The reason Kerouac wore khakis wasnt for the look. It was because denim jeans dont fit well the crotches of rogues riding seated along endless American roads. Any good driver can tell you that.
The mountains of western Pennsylvania really did us in, in terms of time. Slowing down to 55 around those icy curves meant that I needed to push it to 90 on the subsequent straightaways. I dont rush just whenever I'm in the car. I'm not a road rage kind of guy, although I have been known to keep tailgaters in my trunk until they learned their lesson.
Even so, my driving risks the panicked critique of my beautiful wifey, whose fingernails are embedded in the soft plastic of my dashboard.
"Stop driving like a crazy person!" she shouts.
"Listen, sweetheart. Dont call me crazy. It's 3 o'clock in the morning somewhere in nowhere Ohio and you're putting on makeup because we're pulling into an empty rest stop."
And we've still got 300 miles to go. What a way to jump into March.
Syracuse was busted on the NCAA tournament yesterday. It's a fraud. The bubble burst for lots of teams who thought they were in, because there were so many late upsets in division tournaments. Not every division even has a tournament, meaning that not every team was given the same opportunity to win or lose their NCAA bid. Without the Big East tournament, where the Orange did what they could do — beat their Connecticut rivals before losing to Notre Dame, a ranked team who had to play brilliantly to overcome Jim Boeheim's scrappy crew, the Orange wrapped up their season with an upset of #10 Georgetown, who is now a two-seed.
I cant figure out that kind of math, but I have to admit, I'm pretty good when I'm driving.
Every good driver knows that you cant trust city distances on signs. The only thing you can depend on are the mile markers. Rod Serling knew that, and thats how he found the Twilight Zone. Look it up.
Anyone who can calculate distance covered and distance remaining against time both ways and instantly set the appropriate speed to hold schedule, allowing for certain variables, including construction, getting cut off by tractor-trailers, rest stops and weather, might just be an expert driver.
Anyone who can figure out why Syracuse is playing in the NITs is an expert NCAA analyst, which means they really know their bullshit. Nobody is better at bullshit than the NCAA.
I cant figure out the NCAA and I'm not afraid to admit it. But I'm an expert driver, to say the least. I've had my bumps and bruises along the way, just like anyone who tests the limits of the road. I wouldnt be an expert driver without having personally discovered exactly how far to push things, and what happens when you go too far.
The world is littered with people who have gone too far on the road. Take my sister's ex-husband. Seemed like a great guy, until he got behind the wheel, where he started fights with anyone who blinked at him funny. Eventually, they broke up. Now he's giving cheap blowjobs to truckers at a beat-down truck stop in Carlisle, PA. Who knew? He lost his job, lost his wife, and ended up a crackhead. I guess he was always a crackhead. He was just waiting for the chips to fall. He and my sister ended their relationship after a final bad roadtrip to Maine.
Thats why I like the road. If you're not right for the job, you find out quickly when you're driving, maneuvering through madness and forced to make instant life or death decisions. Everyone is down on the roads. Everyone is rushed, trying to get somewhere or trying to run from something, trying to stay alive in adverse conditions. It's an equalizer of unparalleled stamina.
My father taught me to drive in a 1980-something VW Jetta, and I drive a 2003 Jetta today. Both manual transmission. After learning to drive, I discovered the loner part of my father and his father before him, who used to chase illegal immigrants across New York State backroads as a customs officer on the Canadian border. I'd find excuses to disappear into the roads for hours at a time, climbing winding roads in the hills behind town, exploring side streets I had always wondered about while trapped in the passenger seat of someone else's car.
At the same time, he raised me to be a conscientious sports fan and, specifically, a Syracuse maniac. He graduated from the university and my parents raised me in the inner city outskirts of the town on the hill. I couldnt afford to go to SU when it was time, so I went to the University at Buffalo and took to Syracuse on the kind of legendary road trips made popular by fraternity films.
This is the time of year when road trips are a good thing. Every decent college basketball program, men's and women's alike, wants to be out on the road in March. And these teams assume certain things, like when the road sign says it's 200 miles to Columbia, it's really 200 miles to Columbia. But those of us who have been on this road before know that it's really 208 miles to Columbia also realize that the NCAA bracket-makers sometimes dont know what theyre doing, either.
Had Boeheim thought about it, he probably would have known that his team was going to be screwed by the tournament. Too many of his big wins were at home, and the NCAA dislikes the home advantage, which is why they try to send as many teams into distant locales for the tournament in the first place. Me, I know to take certain turns really tight, using all of the road if it's offered to me. And the bubble teams like Syracuse found out, too late this year, that they really needed that extra road win this year.
The tournament is filled with road experts, so I'm prepared for a wild and crazy ride this March. And I suggest that you bet on Ohio State.
