h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I went back to Radford for homecoming/Highland Festival weekend.


It's been over 30 years since I've spent the night in a dorm there. Funny, I don't remember it being so noisy at night. Then again, when I was a student there (back in the dark ages), it was an all girls school, and there were strictly enforced curfews.

It was fun though, and I thoroughly enjoyed the Highland Festival, although there was so much to see, so much to do, and so much going on at once that I wish they'd had a second or even a 3rd day, just so I could see everything.

So anyhow, after driving all day, I arrived there Poets evening, and parked in the lot in front of Amy+'s dorm - this was the parking lot which had already been closed a couple hours earlier in anticipation of all the vendors coming in to set up in that quad for the Highland Festival. I knew I wouldn't be there very long since Amy+ had been waiting to go get something to eat until I arrived so we could have dinner together, and even though I parked right across from the campus police station, they didn't immediately come out and set up a firing squad just because I drove past the do not enter sign, so apparently they aren't all that strict about it.

We went over to Christiansburg since there really isn't much
of anywhere to eat in Radford, and decided to eat at Applebees, which
was the one place that didn't seem to be too terribly crowded. She wanted the Chicken Fried Chicken because she claimed it was so good, but I looked over the menu for something made with flavor instead of grease and found a chicken dish marinated in lime juice and tequila, which was absolutely delicious. No, I couldn't taste any tequila, they probably put about a teaspoon of it in a gallon of marinade, and even if they used more than that, all the alcohol would have cooked off anyway. Anyhow, Amanda had a taste of my chicken and immediately decided she wished she'd ordered that instead. Next time maybe.

Then we headed back over to Radford, and it was already dark by the
time we arrived, so I called Grandma (Lord Scott's mom lives about 45 minutes away from Radford) and told her that I wasn't going to try to drive over the mountain at that hour, especially since I was tired after driving all day already, and although I'd driven that mountain road maybe half a dozen times, I still wasn't familiar enough with it to be really comfortable driving it at night. So we started trying to decide where I was going to spend the night in her dorm, since it was a sure bet that there would be no such thing as a motel room available with all that stuff going on there the next day. She'd expected her roommate to be gone for the night because she'd said earlier that she wasn't going to be back that night, but then at the last minute one of the roommate's boyfriends decided to drive down from Quantico because he suddenly had a 4 day pass, so when he showed up, that threw all the roommate's plans into limbo, and Amy+ had no idea if she was planning to come back that night or not. As it turned out, she showed up at 4:30 am. Amy+ had also asked Melissa if she'd mind if I stayed in her room on the futon, which she didn't mind, but she hadn't confirmed with Mel that I'd be staying there, and she wasn't able to get in touch with her to ask because she doesn't have a cell phone, and the guy she was out with had either turned his cell off or the battery had died. At any rate, Amy+ wasn't able to get in touch with anyone, and I hesitated to go up to Mel's room with no one there, and just make myself at home because I really didn't want her to trip over me on her way in during the night. I was going to send Amy+ up there, but another monkey wrench was thrown into the plans when Ddombrow (U55674) decided at the last minute to come down to visit for Highland Festival too. He was planning to start driving at midnight, arriving early in the morning, and said he'd call Amy+ when he arrived. On her room phone. Which would have meant I'd have to answer her phone and go find her in another part of the building at what we figured could be as early as 6 am. Not that I wouldn't be awake already, but that would have meant getting Amy awake enough to come downstairs to talk to him at that hour.


In the end, we ended up taking the doubled over king size foam mattress pad off Amy+'s bed and putting it on the floor between her bed and desk and I slept there because I can sleep almost anywhere. Although that hard floor was kind of hard on this old body in spite of the doubled over foam mattress pad. But I slept anyway, just not from the second my head hit the pillow straight through till morning. More like a half hour here and an hour there, in between changing positions to quiet the pain in my hips from lying on the floor while I tried to go back to sleep. There was the usual dormitory type noise, with random whooping and hollering, doors banging shut, that sort of thing in the middle of the night. I enjoyed this little nostalgic return to dorm life (although it's considerably wilder than it was when I was a student there), but if I do it again, I think I'll make sure I have an actual bed (or at least a mattress ) to sleep on first.

Highland Festival day itself was a lot of fun, even if very tiring, because we were essentially on our feet nearly the whole time. When Ddombrow and his friends got there, we walked downtown to watch the parade. Not that we couldn't have seen the parade from the campus, but I must say it was interesting listening to the small town chatter from the guy on the microphone at the reviewing stand, since he felt the need to welcome all the visiting dignitaries (for some reason he didn't mention my name, but I thought it best not to make a big deal out of it ) and thanking every business in downtown for letting them use their parking lots, not to mention the street itself. As parades go, this was really rinky-dink, amusing in a way, primarily because of how small-town it was. All the sororities and frats had "floats" although sometimes it was just a bunch of frat guys in the back of a beat up pickup truck who looked like they were still drunk from the night before, and sorority girls on a wagon chanting and clapping just like they did 30-some years ago. In fact a lot of these girls looked exactly like the girls who were in those particular sororities 30 years ago. Some things never change, it seems.

