens to diligently keep score of the game. Around the third inning, I felt a pat on the back from a patron in the row behind us to ask what major league team I was scouting for, to which I disappointingly had to admit that I just really like baseball and was doing it for myself. My ego was then restored in the eighth inning, when the mom next to us, who put in a superhuman effort in keeping two very young boys in check by herself for over three hours, asked me if I worked for the Morning News, the city’s daily newspaper. Again I was forced to admit that no, I was doing it all on my own. The visitors triumphed on this evening, winning 6-4, and Gina found a new boyfriend from Texas.

Historic Grayson Stadium in all its glory

Sunday was quiet and rainy all day; we stayed home and made a nice dinner with bourbon-glazed salmon and asparagus. We braved a tornado watch on our drive back to the airport in Charlotte to drop me off, where the TSA agent called for me to step forward through the scanner before complimenting me on my Union Jack-patterned socks. After getting through security and stopping at a bench to put my belt back on and gather my things, I received another pat on the back from an older gentleman who asked if I play professional sports, because his kids are into soccer and he saw my socks and the Liverpool FC jacket (thanks Davey!) I was wearing. Gina says I’m annoyingly approachable, and I suppose I must acknowledge that it’s true.

I’m back in Baltimore now, and should have a relaxing next couple weekends before making my last visit to Columbia in early May. I’m very, very proud of Gina for how hard she’s worked for four years – interestingly enough, we both had lives before the nine months that she and I have been dating – and am excited to spend time with her family and celebrate a big occasion in her life. I’ll get to see two of her roommates graduate, too, so it should be a wonderful time overall. More then.

Hey Ma

I’ve spent nearly half a month in Columbia, South Carolina since the start of last fall, totaling the five long weekends I’ve visited. For someone who admires very little about Southern culture besides its mouth-watering, eventual heart attack-inducing cuisine, I must admit that I’ve enjoyed my time there and feel like I’ve gotten to know the town fairly well.

My restless personality makes it exceedingly difficult for me to sit still and pass the time by doing the same activities in the same places over and over again. Thus after arriving into town on Thursday night, I was very much looking forward to waking up the next day and doing something the meatball and I hadn’t done much of since our visit to Harpers Ferry last summer – enjoying the peace and tranquility of nature.

Congaree National Park, located just twenty minutes or so outside of Columbia, is one of just 59 such protected areas in the United States to receive that designation. It is the second-smallest park by area in the continental United States, covering over 26,000 acres, and preserves the largest tract of old growth bottomland hardwood forest left in the country.

For our purposes, though, it was the site of a lovely 6.6-mile hike traversing the woods and the floodplain of the Congaree River. We were told this moderate route would take between three to four hours to complete, but even with Gina’s stumpers and small strides slowing us (my gangly long legs) down, your two champions completed the walk in about two and a half hours. Take that, trail guide!

The pose of a true outdoorswoman

I can’t tell you how relaxing it was to listen to the sounds of nature, even if we had absolutely no idea where they were coming from or what was responsible for making them, and how gratifying it was to see an environment left to itself and not artificially shaped by man. We were two of handful of people in the park that day, and I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. For a fleeting moment, we spotted a family of wild hogs scampering across the woods not too far from us, a reminder that we were part of their world, not the other way around.

After re-joining the world of the humans, serenaded on repeat on our drive back into town by the dulcet tones of Cam’Ron and his chart-topper, “Hey Ma”, we had dinner at a pasta place on the other side of town. Bacon-wrapped southeastern scallops served with a spicy sriracha slaw got us started, before I had crab bisque and a lobster ravioli dish and Gina had chicken with sautéed mushrooms, roasted red peppers, and green onions in a cayenne cream sauce over spaghetti. Not too shabby.

Dinner time

Later that evening we went out to a bar called Pinch in Five Points, one of the two main nightlife districts in Columbia, and the music there was just as on point as earlier in the day. I hadn’t heard ‘90s and early 2000s songs in a good long while, at least not since my iPod ceased functioning with any regularity several months ago, so I was comforted by the likes of Good Charlotte, Avril Lavigne, and Lou Bega. Somehow, two very intoxicated (and almost undoubtedly underage) people wearing Carolina Panthers jerseys thought grinding to “Everybody (Backstreet’s Back)” would be the appropriate thing to do, so I had no shame in taking pictures of them without making the least effort to hide what I was doing. 

