Without Shackles: #8 - One Night and Off Again!

After one short night in my very cozy bed, I had the pleasure of hittin' the road again.
This time with Becki B!

The plan was to leave bright and early so we could play our gig that night... about 7 hours away.

By the time she arrived at my place I realized this may be a super "stressful" trip of pushing it with minimal stops so that we'd get there on time. It was cutting our drive time pretty close but figured I could still make it on time.

As we cruised through Morris, a quick skip and jump from the boarder, I remembered;

"Oh man! My insurance is almost up!!"

Thankfully that only took 2 stops to find the right building and about 15 min.

I can easy make that time up!

We DID have to pull over by the abandoned car, from the night before, since I forgot a couple things in it. We arrived just on time as the tow truck was about ready to take it away.

Ok, I can still make this time up and get to our gig...

Unlike most of my border crossings, we weren't searched!
At first the old man was more confused about why he couldn't read my license plate in the photo... after much discussion on how to get a clear shot on the computer with someone he finally moved onto us;

"Becki, can you take your glasses off. Hmmmm... this photo doesn't LOOK like you"
"That's because it's a couple years old and I'm a hairdresser"

Seemed like a good reason to me!
I guess it did to him too since that was pretty much all the "hassle" we got.

As he opened the hatch of my car and saw everything that was in there, it was clear he didn't want to be bothered as he gasped;

"Oh boy!!"

And at that he tried to slam the hatch shut.
I didn't bother telling him my trunk doesn't actually lock shut... I let him slam it a couple times and then said;

"Oh, weird... It does that some times. I'll just pull over up ahead and close it."

Probably best not to tell him that I use duck tape to keep it shut!

As we flew past Grand Forks and pulled into Fargo it was coffee time and most importantly, oil change time. Since the break down the night before I wasn't able to do ANY of the prep I wanted to for this trip. No biggy... I used my spidey senses and found a 10 min oil change place in no time.

Most of the men were too cool, and took their job WAY to serious... calling out random number counts like the time it was taking them and such. It was like they were working at a Nascar event!
One of the cowboys looked like he really wanted to have fun and laugh but no... he could only smerk. There's no place for fun.
10 min oil changes are very serious.

I also duck tape my bumper

One quick loop around, grab a coffee, hassle the coffee guy for not telling us BEFORE we ordered it was "happy hour" and we could have gotten fancy drinks for cheaper, Becki realizes AFTER we gave him a little sarcasm he DID tell her before, and we move on... oops! Sorry guy.

Shortly after this we concluded that we probably wouldn't make it on time... I could speed. I could push it... But at the same time I just wanted to relax with it. I HAD been on the road for almost a week already...

Becki was good with that decision. If we don't make it on time, we'll just jam wherever we are! At this point it was going to be some random place that Becki hooked up with on the online couch surfing community. GREAT way to travel when you're being even more random. Not too good when you have limited time and want to fit a lot in... but then maybe that's just me being a princess and liking a hotel from time to time...

Ok, so, we're not going to play the gig? Awesome. I really want to stop at the Albertville outlets!
(Shocker. I know)

We did a quick look around and then I did a quick change in the bathroom. I found Becki in Zumies with a very friendly sales man. I mean boy. And did I say friendly? Ok, he thought he was friendly, but in reality he was SUPER annoying and kept following us around, talking AT us, and swearing a whole lot!

Hmmm... I guess that works on the young girls? You're awesome. And yes... "your store"...

This time when we hopped back in the car there was a funny sound and vibration... was the tire flat?
Checked and nope!
Was the timing belt coming off?
No. Doesn't make sense.
Was the steering funny?
Nope.
Maybe a ball joint or whatever it's called... bering?
Maybe but didn't seem like it.
Hmmm.... maybe it'll go away. Let's just keep driving! (smart)

We finally arrived at a fabulous little studio in Minneapolis where we had a taste of surprisingly good local beer and a nice little jam broke out! From there on... the mayhem continued. Did we make it to the couch surfing place? No. But my buddy Mat ended up getting us a room at a hotel... I like that!