When we left off last time, we were two days into the road trip and had finally made it to Virginia.  We pick up the tale the following morning.

Sunday

Things got off to an early start, for me at least, as I found Saturday night’s dinner not agreeing with me very well.  After taking care of that particular problem, I found that the guest bathroom in Jeff’s apartment was missing one very important item: toilet paper.  Nothing on the roll, nothing under the sink, and nothing in the little closet.  Thankfully, there was some Kleenex on the back of the toilet, so I was forced to kill that off in order to go about my night.

When I woke up for real on Sunday morning, Jeff had been out to the market and had returned with bagels and other items and fresh coffee being brewed.  After some initial difficulties using the toaster (turns out you need to push the handle all the way down for it to work), I was good to go.  Eventually, Val woke up and the three of us spent the morning eating breakfast and watching the Sunday morning news shows.

At some point, either while waiting for Val to wake up or while she was in the shower (I forget the exact order), Jeff pulled out some of his art books for me to look through, most of which focused on the fantasy realm.  While I’m not the biggest fan of fantasy, my years of comics reading means I can appreciate good art, so, aesthetically, I could appreciate it.  Later, he pulled out his old portfolio and showed Val and me some of his work from college, when he was an art major.  Seeing as I can hardly draw a stick figure, I was impressed by his talent.

After taking in a 5th episode of the new season of Daredevil, we decided to head out on the second leg of the trip, with Disney World our next destination.  Our first stop was at the Wendy’s in Ridgeway, Virginia, about an hour into the trip.  While certain people tried to once again get their bearings, I went in and bought lunch for both Jeff and myself.  Val expressed interest in some curly fries, perhaps intrigued by the previous day’s stop at Arby’s, but the Hardy’s across the street did not offer them and there was no Arby’s in sight.  Over Val’s objections, Jeff vowed to stop at the next Arby’s we found to get her those curly fries, but we oddly did not see one for the rest of the day.

While traveling through the Carolinas, we kept passing signs for a restaurant called Zaxby’s.  Those of us from Chicago have never encountered such a restaurant, to the point that the website won’t even tell me the closest location to my house.  Anyway, Val asked what type of restaurant it was and Jeff explained that it was a department store, similar to Nordstrom.  Because in the deep south, there is no difference between Zaxby’s and Saks Fifth Avenue.

Around 300 miles into the 750 mile journey, we decided to stop for the night.  We found a Hampton Inn in Orangeburg, South Carolina, and, thankfully, this one met with Jeff’s approval.  Once again, got 3 hotel rooms and, since everyone was feeling relatively good and it was still pretty early, we decided to order in some dinner.  Our first attempt failed when the BBQ joint did not have a dinner-time vegetarian option, so we ordered Papa John’s.

When dinner showed up, we found the smash hit Pitch Perfect II on the television, which apparently every one had seen except me.  Once the movie ended, we decided to call it a night a retreat to our separate rooms for the night.

Monday

Day one of the Reach For The Stars conference began at the Hampton Inn in Orangeburg.  With about 450 miles to go, we were supposed to be in the hotel by 4:00, with the gala celebration due to kick off at 6.  After enjoying the free breakfast, we got on the road for the final leg of the trip.  The rest of the trip, through Georgia and into Florida, was mostly uneventful, minus the occasional long rest stops that had by now become the norm.  The biggest change was the texts from Tom, who wanted to know when we were arriving.  He had forgotten the power cord for his laptop and needed to borrow Val’s, who managed to sleep most of the afternoon.

Then, things started to slow down.  By 1 PM, we were less than 3 hours away, according to Google Maps.  At 3:30, we still had an hour to go.  Finally, we arrived about 430 and got in the room about 10 to 5, local time.  Only one problem: we didn’t have our luggage.  When we got out of the car, we went in to the main entrance to the resort, not the conference entrance.  In order to check in, though, we needed to go to the conference entrance.  Rather than making us carry the luggage back and forth, the offered to deliver it to the room.  Unfortunately, they forgot Jeff’s name and my bag was the only one with a name tag, so they put everything under my name, and the room was under Jeff’s.  With less than an hour before the gala, we had no clothes to change into.  About 5:30, after 2 phone calls down to the front desk, our bags arrived and, a few quick showers later, Jeff and I arrived fashionably late to the gala with Tom and his wife.

This seems like a good stopping point, so we will pick up with the gala celebration next time.