We continued our physical exertions at South Carolina's palatial on-campus gym, which charged me an extortionately high $5 as a guest to gain admittance to its facilities. We made thorough use of the practice basketball courts, playing spirited games of one-on-one, around the world, and horse. If we would've played two more classic games, knockout and 21, my flashbacks to youth basketball would have been complete. Then we moved over to the ping pong table downstairs, a workout in itself just to get there in this place, and pretended to be Asians for a while. It was all good fun.

The main event on Saturday, though, was the university’s basketball game against Georgia. Admittedly, the prospect of seeing two middling teams from a decidedly mediocre basketball conference wouldn’t be the most exciting thing in a world to any sane, rational person, but it did have appeal to me and I relished the opportunity to do so. Well, at least for the first half. The game was brutal. It was positively unwatchable. South Carolina controlled the game from tip to buzzer and won 67-50, but I would sooner gouge my own eyeballs out then be subjected to watch anything like that again. Georgia took 50 shots in the game and made just 11 of them, including only 3 of the 17 three-pointers they attempted. The two schools combined to commit 44 fouls in a 40-minute game. The official attendance was 13,031, but there was hardly any atmosphere or noise in the building and the fans started trickling out while there were still five minutes left in the game. Still, a major college basketball game is a major college basketball game, and I was happy to attend. Cross one arena off my list in the quest to see as many games in as many different venues as I can.

Another missed shot, I'm sure

Our Saturday night was positively wild. You can’t have had a crazier night than the one us party animals had. Through the miracle of Apple, we FaceTimed with Gina’s dad in New Jersey for a while, and were delighted to hear that her brother Cameron had taken a break from lighting his girlfriend Jaime on fire long enough to be accepted to Penn State this fall, though is undecided if he will attend. We also made plans to move Merlin, Gina’s cat, to her dad’s house until Gina gets a place of her own at some point this fall and will be able to take her big boy back for good. Then we watched my ultimate man crush, Justin Timberlake, fail to act his way out of a paper bag alongside the beautiful and talented Mila Kunis in a movie I have a secret soft spot for, Friends with Benefits.  We also had Ben and Jerry’s chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream. I’d say the night was definitely a win.

We felt so refreshed and content with ourselves after our hike on Friday that we set out for another nearby park on Sunday morning for another outdoor activity. Saluda Shoals Park was the site for an hour-long bike ride on the banks of the mighty Saluda River, if by mighty you mean serene to the point of brackishness. Still, it felt good to be outside on a chilly morning, feeling the brisk breeze whipped up by our frantic pedaling on our one-speed, back-brake bikes. What a bell on those bad boys, though! We finished our time in the park by taking advantage of the children’s playground near one of the campsites. Kids have it made, with their miniature rock walls and their monkey bars and their curvy slides. I miss recess.

Morning ride

Before my flight back to Baltimore, we ate and were merry at Mellow Mushroom and Marble Slab in downtown Columbia. There are positives and negative to the immediate proximity of delicious pizza and ice cream places, I suppose; far more joyous and satisfied in the moment ranging to the despair and stomach pains afterwards. It was tough going from the beautiful, 60-degree weather of South Carolina back to the freezing temperatures of the mid-Atlantic, but we’d had yet another successful visit and are looking forward to the next one in a couple weeks. More then.

Land of the Pines

The fortuitous timing of a federal holiday last Monday and some spontaneous thinking last Thursday night combined masterfully. I was afforded a chance to pack up the ol’ Camry and head on down to South Carolina without having to miss a day of work, and there was simply no way that opportunity could be missed. The meatball was waiting!

That was what I kept reminding myself, at least, on the 530-mile slog from Baltimore, the first two hours of which were frustratingly spent in traffic on one of this country’s worst rush-hour commutes, the I-95 corridor between Baltimore, Washington, and Fredericksburg. Believe me, when the highlight of a drive is stopping for a jalapeno-filled pretzel with nacho cheese dip at Sheetz in Smithfield, North Carolina, the less said about that experience, the better.

After arriving at 12:30 AM and heading straight to bed like the old soul that I am, I woke up Saturday morning feeling refreshed and ready for a day of adventures. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision to come down to Columbia, so there really hadn’t been time to obsessively and compulsively plan anything, as is my usual modus operandi, but it was nice to just go with the flow for once.

