Destination: Tampa/Brandon

Travel Day September 22,2012

I’m up early, at 5:30. No real reason other than today I want an early start and early finish. It’s day one of the marathon to get home. Well not really a marathon. I’m trying to enjoy the journey after all, so I map my route home to take advantage of shorter driving days. Most days will be between 7 and 8 hours, with one day at just over 9. Today’s drive will be just over 5 as I make my back to Tampa/Brandon. I want to start out easy to get my driving legs back under me.

I grab an Awake tea from the small bistro in the lobby. It’s really a place that serves some Starbucks product, but it’s not a true Starbucks. At least they have real tea. I also grab a chocolate croissant, and have a momentary flashback wishing it was a beignets, and the tea was café au lait, and the place was Café du Monde. A fond memory, quickly made, quickly left behind, sadly.

I fuel up at the Shell station across from the hotel and hit US 1 North at 7. It’s dark and a light rain falls as I move further north towards Homestead and Florida City. By the time I hit the eastern outskirts of Miami it’s raining in Biblical proportions. It gets darker as I move further north, but that doesn’t seem to slow people down. I consider myself a hazard so I turn on the 4-ways, and slow to about 20 below the limit along with a bunch of other sane people. And we put ourselves in the far right lane and hope for the best. I’m praying that nobody nails my slow moving behind.

The driving horror lasts about 30 sweat filled minutes, and at 845 I find myself parking the car at the Starbucks I found on the way down. Remember the one where I finally got a fruit and cheese plate? That one! I grab an Awake tea, and just for fun and thrills, a fruit and cheese plate to help get me back across Alligator Alley.

The heavy rain starts up again and I get soaked walking back to the car. I am once again thankful for my quick drying travel clothes. The rain doesn’t choose to ease up until I hit the Everglades toll booth.

The drive across the Everglades is far less frightening than it was a week ago. I am thankful that I see no wildlife at the side of the road. I am also thankful for a new car that won’t leave me stranded.

I roll on through, digging on the radio for something different. I try to find the public traveller information stations I found on the way down but have strangely bad luck. I do find a station out of Naples that plays a format I haven’t heard before. They call it Modern Easy Favourites, and it’s WAVV 101.1. I find it just offbeat enough to keep on listening until it fades out an hour south of Tampa.

Have I mentioned the itching of these mysterious little insect bites? They are driving me crazy. I have one on the arch of my right foot, and one on my big toe, along with another eight or so across my ankles, and a truly agonizing one on my left Achilles’ tendon right on the shoe line. I think I can adequately suggest that this would be fine form of torture. Forget waterboarding, and forget drilling kneecaps, forget sleep deprivation. For the most part I am fairly well held together mentally. I say for the most part because everyone has something that makes them off center. The itching is making inroads on my long term sanity. I feel like my feet and ankles are becoming the center of my consciousness. It is beginning to define the very center of my being, my entire chi. I am not happy about this. At all!

I return to the mall in Brandon where I had dinner once. It’s huge. I park the car on the outskirts of the parking lot. I learned my lesson last time to not park in close. I wasted 30 minutes of my ever shortening life to get out of a parking lot. I walk into the mall, consult a “you are here” map and find only one of the stores I’m looking for, a Radio Shack. I head there to buy a cheap computer tool kit. I need to remove the hard drive and memory out of my old one before I get rid of it. I ask the guy in the store about a pharmacy. He’s not sure. Imagine working in a mall and not knowing what other stores are there? To be fair it could have been his first day. I ask the perky mall concierge, and she looks at me blank faced. Then she seems to think really hard, the screwed up intense look on her face is convincing, and suggests there might be something on the highway outside of the mall. But she’s not sure.

As I walk back across the Rhode Island sized parking lot I see that a Walgreen’s or CVS is at the entrance to the mall parking lot. Really?? At the entrance to the parking lot? I can see me missing it, but people who work there every day? I'm not sure which it is because I'm losing my ability to concentrate.

By this point my feet and ankles are itching so bad and causing me such great discomfort I must look like I work for the Ministry of Silly Walks. I try to prevent my feet from touching the ground, I twist my ankles to try and avoid putting pressure on my soles, twisting and flexing my knees, and rolling my hips. The bites along the ankles and soles of my feet are flaming up and they’re swelling against the side of my shoes. Ever had blisters on the ball and sole of your foot and across the back of your Achilles tendon all at the same time? Do you get the general idea? I’m feel bad and I must look demented, or worse yet, a hop head looking for a fix!

I head directly for the pain relief aisle. I find products I have never seen before. The best one I find? Benadryl anti-itch stick. I like the idea that the same product, the only product, that stops my spring time allergy symptoms has a topical application. I buy it without hesitation, along with a six pack of Land Shark. If one doesn’t work I’m pretty sure the other will. An anaesthetic is an anaesthetic.

I head to the hotel to check in. I liked the one I stayed at on the way down, so I’m staying there again, a Hampton Inn. I immediately take off my shoes and socks, and apply a liberal dose of the anti-itch. Within moments, the suffering is over. Brain structure and function begins to return. I can begin to feel other parts of my body, apparently my back isn’t too happy, but that’s OK. One pain at a time.

I also seem to be hungry. It’s a Saturday night, every person in Tampa and surrounding area will be out eating, lineups will be long. I figure that pizza’s a good idea. I search the internet for inspiration and find a lot of local places are closed, permanently. I figure it’s going to be a Pizza Hut night and find a listing for one a mile or so away. I plug it into the Nav and go on my way. I am increasingly clear minded as the anti-itch stuff works its magic. Reaching the address is easy, but the Pizza Hut isn’t there. A bar that seems to be quickly fading away on its reputation is the only eating place in the strip mall. The large number of gentleman casually standing outside the front doors, in leather vests with motorcycle patches on them, suggests to me that discretion is called for.

I drive back over to the area around the mall, and cruise the eight lane street looking for new inspiration. All I can find that has potential is KFC. I’m crushed that I have come so far, eaten such wonderful fresh food in some fabulous places, and all I can find here that is halfway appealing is KFC.

I take the chicken back to the hotel. It’s not as bad as the stuff at home. More pepper, less salt. At some point I am sure my blood pressure will thank me for that, but I’m also sure it won’t be today.

My back is tender where it spasmed quite painfully in July. I am just a bit concerned, but I also brought my heating pad, just in case. I don’t want to wind up flat on my back for a week like the last time.

I take an Extra Strength Robaxacet, according to my friend you can’t buy it here so I brought some along, type up and post a blog entry, check some e-mail, and catch some AC360 on CNN. Then it’s bed. Tomorrow is a very long drive day to get to Atlanta.