road trip

I accompanied my brother Andrew on his journey from Oklahoma to Orlando, along with a friend of his.

Got in the car about 6:30. Icy cold. Drove for a bit, had to poop, did so in some bushes. Wiped with Mapquest directions, long live TomTom. The back suffocated me. Had to sit with my legs up, straight, not moving. I got to drive through Louisiana. That state is goddamn beautiful. Trees and rivers and steel bridges. Marshland, stumps just rising above the waterline. Around eleven o'clock that night I got tired. Lawton, Oklahoma to Pensacola, I believe. We had about six more hours to go. My idea: get a hotel, get something to eat, crash. Wake up at six AM and get to grandparent's house about 12. Little brother was not having it. I don't know whether that thought made him nervous or whether he was simply a mess, frantically needing to be near his woman. Shrug. He decided, instead, to drive straight through, get to grandparents house at 4, and sleep until...you guessed it, 12. This made no logical sense to me. But I disagreed and therefore I was just a grouchy naysayer. You were with Andrew or against him. Rational dissent was not to be had. I disappeared into a Flying J to charge my phone, and this enraged him, which enraged me. I needed fifteen minutes to charge my phone. That was it. He told me "you have one minute. you can do without facebook for four hours." When I told him he was being uncompromising, he said, "I let you poop". Sigh.

So now we are here. I enjoy visiting the family. Florida is palm trees and fountains. Strip malls that look like Colombian drug lord compounds. Tomorrow I'm going to get a hot shave. Then I'm going to go to a comic shop. What I need to do, is hit up a bar. I need a drink.