The first in a series documenting my summer 2003 road trip.
chapter one louts krauts and sprouts
Chapter One- Louts, sprouts and Krauts.
“What do you mean the f*****g car won’t start?” I gave Mr. S a look of disbelief, half expecting him to laugh and tell me he was joking, but he didn’t. “The f*****g car won’t start! I turned it over a few times and it sounded like a dying giraffe. Having sex. With an elephant.”
“Why don’t you say a half dead giraffe?” enquired my father, peering over at the screen. “what?” I replied wondering at his logic. “well, if he’s half dead at least he’s got some hope!” Well, I couldn’t argue with that. “Besides, if you say that, you can do the classic joke!” he exclaimed, “Which one is that then?” “The one about the difference between the Giraffe and the fork lift truck, ones got hydraulics and ones got high bollocks!”
“Great! Can I use that one in the book?” “Yeah no problem, plus, when the German guys don’t get the joke you can do something about sauerkraut.”
“I’m not bloody paying you for this stuff you know!” I told him, quite sternly, putting him in his place. Besides, I have to get back to the book, I was going to write the first chapter in real time weaving the illusion in the readers mind that they were there, but that’s gone out of the window now. Anyway, back to the story.
“Shit” I said, “well, let me go back in the house and get my bags together and then we can go and sort it out.” So I did. Once I had acquired my luggage, I joined Mr. S in the car and we drove down the hill to where our brand spanking new second hand car was parked. I had said my tearful good-byes the previous day, hugging each person in turn, promising and requesting continued friendships via email and other such bastions of the modern world. I had lived and worked in this village for nearly a year and made some good friends, it was a tough place to leave but I always had the idea in the back of my mind that I would be returning.
“Bill says its probably the battery, he gave us this.” At this point, a grinning Mr. S presented a portable jump starting kit, the technical term for which escapes me, so, for prudence, it will be called a PJK. It was now 10 am Eastern standard time, our initial intended time of departure, which meant that we were now behind schedule, a point which angered the incredibly anally retentive Mr. S no end. Mr. S and myself exited the vehicle and made our way to the van. I grabbed the PJK (in loving memory of prudence,) and hooked it up to the car battery, crossing my fingers and toes and hoping for the best. The Ghastly smokers cough of our beautiful 92’ Chevy roared out loud and woke up all within range, and an outstanding display of manly noise making ensued from the soon to be departing intrepid road trippers. We were on top of the world and at the starting line of our trip of a life time. With the luggage slotted firmly in place in the former toilet area of the Van, we set off, taking one final drive through the village we had called home for the past year, honking the horn and shouting at the top of our voices. I can even say quite comfortably that I may have shed a man-like tear or two. With a quick stop at the maintenance building to drop off a respectable supply of beer and a thank-you note to Bill the van man, we were on our way.
Mr. T fired up the CD player and deposited within a song which would turn out to be our road trip anthem, or theme song if you’re a picky bastard. “California here we come!” by the Phantom Planet was a stonking great tune and quickly got us all in the mood and had us all acting like we were in a bad American teen movie, cracking open beers with our heads and yelling “road trip!” out of the windows. We were on the road and loving it, and in the extravagant linguistic tongue of Mr. T, “ I Love it, I fucking love it guys!” Sheer poetry.
Let us take a quick break at this point, and in the meantime, you are invited on a journey through time, back to the beginning, I promise it will be relevant to the story. Besides, I say invite, you pretty much have to read it, if not you can all just piss off and buy the fucking lonely planet guide and do it yourselves.