Gina and I had a nice morning stroll around The Horseshoe on the university campus, stopping at Barnes and Noble (as we do) to pick up Paula Hawkins’ The Girl on the Train, one of the most acclaimed new fiction titles of the year so far, which we’ll begin reading together soon. We walked from campus to the capitol building of South Carolina, the State House, where the Confederate battle flag has been proudly displayed on the grounds since 1962. While there, we bumped into an old friend of mine from middle school and high school and had the most pleasant of times catching up. I hadn’t seen Janie in at least 6 or 7 years, but the graduate school at South Carolina has an asset in its Public History program. One of life’s most underrated pleasures is the art of conversation, and I was glad to spend some time renewing acquaintances with an old friend like no time had passed.

The South will rise again?

After that, we walked up and down Main Street for a bit – for a state capitol, Main Street in Columbia really isn’t much to brag about, though it does seem to have up-and-coming restaurants and apartment buildings – before grabbing sandwiches at Groucho’s in the Five Points district. Formula 45 sauce: delicious. Yes, it was annoying to pay 25 cents for water in a Styrofoam cup that broke and spilled everywhere, but you can’t win them all.

We fulfilled a long-standing quest of mine that afternoon by going bowling with a few of Gina’s friends and roommates. I’ve been pestering her for weeks, if not months, to go, and as is the case with most of my requests, she puts up with me heroically, despite having every reason to be nothing short of annoyed. Seven of us played for a couple hours, and when the alley turned its lights off for a bit of cosmic action, it was on.

Aw, her tiny feet

Gina, Emily, and I capped the night by going to a dueling piano bar in the fancier part of Columbia, such as it is. We may have been the youngest people in the place by about a decade, but it was still a fun time. We stood on the balcony, drinking our beers and taking part in one of the more entertaining pastimes in life: people-watching. Our favorite was unanimous: a couple in their 60s, at least, dancing and having the best time of anyone there that night. When “Shout” by the Isley Brothers – a song everyone knows, young and old – was played, both the man and woman were literally laying on the floor on their backs dancing. When I’m their age, I’m sure I’ll be lucky to stand and walk without debilitating hip, knee, and back pain, so watching them channel their inner teenagers was heart-warming. “Wagon Wheel” by Darius Rucker was also played; the second time in two days I had heard that song after going months without hearing it once. Sigh, country music.

There was lots of laughing later that night, not to mention cheese and pepperoni Bagel Bites and Ben and Jerry’s chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream. Gina and I had made bourbon-glazed salmon (thank you, Publix) for dinner with broccoli on the side for both of us, as well as penne with raspberry vinaigrette dressing for me and a sweet potato for Gina, before we went to the piano bar, so we were allowed to cheat a little. Right? Right.

We woke up Sunday with a more relaxed day on the docket. The morning got off to the best possible start with several episodes of Parks and Rec, and we went on a long walk by the Congaree River in the afternoon. See, we made up for those Bagel Bites. Despite it being nearly 60 degrees, the River Walk was filled with college girls wearing oversized, baggy sweaters as if Columbia was sub-Arctic in climate. This inexplicable choice of wardrobe, which not coincidentally was combined with full makeup and huge sunglasses, amused me tremendously.

Gorgeous day for a walk

The best part of the walk by far, though, was all of the dogs out gallivanting. Never in my life have I seen such perfect pups, of all breeds and sizes. I wanted to take so many of them right there and then from their owners for myself. Owning a husky is something I want badly one day, and there were several showing their stuff on this Sunday afternoon. There just isn’t a more beautiful dog than that.

We watched football on Sunday night (full disclosure: I couldn’t have been more wrong about Andrew Luck and the Colts) and unashamedly took full advantage of a gift certificate Gina had to a nice Mexican restaurant in town. Can’t go wrong with chips and queso, or BBQ shrimp, chicken teriyaki, and chicken pesto tacos. I may not love a lot about the South, but the one thing done better there than anywhere else I’ve been is the food.

Gina and I ran a few errands and had lunch Monday morning before I made the return drive to Baltimore. Thank God for daylight and podcasts, as they made my drive back exponentially more bearable than the slog down there on Friday. Instead of Sheetz, I stopped at a Dairy Queen in Dunn, North Carolina for a Georgia Mud Fudge Blizzard. Thanks to either the incompetence of its employees or a faulty credit card swipe machine (yes, I was going to pay $3.30 with a debit card, and I’ll be charitable and say it was the machine’s error), I even got it for free! Can’t beat that.

I return to Columbia next weekend. If it is half as rewarding as this trip, I’ll be a happy camper. More then.

Another Carolina...Trip Down!