Let's see, what else did they have? Oh yeah, the EMTs drove through tossing candy to the kids and blasting their sirens, apparently hoping some kid would choke on a tootsie roll so they could charge the parents to rush them to the hospital.

Then of course there were the pipe and drum bands - apparently a lot of bagpipe bands make this highland festival and parade an important part of their annual calendar of events.

After the parade, we walked back up to the campus, and I do mean UP.
I haven't walked up that hill (which takes off at about a 45 degree angle) from downtown in over 30 years, but I'd spent a year building up my endurance by swimming 5 days a week and managed to make it up the hill without having a heart attack. Of course it helped that we were behind a lot of other old people walking up the hill too, which slowed down the pace a good bit. After we got past Muse dorm, I made Amy+ cross over to the campus and walk through the campus, which is the route I used to always take because if you stay on the street, the slope continues for a lot longer, the grade is much more gentle through the campus.

It was lunchtime, and we bravely (or foolishly, not sure which ) ate at in the dining hall which was actually very good, and by selecting my food carefully, I didn't even get sick from it. Not yet, anyway.

Then it was out to see the games and concerts, and wander
through the stands at the festival. The celtic rock group Enter the Hagis that Amy+ likes so much did two concerts, and we saw part of one and the entire second concert. There were only about 6 rows of chairs inside the tent, with people gathered all around. We couldn't find a place to sit for the first concert, and ended up standing right next to one of their screaming fans ("Haggisheads"), so it wasn't too long before between her screaming and being a little too close to their massive loudspeakers our ears were ringing and we just had to leave that immediate area, not that we couldn't still hear them as we wandered around the stands. They really are an excellent band - they're all quite obviously very accomplished musicians, not just some garage band that does the Celtic festival circut.

I loved all the celtic stuff they had, especially the clothes and the jewelry.

All in all, it was a fun day and really good to visit with Amy+, but extremely tiring because I'm not used to being on my feet all day long any more.

Drove home yesterday, another loooooooooong drive.... left grandma's about 8:30 am and didn't arrive home until about 4:30pm.

MMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm..... I like that Applebee's chicken...

So it took about 8 hours to make the trip how far did you drive Lady Scott? I like Celtic music. One of my Favourite bands is Big Country a 80s rock I con't know if they play celtic stuff there guitars sound like bag pipes kinda.

It's only about 400 miles or so, a lot of it at 65 mph, so *theorhetically* it shouldn't take me that long to drive it. At least Lord Scott insists it's 6-1/2 hours "actual driving time", but then he uses his stop watch to time it, and stops the clock at the exact moment he leaves the road to make a stop, then starts the clock again the exact moment he enters the interstate again.



If you like the sound of rock bagpipes, you really need to listen to Enter the Haggis - they have a few music samples on their website that you can try out. (enterthehaggis.com) Their musical style has grown up a bit over the years since their first CD came out, but then again, they have a different violinist now too, and his musical ability and tone make a big difference in the overall sound. The guy who plays the bagpipes also plays electric bagpipe on some songs. Although I don't like it as much as the sound of the real bagpipes - it *sounds* too electronic to me. The newest CD is really, really good, and shows off the full range of their current ability.

Even so, the CD can't possibly convey the energy and fun of a live concert by those guys. You can tell that they really love doing this music, and the small (almost intimate) celtic/highland festival setting for their concerts.

Rock bagpipes?

The world is coming to an end if they have rock bagpipes now!

Amy+ said that her freshman year she'd gotten so used to hearing bagpipes all over the place during highland festival that when Enter the Haggis came on stage (she wasn't particularly near the stage), she thought, well, at least that bagpiper is playing a different song.

Then she heard the drums, but that's not so unusual in a bagpipe band. After all they're normally called pipe and drum bands, right?


Then the guitars started.


And the singing.


And she was hooked!


I must admit that there is something truly energizing about taking old instruments and using them in a new way.


I'm not the only gray haired person in the audience who was really bopping to the music - it really is good.

Awe Lady Scott your hair can't be to gray can it. I'm lucky meself I have strawberry blonde hair and not a speck of gray in it. Though I admit I'd be bald as a cucumber had I not found out bout this shampoo that not only stops the hair loss process it regrows hair already lost. Hey I've left you a post in your Music Room I hope you read it.

Yeah, it's most decidely gray.


Well, parts of it are, anyway.

More and more parts of it seem to be gray all the time.


These should scare you enough that even *your* hair turns gray:

http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/judilou824/my_photos

Where's my music room? I wasn't aware that I had one.

