Ode to Valerie

Hello again.
I know...the mind reels at the good fortune of another post being...uh....posted so quickly after the previous one but what can i say? I'm feeling benevolent.
Listen to a story about a man named Jed. Or better still, about my best friend in the world, Valerie McLean.
Now Val has been my best (no, not "bestest" because that word, quite frankly, pisses me off) friend for the past twenty...going on twenty one years and I have yet to say a whole heck of a lot about her--a fact that apparently annoys her, according to her response to my last blog post. And yes, she's put up with me that long. Ha. Ha. Val is quite possibly the smartest person I know and she knows exactly what she wants and goes after it, with a ferocity that often scares me. i know better than to tick her off because, though it doesn't happen all that often, it's a scary spectacle to behold, mostly cause she's six foot tall (that right, val?), and she's loud. Only when she's mad(the loud part not the tall part). She and I met in preschool and, i assume largly because of our unpopularity and general dorkiness, we bonded immediately and stuck that way (much like if you make a face for too long, it'll stick like that). She lives in G'vegas (aka.Greenville, NC) where she and I went to college together and so now i can use visiting her as an excuse to go back and relive the "glory days" at ECU, while trying to forget the much less popular "psycho days". Right now she probably thinks I've written quite enough about her and she's kicking herself for having written any kind of response to my last blog post at all but let me just say, in wrapping this up, that Valerie, though tall and sometimes scary, is not at all hairy and lately (to my knowledge), she hasn't dated any guys in the military. Nobody but Val will get that and for this, I apologize. For all of these reasons and many more (homegirl can make some sweet tea!), I love Valerie. There, Val, I said it. Are ya happy? Any cute, Christian, funny, fearless guys out there who want her phone number can feel free to drop me a line.
Okay...what else can i talk about? Well...I could fill everybody in a bit more about my Philadelphia trip outside "The U2 Experience", as its come to be known. Jeffrey and I left home and hit I-95 about a quarter to ten that friday morning (the result of intending to leave at nine o'clock). I, having always had a hankerin' for a "Virginia is For Lovers" t-shirt wanted to stop at the Virginia Welcome Center at the state's border and so we did, though Jeffrey was mostly humoring me. I didn't get my t-shirt because apparently you can only buy them online (and even then, they're the hoity-toity colared polo version or yuppie tourist version) so we left instead with a fist full of brochures on williamsburg, etc. and a "Virginia is For Lovers" sticker. I was happy. Moving right along, which we did just fine until we got within a fifty mile radius of Washington DC, we stopped only for lunch and then crawled the rest of the way from Washington DC to Baltimore, to Wilmington, Delaware. Jeffrey and I kept each other entertained, alternating between picking on each other to annoyance or playing the Alphabet Game (where you find each letter of the alphabet in order on signs near the road. And the letter has to be the first letter of a word or it doesn't count.) My butt hurt. I insisted on driving. Yankees can't drive. My nerves started to wear thin.
Thankfully, about the time that I was verging on nuts, we got to Christina's apartment, thanks to Jeffrey's awesome navigating skills. Christina, whom I hadn't seen in at least two or three years, welcomed us in and proceeded to cook us spaghetti, complete with salad and garlic bread. Her boyfriend Albert (who quickly became one of my favorite people) arrived shortly after dinner but i missed out on most of his visit as I fell asleep on Jeffrey on the couch. Deep asleep. I slept on an air mattress on the living room floor that night...very comfortable until i woke up about an hour and a half later, still on the mattress, but also flat on the floor. I apparently deflated it.
Well...highlights of the next day: Jeffrey and I followed Christina and Albert (who was driving like a true native) into the city to Albert's office building where we parked for the day. As Christina instructed me and i quickly learned, "Speed limits don't mean anything. Go with the flow of traffic, go through yellow lights, and cut people off because they sure as heck won't let you in, signal or no signal." Fun stuff. Our day in the city was great. The city is beautiful and we walked all over the place from Independence Hall to the site of where Ben Franklin's house once stood, to Betsy Ross's house. It took a bit to find that one, but once we did, we got to chat and have our pictures taken with a friendly "colonial dude" who mistook Jeffrey for a Tory because of his (Admiral)Abercrombie shirt. The weather was beautiful, the flowers were blooming, people covered the parks, and the river was dotted with boats full of rowing teams.
After our first cheesesteak in actual Philly (mostly like cooked ground beef with melted cheese in a bun...you had the option, which i didn't take, of marinara sauce), we picked up my car and headed our seperate ways. Christina even called after the concert to check on us and make sure we could remember how to get back to her apartment. Another reason why Christina's awesome.
Well, this will be an abrupt ending but i've written enough for this post so i'm gonna quit it, but suffice it to say, it was a great trip and we were extremely tired after driving all day the next day. I'd go back again in a heartbeat.
I'm tired and so are you. Peace out.