Wheels up to Carolina

There are many things in this world that don't make sense to me, but why US Airways had me connect in Philadelphia on my way from Baltimore to Charlotte this past Thursday evening truly boggles the mind. I could, quite literally, have driven from my house in Baltimore to the airport in Philadelphia faster than it took me to drive to BWI, go through security, board the plane, and fly to the City of Brotherly Love. Why not just fly directly from Philadelphia to Charlotte, then, you ask? Because that would've been more expensive. And then my second flight was delayed 30 minutes, anyway. Of course. Sigh.

The meatball was wonderful enough to make the 90-mile drive from Columbia to Charlotte to pick me up on a school night, and we made our way back to South Carolina. You gotta have tunes for a trip like that, right? So as I rummaged through her glove compartment navigating my fingers through countless cords and chargers searching for something to plug my iPod into her stereo, I was coming up empty. After turning her overhead lights on, we were finally able to find the right cord, and the rest of the ride was smooth sailing. Or so I thought, until the morning.

Friday

Gina had an exam Friday morning, so we got up early to prepare, and by prepare I mean she studied her marketing research material that would've put me back to sleep immediately (I don't understand a single word of it) while I read Bill Bryson's endlessly entertaining A Walk in the Woods, the author's account of hiking the Appalachian Trail. Because her exam wasn't going to take long and we wanted to go to lunch right after, I wanted to come onto campus with her and just wait in the Business School (hey, Darla) for her to finish. That unique combination of New Jersey and Italian feistyness burst into the house after going out to her car, White Sauce, with the unfortunate news that it wouldn't start. Turns out we, and by we I mean I, didn't turn the overhead light off after trying to find my iPod, and the battery died. The most powerful of jump-starts from her roommate Julie's impressively huge, and tank-like, Jeep Wrangler, was needed to bring White Sauce back to life. We were on our way.

Her exam took, with no exaggeration, 12 whole minutes. I didn't even have a chance to get comfy in my chair or listen to any of the podcasts I wanted to catch up on. How selfish of her to excel in school. God. From there it was onto lunch at DiPrato's, which has the best bacon and pimiento cheese dip with pita bread one could imagine. Truly food of the heavens. The man upstairs himself couldn't eat anything more delicious.

According to my lovely mother, and I must admit that I fully agreed wholeheartedly, the state of my pants situation lately has been dire. Holes everywhere in the few pairs of jeans that I have, which date from high school, and I can't wear shorts for much longer this year. After much hand-wringing and protestation, then, it was off to the mall in Columbia. I could never stomach shopping for clothes with my mom, and it wasn't much more appealing with my girlfriend, but I suppose women always know best. I guess. Many stores and wrong sizes and trying-on-of-things later, I emerged with three new pairs of pants and four pairs of fun socks, the highlight of the excursion for me. I'm just so playful and carefree.

Saturday was going to be a busy day, so the rest of Friday was spent pretty quietly. I met another of Gina's roommates, Emily, who was out of town the previous time I visited Columbia this fall. Emily is a gem. It was great to get to know her the whole weekend, and suffice it to say she knows what I think about her. We went out to a couple bars in town that night, but nothing too crazy since we had to be up early the next morning. Football!!

Saturday

Hey GeanBean

South Carolina's struggles on the football field this season, combined with their lowly opponent, Furman, resulted in a noon kickoff Saturday instead of a later start in the day. That meant being up by 8 to get ready to leave the house at 9 to tailgate, and I was fine with it. Having gone to a D2 college myself but being such a passionate fan of Michigan, it was about time I got to experience a major college football game in person.

Unsurprisingly, the game itself was a blowout. South Carolina destroyed Furman, 41-10, but it was the entire experience that stood out for me. Tailgating with so many students on gameday, right next to the stadium, was terrific, and I can only imagine how much better it would have been had the opponent been more appealing or had the game started later in the afternoon. I've been on the field at Texas A&M, at Nebraska in the snow, been right next to Ohio State's stadium in the parking lot, and down the street from Wisconsin's, but none of those trips occurred for a game. Williams-Brice Stadium and the 78,101 people in attendance weren't particularly loud on this day, even though it was Homecoming, but I was able to cross a bucket list item off nonetheless.

In my classic fashion, I forgot to wear sunscreen and was truly worried to no end that I was going to resemble a lobster before we went to the South Carolina State Fair that evening. Luckily Gina came to the rescue, as always, and procured one of those towels they hand out to fans to wave at key points in the game. Believe me when I tell you those towels weren't used often at this game, but one served as a nice headband/helmet to protect my face.