In the beginning God created the universe in seven days, and it was this exact amount of time we had left when our God, Bill the van man delivered our salvation. Since Christmas 2003, a small core group of men consisting of Mr. T, Mr. Pink and myself had been dedicated to cruising the American dream. Visions of Drinking, smoking and general cavorting had danced in our heads for months. We wanted it all coast to coast, route 66, culminating in a mammoth party week in California. Within a month, Mr. C was on board and eventually Mr. S in the closing weeks. We had purchased a shiny beautiful Chevy Van with our pooled money, bedecked with resplendent furniture and completely indulgent accessories such as a Nintendo and a CB radio so we could annoy passing truck drivers. Mr. C had been to the dealers to take a number of photographs, which we all drooled over for weeks, and displayed to our fellow co-workers. We had even developed a friendly rivalry with another group of prospective road-trippers from our community who, incidentally, were already in material possession of their van, which we mocked on countless occasions. We had paid good money to ensure our baby would be fit for a journey across the vast expanses of the United States, and back again. And even paid extra money to have a newer engine fitted, which would practically guarantee the safe return of our van and its remaining occupants. The alarm bells never rang. Even with mere weeks to go, we sat back and planned the route and pilfered provisions, safe in our own little bubble, wherein everybody in the world was reliable and trustworthy. Mr. T had gone to pick up the van on no less than fifty occasions! (Well okay, maybe a little closer to 4 occasions, but the point still stands that it was outrageous.) Each time he was told that the engine was going to be fitted within a week or a few days, and he’d come home and told the rest of the group. By the end of June, most of the group would be leaving the community to co-ordinate summer camp groups with the children under our care, and the whole nasty business was left in the capable hands of Mr. T, who, for his part, handled it all admirably. Finally, after the fiftieth time we’d been turned down (or there abouts,) Thomas stormed up to the shifty car dealer and told him a few home truths, shouted the odds a bit, and probably said a few other downright nasty things for which the similes escape me at present. To cut long story short, our money was returned to us by the dealer, much to our relief, and we were back to square one. No fuck it! we were no longer even at square one. We were at a place where squares no longer had any meaning, some other dimension or parallel universe of shit where squares didn’t exist. We were at shit one.
I returned to the village after two sunny weeks at the beech in Delaware, home of tax free shopping and the funniest fourth of July fireworks display ever put on, where the blinding, beautiful sparks of the pyrotechnics were masked by their own smoke! Trust me, you couldn’t see a thing! I nearly pissed myself with laughter. I hoped and prayed as we pulled into the village, hoped that we had a van, as yet uniformed of our dire straits, prayed that our van was in good, working order. Boy was I in for a surprise. That night, the night of my return, Mr. T found me enjoying a magazine in the social room, waiting in line to use the slowest internet computers in the world.
“We are fucked! I went to pick up the van and it still wasn’t ready. I just fucking lost it man, I told him it wasn’t good enough and that I was a paying customer, and that I wanted my money back. The dealer looked pretty upset. I saw he had a fucking baseball bat on the desk behind him, it was fucking scary man!”
“ So do we have a van now?” I asked nervously, “No we don’t. You and Simon have got to find one now, I have to go off on summer camp for a week, good luck.” And that was that, we had no van and I had all the money and no idea where to start. Shit.
“ Bill is going to take me out this lunch time, we’re going to check out that green Plymouth in Pottstown. It isn’t very big but if its in good shape I’ll have to buy it.”
Simon sounded a little worried on the other end of the line. “Besides,” I said, “ If Bill is coming along and he says it is good then we’re sorted.” With that I put the phone down triumphantly, ending our conversation, not wanting to hear anymore of his negativity and worrying, I had enough of my own without all that.
You’ve got to pick a pocket or two boyyyyyy!
“Do you get what I’m saying?”
Of course I did! I was a man. A man of the world no less. I understood his complicated system of winks and nods.
“ I just can’t take you to go and see the vehicle while he’s here.”
He indicated my companion, a young man under my care who I thought would love the outing, as he was a big fan of SUV’s. I was confident now in our back and forth banter, and felt quite “cool” as Mr. Fagin continued his system of winking and jerking his head to the side. He was clearly indicating his wish for us to step around the back of the shop and do some under the counter dealings, and he didn’t want any witness’s. With my friend safely in out of the way and the keys in his hand, Bill proceeded to give the van a thorough looking over, while I stood back and admired the man at work, still high off of my Dodgy dealings with Fagin. “No way,” he said, ”Shit!” I replied, “are you sure?” I enquired,
“Well, the tyres are in pretty bad condition so they won’t get you far outside of Pennsylvania if the police don’t catch you first. And then there is the engine, it doesn’t look too hot either. If I were you, I wouldn’t drive to the mall in this.”
During our conversation, Fagin had begun to limp over, spotting my handy mechanic and cursing silently to himself. I deposited the key in his sweaty callused palm as he began,
“So, what do you thing then my darlings? Is it worth a bob or two?” He wandered back a few paces and started to dance as we burst into song about the promising life of pick-pocketing. Well, at least that is what he would have done, if he were even a convincing thief, which he was not. Instead, we concluded our dealings and Bill and myself got back into the car after I made a vague mention of returning later in the week. We drove off back down the road while Fagin kind of limped off, back to his office cursing and jerking his head to the side.