That was'nt the original name for it and the name ecsapes me now. I thought I may have upset you about asking you what town you lived in. I don't know I sometimes think you know well maybe you but Iwould'nt want to cause alarm or such cause I think of you as a good E'friend and I would'nt want to lose that relationship with you. I know the sentence stucture on that last sentence is wrong. Did I tell you I failed English is high school. yep the teacher show an extreme dislike for me. So I retaliated by flunking her class. what's smarts aye. Nice to here from you.

Lady Scott, those pot rack pictures are a hoot!

I love that picture of you in a grape dress.

Actually those are flowers on that dress... I think they were some kind of tulip style flower. But I do look kinda like a huge grape, I'd have to agree with that.


That pot rack was a mess to hang!

First, we had to measure, and mark the placement for the hooks with a plum line. Then we drilled holes in the ceiling, and of course we didn't hit a single piece of wood.

So that meant we couldn't use the wood screw hooks that came with the rack and had to go out to Home Depot to find toggle hooks... Which of course is easier said than done, because Home Depot doesn't have nearly enough signs telling you where to find things in their store, not to mention that their categorization of items according to those signs leaves a bit to be desired too. Anyhow, we finally found someone who actually worked there, who not only knew where the toggle hooks were, he took us directly to them.


Hooks in hand, we headed home to install them.


But not so fast!


First we had to drill bigger holes to accomoodate the toggle thingies.



Holes drilled, installed the toggle hooks and started to hang the rack...


Only it's hanging terribly crooked! Two chains weren't even supporting the weight of the rack, and it's all askew instead of lined up with the counter below it.



So we started measuring and decided at one point that perhaps we drilled one hole in the wrong spot, so I removed the toggle hook and started measuring exactly where to put the new hole, then decided that it was so close to the old hole that we'd probably end up pulling down a chunk of ceiling if we tried to relocate it.




Do you know what happens when you remove a toggle bolt/screw/hook?! You *lose* the toggle behind the wall! Or in this case in the attic insulation above the kitchen ceiling.


So Lord Scott went up in the attic and dug around through the insulation while Shorty (working from the kitchen with a magnetic extension magnetic wand) found the toggle in the insulation and held it up so Lord Scott could find it.

So I installed the toggle hook again, and hung the pot rack again, and again it hung incredibly crooked.


This time, we decided that it must be the chains. Surely they were the same length... or *were* they?

Sure enough, two of them were ever so slightly shorter than the other two, so we put them on the same side of the rack and although it still isn't perfectly straight, at least it isn't completely cock-eyed.


There were a lot more pictures than the ones I posted, but I only chose a few representative ones.

Kid - no you didn't upset me.


I take it you realized too late that flunking English out of retaliation only hurt you, not the teacher?

I'm Glad that I did'nt you know easy it is to be misunderstood at time especialy if your writng style is like mine.

Yep I'm a idiot at times or atleast appear to be. I can be my own worst enemy. I guess I'm much like me Dad We were so much alike we did'nt get along until the last year he was here. But I am gratefull to have came full circle as far as he was concern He was'nt very happy with me for doing as he had done to some degree. But He finaly became proud of me when it was all said and done.

It's wrong to put but in the begining of a sentence is'nt it? I think I remember that from a teacher that did'nt have a bias against me. She was a nice teacher could swing a mean paddle though.

*Technically* it's improper to start a sentence with words like but, and, so, therefore, and however because they're whatchamacallits... Conjunctions? I think that's the word...


But, I find that using words like that to start sentences happens to be one way to make written words flow more like the way we talk.

So, you'll see me doing it all the time.

Therefore, I don't mind it at all.

And I'm not going to criticize anyone who does it.


However, that doesn't mean that we really should be doing it.

See I thoughtthat . But it was back in the Fifth Grade. Boy would Miss Barnes by PO'd. She was a great teacher. that two year's before forced bussing you during the gas shortage those yellow things that got tree gallons to the mile. School and the teachers was'nt the same after that withwhat having to be on guard all the time just in case some person wanted to mess you up because he felt down trodden. Yep it went along way to lowering the level of education I stopped being interested cause I was'nt being mentally challanged. Not to get sympathy but to state a sad condtion that exsist to nowadays. Public School are litte more than precursers to prisons in my opinon.

You were in 5th grade 2 years before the gas shortage in the 70's?!




I'm starting to feel really, *really* old now...

Well it was getting started in 73 it did'nt get full blown until was the late 70's my bad. It was 74 75 when the arab's placed the embargo on us. You are'nt old I turned 46 on September the third of this year.
I kinda misstated the fact's.

You're about the same age as my sister.


I remember the gas lines well. I was a junior in college, and I remember walking in the snow to someplace that certainly didn't seem too awfully far by car... but you know how it is in this country - no sidewalks, so there we were walking along that road in the slush and ice. Was not a pleasant experience.

And we thought the gas prices were bad back *then*! They've gotten totally out of hand now!

No kidding I'm think to use the mass transit to save money