State Fair

We took a nap after the game -- it's a hard life, college football Saturdays -- and got ready to head to the fair. We went with Gina's friend Sam and her brother, who is in town visiting from his college in Florida. South Carolina's residents were on their best form, eating their weight in fried things. We saw one gentleman with his jeans starting much lower than a person's shorts usually end being led out in handcuffs by two policemen. I hadn't been to an amusement park in a long time -- shoutout to Kings Dominion! Tivoli Gardens! -- and was ill-prepared for the terror that gripped me on the swinging pirate ship and the mega drop, Tower of Terror-type ride. I thought it was over for me. I made noises humans don't normally make. I was thrilled to have Gina ride the log flume with me, though she clearly had no desire to do that, and was even more thrilled when we got wetter than either of us had expected. For a girl who loves the water, Jerz wasn't too happy about her predicament post-flume. She cheered up after the deep-fried Snickers bar we had as we left the fair. Mmm.

Saturday evening was spent in rapturous, rip-roaring fashion, watching Gerard Butler save the country from the invasion of Koreans and their capture of the White House. Nothing says America like a Scottish actor single-handedly destroying North Koreans, amIright?

Sunday

We had no particular plans for Sunday, other than to make dinner before I had to head back to the airport, so it was perfect when Emily, a girl after my own heart, came over and asked if we wanted to watch USC's women's soccer team play that afternoon. I'm never one to turn down a sporting event so obviously I was in, and we all settled in to watch the Gamecocks cruise to a 2-0 victory over visiting Ole Miss. The Rebels contributed absolutely nothing to the game, but unlike USC, they're a real football school so their lack of talent on the pitch could be forgiven. Oh Cocks, I kid because I love. Just been a tough year for the boyz.

Gina and I went grocery shopping to make dinner. We had the best intentions -- salmon with lemon, pepper, and garlic, asparagus with cheese and butter, and mashed potatoes. Everything was going well until we actually pulled the salmon out of the oven. A bit dry, but c'est la vie. Can't win 'em all. Whatever other cliche you'd like to insert here.

I packed up and we made the drive back to Charlotte, this time for a non-stop flight back to Baltimore. I fell asleep before takeoff, a particular talent of mine, but due to my own moronic actions, I ended up not getting home until much later than was necessary. Credit to the shuttle bus driver and the airport parking guy who stayed very late into the night with me, cruising Long Term Lot B. Another story for another day.

Heading back to my roots in New Jersey this weekend to visit my uncle's family. No trip to Jerz would be complete without a recap. Until then.

ColAtl

Another question?? How is that possible?! The staff meeting dragged on and on Thursday afternoon, with people asking ridiculously mind-numbing questions one after another when I all I wanted to do was get my show on the road. I had over 500 miles to drive, which was tough enough, but navigating the 100-mile stretch from Baltimore to Fredericksburg would be particularly challenging. Time it wrong, and I could be delayed for hours. Time it right, and I could enjoy the meatball that is my lovely girlfriend jumping into my arms at a reasonable hour.

Of course, my worst fears were realized. After spending an excruciatingly frustrating 3 hours getting from my office to my hometown, where traffic would lighten, I was in the clear, finally able to channel my inner Jeff Gordon on the way to South Carolina. The rest of the drive was as calm and serene as a Southern breeze, minus the one middle-aged guy ahead of me in line getting an XL Stuffed Burrito and six (!!) tacos at the Taco Bell in Florence. I made it to Gina’s house before 1 AM, over 9 hours after I’d set off, and a quick kiss or seven later, we hit the town.

Columbia, Night 1

I’d been to Columbia once before, visiting a friend my senior year of college. It defeated me. I tried to walk into a bathroom at Sonic in a highly-charged and intoxicated state of mind. Little I did realize you can’t actually walk into Sonics, and after being alerted by the cheerful kitchen staff that there was no bathroom available inside, I puked in the grass outside. I always keep it classy.

My first night went swimmingly, as I met the roommates and friends and enjoyed a night out in the Five Points bar district. Bud Light pitchers for $5? Yes, please, and keep ‘em coming. Fun times were had by all, and the weekend was off to a great start.

That continued the next day, which started with brunch at a local restaurant where I had a breakfast burrito that was, ehhh, alright. I consider myself to be a connoisseur of breakfast meats and cheeses wrapped in tortillas, and though it wasn’t awful, it wasn’t the best I ever had, no not the fucking best I ever had. Still, the biggest difference it seems to me between the South and the North is price, so couldn’t complain.