It was only after a minute or two of being back on the road that I realised the extent of my stupidity. Fagin wasn’t a happy go lucky, loveable rogue who was trying to communicate his dark intentions to me in signals, he had a nervous tick. At the moment of realisation, I sat with my head in my hands, wallowing in my own ridiculousness and the fact that we still had no van. I was a failure. While I sat banging my head on the door-frame, Bill had the grand idea of nipping into a car lot we had spotted on the way, that we had dismissed as to dear for us and well out of our price range. As we drove in, we were greeted by a line of chevy vans, dazzling in the mid-day sun, the glint on the head-lamps taunting me, winking like my old friend Fagin. They were saying to me “Piss off you loser, you can’t afford us, go back and buy the shitty Plymouth.” The limp-free dealer emerged from his castle, bedecked in robes of silk, and diamond encrusted underwear (probably,) looking far too important to sell a van to us. He walked over, no, he swaggered over, as if to accentuate his limp free gait, and casually lent upon the van that took our fancy. “Howdy!” He spoke to us! I naturally let Bill take it from here, while I stood naturally, inspecting the van, pretending to know what I was doing. “Well,” he said, grasping his solid gold belt buckle, “I couldn’t let it go for any less than 3000.” My countenance fell considerably. “That’s a shame,” I said. “I was looking for something a little more in my price-range.” Bill nodded in agreement. “Well, like I said,” continued the savvy dealer, “I Can’t let it go for any less that 2500 to 3000.”
“2500!!!!!!!!!!”
I exclaimed, like a complete moron. “Well, 2500 at the least,” he replied as a smile crept across his face. I lowered my stupid head and let Bill take it from there.
“It’s fucking sweet!” I shouted to Mr. T over the phone, “ It’s huge, bigger than Lucas’s van, it pisses all over them! It has a TV, Oven, Fridge, CB radio. It even has a bloody toilet in the back, a toilet!”
“Dude, when I get back I am going to kiss you!”
The whole business was now out of my hands, Mr. T and Mr. S were going to deal with the insurance papers and all other necessary mumbo-jumbo, while I sat back, relaxed and reveled in the fact that we now owned a van.
“What do you mean the f*****g car won’t start?” I gave Mr. S a look of disbelief, half expecting him to laugh and tell me he was joking, but he didn’t. “The f*****g car won’t start! I turned it over a few times and it sounded like a dying giraffe. Having sex. With an elephant.”
“Why don’t you say a half dead giraffe?” enquired my father, peering over at the screen. “what?” I replied wondering at his logic. “well, if he’s half dead at least he’s got some hope!” Well, I couldn’t argue with that. “Besides, if you say that, you can do the classic joke!” he exclaimed, “Which one is that then?” “The one about the difference between the Giraffe and the fork lift truck, ones got hydraulics and ones got high bollocks!”
“Great! Can I use that one in the book?” “Yeah no problem, plus, when the German guys don’t get the joke you can do something about sauerkraut.”
“I’m not bloody paying you for this stuff you know!” I told him, quite sternly, putting him in his place. Besides, I have to get back to the book, I was going to write the first chapter in real time weaving the illusion in the readers mind that they were there, but that’s gone out of the window now. Anyway, back to the story.
“Shit” I said, “well, let me go back in the house and get my bags together and then we can go and sort it out.” So I did. Once I had acquired my luggage, I joined Mr. S in the car and we drove down the hill to where our brand spanking new second hand car was parked. I had said my tearful good-byes the previous day, hugging each person in turn, promising and requesting continued friendships via email and other such bastions of the modern world. I had lived and worked in this village for nearly a year and made some good friends, it was a tough place to leave but I always had the idea in the back of my mind that I would be returning.
“Bill says its probably the battery, he gave us this.” At this point, a grinning Mr. S presented a portable jump starting kit, the technical term for which escapes me, so, for prudence, it will be called a PJK. It was now 10 am Eastern standard time, our initial intended time of departure, which meant that we were now behind schedule, a point which angered the incredibly anally retentive Mr. S no end. Mr. S and myself exited the vehicle and made our way to the van. I grabbed the PJK (in loving memory of prudence,) and hooked it up to the car battery, crossing my fingers and toes and hoping for the best. The Ghastly smokers cough of our beautiful 92’ Chevy roared out loud and woke up all within range, and an outstanding display of manly noise making ensued from the soon to be departing intrepid road trippers. We were on top of the world and at the starting line of our trip of a life time. With the luggage slotted firmly in place in the former toilet area of the Van, we set off, taking one final drive through the village we had called home for the past year, honking the horn and shouting at the top of our voices. I can even say quite comfortably that I may have shed a man-like tear or two. With a quick stop at the maintenance building to drop off a respectable supply of beer and a thank-you note to Bill the van man, we were on our way.
