Hey everyone! Hope you’ve all made it to your destinations and are ready to get started tomorrow!
This trip began on Thursday when I left Nashville to go see my good friend from high school, RT, who lives in Niceville, FL - just north of Destin (which is unbelievable by the way…I’ll get into that later). In the interest of brevity, I’m going to just list some things I noticed on my way down I-65 through Tennessee and Alabama:
1. Tennessee is awesome…can’t comment on the people because I didn’t talk to any, but that state has some serious scenery.
2. Alabama is the antithesis of Tennessee, if you’re looking for more shredded tires than you’ve ever seen in your life and a slew of vacant Subway’s, this is your state. (Note: the largest man I’ve ever see in person resides in this state…didn’t catch his name, but wow!)
3. Florida has palm trees and the softest white sand in the world…seriously, find a way to get yourself to Destin…you won’t regret it
7 hours after my trip began, I found myself in Niceville! Since the first night was mostly filled with conversation we’ll skip ahead: The next day, RT and I decided to go for some sushi at a restaurant that was voted “best sushi” in Destin (which might not sound like much, but let me assure you…this place was unreal) Half-way through our meal, one of the servers came over to alert us that Emeril Lagasse was in the building! (the “BAM!” guy…obviously…) This resulted in a mass exodus to the “bathroom” and one patron’s painful attempt to take a picture of him while acting like she was on the phone…it wouldn’t have been so bad, but the girl left her flash on… With sushi behind us, we made our way to Baytowne which is a resort-like part of Destin/Sandestin that has a very New Orleans-type vibe (Note: I loved it).
After some time out on the town, I got hungry and decided I needed to try Whataburger (worth it!). The only problem is that I needed to get a cab, and in Baytowne, the cabs are incredibly over-priced…for instance, it costs $30 to travel 4 miles (which was the round-trip distance between the resort and Whataburger). This would have made me more upset, but my cabby was an absolute juggernaut! He wore a cowboy hat and referred to himself as “Slick” (I thought was a joke until we arrived at Whataburger and every employee knew him…and called him “Slick”). On top of all of this, Slick had a little road rage…which I can appreciate. He yelled at the guy ahead of us in the drive-thru line to get out of our way and “move his ass.” Things escalated quickly when the driver stepped out and challenged Slick to make good on a threat of violence…nothing happened, but I’ve never seen fast food employees move that quickly. (Side note: the guy in front of us drove an H2, couldn’t have been taller than 5’4” and had a lady in the front seat who stepped out of his SUV squinting at us and yelling: “ya’ll better watch what you say to my man!”… I don’t think he had a lot going for him). It was the most entertaining trip to Whataburger ever!, and since it was my one and only trip to Whataburger, I’m assuming that this is all just a part of the experience.
The next day, RT had to work so I wandered around town for a few hours. I stopped in and had an unbelievable Crab and Artichoke pizza at a local pizzeria then went into a bar to grab a couple drinks and watch some TV to pass the time. When I arrived at the bar, I ordered a gin and tonic which I was told cost $8.75 (this was well gin…a little pricey you ask me, but I’m on vacation so what the hell). The bartender was very conversational and casually mentioned to me that he was gay...he didn’t need to tell me…let’s just say I gained an appreciation for what women go through when they’re being hit on and aren’t into it. (Note: I also got the majority of my drinks paid for so I guess I can’t complain…the whole bill was only $16.00 and I had a few more than 2 G&T’s…not bad!). After a few hours RT got off of work and we decided to head out and go to some local places. Again, after some time on the town, I became hungry…so we walked to Waffle House. I can’t be sure, but I’m 99% positive that the heavens opened up after my first bite of bacon…I had a moment. Say what you want to about Waffle House, but at the end of the night, I was full and happy. I also found out that I know more Spanish that I thought…our server spoke mostly Spanish so we had a broken conversation with each other and made fun of a near-by guest…great night. I spent the night sleeping on a couch at RT’s girlfriend’s place (and by sleeping I mean waking up every 2 hours because the cats kept walking on me…stressful)
Today, on almost no sleep and a pounding headache, I began the trip from Niceville to the HLC (House-Lady Compound). As I did above, I’ll just list some of my observations:
1. Thank God for Little Caesars and their hastily made $5 large pizzas.
2. The panhandle of Florida is in the Central Time Zone…this will never make sense to me
Made it to the HLC around 7:45 pm (after the time change) and I was/am exhausted. The HLC is beautiful and House-Lady seems to be really cool. Should be a great situation for the next 5 months! Tomorrow is the first day of work which means that my favorite summer ever is officially over…it was a great run! I’ll probably have a post tomorrow to report how everything went. If anyone has a great first-day story, let me know and we’ll make that the first “Story-Corner Thursday” story. G’Night!
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