View from in front of the Ellis

Atlanta

A quick pit stop to the mall later and Gina and I were on our way to Atlanta for the night. Anyone who knows me knows how much of a Braves fan I am. I’ve seen them play in Baltimore, Washington, Kansas City, Pittsburgh, and Chicago, but never at Turner Field. That was about to change. Three hours in DJ Gina’s sporty Acura with her at my iPod’s control went by quick, and we checked into our hotel on Peachtree Street right downtown. Shoutout to the Ellis Hotel for a king bed, huge shower, free lemonade, and powerful ice dispenser. We stopped for a dinner of champions – her at Jimmy Johns, me at Subway – before navigating the streets and being helped by a kindly homeless man who then solicited me on the way to the shuttle that would take us to the stadium.

We got to Turner Field an hour early – yes, I’m THAT guy. Gina deserves a crown for the sports addiction she has to put up with. I was convinced very unwillingly to take a picture with a depiction of Chipper Jones outside the Braves Hall of Fame; Chipper is my all-time favorite athlete and the only reason I wore #11 in my sporting life is because #10 was taken by the kid in front of me in line when we picked our jerseys for the U9 Hotspurs travel soccer team. Damn you, Bret Hudson. We got to our seats on the 1^st base line – and let me take a moment to pat myself on the back for trawling through Stubhub until I got exactly what I wanted – and they were great. Except for the little kid who continuously kicked the back of Gina and I’s chair as if it was an airplane. Come on, son.

Turner Field looked great. The Braves did not.

The game itself was nothing to write home about as the Braves continued their truly magnificent losing streak in fine fashion, losing 5-0. The saving grace was it was Fireworks night afterward, and that makes everything better. Gina was on a quest to get on the scoreboard video screen, doing her best to get the attention of a cameraman who was always near our section but seemed to prefer the attentions of another clientele base, should we say. Eventually we made it on in the background. Simba Cam was pretty cool, too.

We headed back to our hotel after the game, pretty tired and without the motivation that could have been provided if there were any fun or cool bars around our location. No such luck.

Back to Columbia

The next morning we checked out of the hotel and waited approximately 47 minutes for the valet to get Gina’s car, the whole time just wanting to be inside it so we could eat our breakfast of the gods – Dunkin Donuts. The whole world runs on it, y’know. It was easy enough to get out of the city and after stopping for gas, which I consider to be a fun adventure with Gina as she’s from Jersey and has gas pumped for her there, and getting vital nourishment in the form of Gatorade, Arizona Iced Tea, and three AirHeads, we were back in Columbia for the night ahead.

Beer, blue drank, and football. She's ok, too.

Gina’s lovely roommates Julie and Kristy hadn’t had the most relaxing of nights the night before, and our arrival at their house was greeted with the warm welcome of two girls curled in balls on the couch looking like they wanted to end it all. The magic of youth worked its wonders, though, and after watching Michigan stumble and bumble its way to a pathetic 26-10 loss to Utah, we got ready to head out to Five Points again to watch South Carolina’s primetime matchup with Vanderbilt.

We went to the same bar as Thursday night, with the same pitchers of Bud Light, with the added twist of pitchers of Adios, a blue drank which later proved to be my downfall. Everyone was decked out in their gear, and nowhere have I seen more girls interested in football. After spotting Vanderbilt two touchdowns, you know, just to keep things interesting, USC came back and won handily in Nashville. Good win for the Cocks, and now they have College Gameday in Columbia next Saturday as a reward. By the end of the game, your boy was starting to feel it. Many group selfies and Snapchats and drinks and another bar later, it was time to go home. I don’t remember the cab ride back or many of the other proceedings, other than pasta and a sandwich and pita chips were involved.

Waking up wasn’t the most fun Sunday morning, and so little was done. Unless you count watching Planet Earth on the couch for hours, because if you do, then we accomplished everything God put us on this planet to do. We went to pick up Gina’s car and got Cookout along the way – sidenote, if you’ve never been down South and gotten food from there, stop reading this NOW and go. You’ll thank me after your quesadilla, hush puppies, and milkshake. The prospect of a 500-mile drive home awaited me, and after saying c ya to Gina, I headed back to Maryland.

Columbia, Round 2 is in a little less than a month. After my experience there this weekend, I can’t wait to go back.