Mr. T fired up the CD player and deposited within a song which would turn out to be our road trip anthem, or theme song if you’re a picky bastard. “California here we come!” by the Phantom Planet was a stonking great tune and quickly got us all in the mood and had us all acting like we were in a bad American teen movie, cracking open beers with our heads and yelling “road trip!” out of the windows. We were on the road and loving it, and in the extravagant linguistic tongue of Mr. T, “ I Love it, I fucking love it guys!” Sheer poetry.
Let us take a quick break at this point, and in the meantime, you are invited on a journey through time, back to the beginning, I promise it will be relevant to the story. Besides, I say invite, you pretty much have to read it, if not you can all just piss off and buy the fucking lonely planet guide and do it yourselves.
In the beginning God created the universe in seven days, and it was this exact amount of time we had left when our God, Bill the van man delivered our salvation. Since Christmas 2003, a small core group of men consisting of Mr. T, Mr. Pink and myself had been dedicated to cruising the American dream. Visions of Drinking, smoking and general cavorting had danced in our heads for months. We wanted it all coast to coast, route 66, culminating in a mammoth party week in California. Within a month, Mr. C was on board and eventually Mr. S in the closing weeks. We had purchased a shiny beautiful Chevy Van with our pooled money, bedecked with resplendent furniture and completely indulgent accessories such as a Nintendo and a CB radio so we could annoy passing truck drivers. Mr. C had been to the dealers to take a number of photographs, which we all drooled over for weeks, and displayed to our fellow co-workers. We had even developed a friendly rivalry with another group of prospective road-trippers from our community who, incidentally, were already in material possession of their van, which we mocked on countless occasions. We had paid good money to ensure our baby would be fit for a journey across the vast expanses of the United States, and back again. And even paid extra money to have a newer engine fitted, which would practically guarantee the safe return of our van and its remaining occupants. The alarm bells never rang. Even with mere weeks to go, we sat back and planned the route and pilfered provisions, safe in our own little bubble, wherein everybody in the world was reliable and trustworthy. Mr. T had gone to pick up the van on no less than fifty occasions! (Well okay, maybe a little closer to 4 occasions, but the point still stands that it was outrageous.) Each time he was told that the engine was going to be fitted within a week or a few days, and he’d come home and told the rest of the group. By the end of June, most of the group would be leaving the community to co-ordinate summer camp groups with the children under our care, and the whole nasty business was left in the capable hands of Mr. T, who, for his part, handled it all admirably. Finally, after the fiftieth time we’d been turned down (or there abouts,) Thomas stormed up to the shifty car dealer and told him a few home truths, shouted the odds a bit, and probably said a few other downright nasty things for which the similes escape me at present. To cut long story short, our money was returned to us by the dealer, much to our relief, and we were back to square one. No fuck it! we were no longer even at square one. We were at a place where squares no longer had any meaning, some other dimension or parallel universe of shit where squares didn’t exist. We were at shit one.
I returned to the village after two sunny weeks at the beech in Delaware, home of tax free shopping and the funniest fourth of July fireworks display ever put on, where the blinding, beautiful sparks of the pyrotechnics were masked by their own smoke! Trust me, you couldn’t see a thing! I nearly pissed myself with laughter. I hoped and prayed as we pulled into the village, hoped that we had a van, as yet uniformed of our dire straits, prayed that our van was in good, working order. Boy was I in for a surprise. That night, the night of my return, Mr. T found me enjoying a magazine in the social room, waiting in line to use the slowest internet computers in the world.
“We are fucked! I went to pick up the van and it still wasn’t ready. I just fucking lost it man, I told him it wasn’t good enough and that I was a paying customer, and that I wanted my money back. The dealer looked pretty upset. I saw he had a fucking baseball bat on the desk behind him, it was fucking scary man!”
“ So do we have a van now?” I asked nervously, “No we don’t. You and Simon have got to find one now, I have to go off on summer camp for a week, good luck.” And that was that, we had no van and I had all the money and no idea where to start. Shit.
“ Bill is going to take me out this lunch time, we’re going to check out that green Plymouth in Pottstown. It isn’t very big but if its in good shape I’ll have to buy it.”
Simon sounded a little worried on the other end of the line. “Besides,” I said, “ If Bill is coming along and he says it is good then we’re sorted.” With that I put the phone down triumphantly, ending our conversation, not wanting to hear anymore of his negativity and worrying, I had enough of my own without all that.
You’ve got to pick a pocket or two boyyyyyy!
“Do you get what I’m saying?”
Of course I did! I was a man. A man of the world no less. I understood his complicated system of winks and nods.
“ I just can’t take you to go and see the vehicle while he’s here.”
He indicated my companion, a young man under my care who I thought would love the outing, as he was a big fan of SUV’s. I was confident now in our back and forth banter, and felt quite “cool” as Mr. Fagin continued his system of winking and jerking his head to the side. He was clearly indicating his wish for us to step around the back of the shop and do some under the counter dealings, and he didn’t want any witness’s. With my friend safely in out of the way and the keys in his hand, Bill proceeded to give the van a thorough looking over, while I stood back and admired the man at work, still high off of my Dodgy dealings with Fagin. “No way,” he said, ”Shit!” I replied, “are you sure?” I enquired,
“Well, the tyres are in pretty bad condition so they won’t get you far outside of Pennsylvania if the police don’t catch you first. And then there is the engine, it doesn’t look too hot either. If I were you, I wouldn’t drive to the mall in this.”
During our conversation, Fagin had begun to limp over, spotting my handy mechanic and cursing silently to himself. I deposited the key in his sweaty callused palm as he began,
“So, what do you thing then my darlings? Is it worth a bob or two?” He wandered back a few paces and started to dance as we burst into song about the promising life of pick-pocketing. Well, at least that is what he would have done, if he were even a convincing thief, which he was not. Instead, we concluded our dealings and Bill and myself got back into the car after I made a vague mention of returning later in the week. We drove off back down the road while Fagin kind of limped off, back to his office cursing and jerking his head to the side.
It was only after a minute or two of being back on the road that I realised the extent of my stupidity. Fagin wasn’t a happy go lucky, loveable rogue who was trying to communicate his dark intentions to me in signals, he had a nervous tick. At the moment of realisation, I sat with my head in my hands, wallowing in my own ridiculousness and the fact that we still had no van. I was a failure. While I sat banging my head on the door-frame, Bill had the grand idea of nipping into a car lot we had spotted on the way, that we had dismissed as to dear for us and well out of our price range. As we drove in, we were greeted by a line of chevy vans, dazzling in the mid-day sun, the glint on the head-lamps taunting me, winking like my old friend Fagin. They were saying to me “Piss off you loser, you can’t afford us, go back and buy the shitty Plymouth.” The limp-free dealer emerged from his castle, bedecked in robes of silk, and diamond encrusted underwear (probably,) looking far too important to sell a van to us. He walked over, no, he swaggered over, as if to accentuate his limp free gait, and casually lent upon the van that took our fancy. “Howdy!” He spoke to us! I naturally let Bill take it from here, while I stood naturally, inspecting the van, pretending to know what I was doing. “Well,” he said, grasping his solid gold belt buckle, “I couldn’t let it go for any less than 3000.” My countenance fell considerably. “That’s a shame,” I said. “I was looking for something a little more in my price-range.” Bill nodded in agreement. “Well, like I said,” continued the savvy dealer, “I Can’t let it go for any less that 2500 to 3000.”
“2500!!!!!!!!!!”
I exclaimed, like a complete moron. “Well, 2500 at the least,” he replied as a smile crept across his face. I lowered my stupid head and let Bill take it from there.
“It’s fucking sweet!” I shouted to Mr. T over the phone, “ It’s huge, bigger than Lucas’s van, it pisses all over them! It has a TV, Oven, Fridge, CB radio. It even has a bloody toilet in the back, a toilet!”
“Dude, when I get back I am going to kiss you!”
The whole business was now out of my hands, Mr. T and Mr. S were going to deal with the insurance papers and all other necessary mumbo-jumbo, while I sat back, relaxed and reveled in the fact that we now owned a van.
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