DAY TWO - May 23, 2004

Day Two of the trip began with fitful sleep due to the fact the bus was still very full. When I woke, I realized we had slept all the way through Virginia, oddly enough. We stopped at a place called Gold Rock in North Carolina and I was happy to once again get a chance to smoke. I still was conscious enough to remark to Martin that I had not seen any gold rocks.

On the bus I fell asleep once again until Fayetteville, North Carolina, where I was woken up by one of the talkative Canadian guys who smacked into the back of my seat and then apologized.

At the bus station in Fayetteville, North Carolina, I got swindled out of forty dollars. Before you laugh, I consider it forty dollars paid to get out of the situation unharmed.

After Martin and I had a surprisingly good breakfast, I went outside the terminal to smoke where a guy struck up a conversation with me about where I was going. I told him Jacksonville and asked the same. He said he was actually from Connecticut, but lived here and had just got out of jail right across the street. Well, hey, that should have been my first hint but I've known quite a few people who've been in jail that were all right. I asked him what they sent him to jail for and he said driving without a license. I scoffed the law and said that everyone does that, bummer that you got caught. He asked me if I was Christian and I mentioned that I was when I was younger, but not now. Then we got right down to where he had most likely originally intended to go with this conversation and asked me if I smoked weed. My ears perked since I did not have very much and went through great pains to get some before the trip, but to no avail. I said I did and he offered to sell me some by having me compare prices to what I would get in my hometown and slitting it in half.

I don't know, usually I'm smarter. I don't know why I chose at that minute to walk away from the terminal with him with weed on my mind. Hindsight is always 20/20, as they say.

Anyway, we walked around for a second looking for a private place to make the transaction. There was an old building two blocks away that had a loading dock out back that was out of sight and I proceeded to give him the money. He gave me back a wrapped up bag of what he called "chronic" but in actuality looked and smelled like field weeds. I looked at it very close, said "Is that what chronic looks like?" and then he smacked my lighter, bowl, and the bag out of my hand and said "I'm tired of this shit". I thought I was about to get robbed right then but thankfully he walked away, with my forty dollars, but me staying unscathed.

I walked back to the bus terminal where three people chased me down and asked if I was all right and if I had gotten swindled. I said yes to both questions and showed them the bag and they found it very funny. I was a source of amusement for a little while on the ride and was feeling humiliated and lucky at the same time.

Well, after that, the trip all the way to Jacksonville was wrought with bad bus driving. In Lumberton, South Carolina, after stopping at a gas station to take a break, the driver did not announce to the other passengers that he was leaving and started to drive off before six people had a chance to figure out we were actually leaving. He did the same thing to two people in Ridgeland, South Carolina, but this time it was their fault since he had announced it before leaving. Also after Lumberton, the bus driver asserted his power by turning on the heat against requests to turn on the cool air and Martin figured out that by turning on the hot air and then the cool air he froze the coils and broke the conditioner. Much of the ride was spent sweating.

Savannah, Georgia was an awesome sight since our introduction to the city included going over a river specifically used to load truck carriers on a bridge that was obviously fairly new, very high, and held up by cables. The bus station wasn't all that interesting and neither was the rest of the trip through Georgia, save some rivers that obviously led to the ocean.

Upon arriving in Jacksonville, Florida the bus driver realized that we were ahead of schedule and made two completely unnecessary stops, one at a bus stop that was now closed and one on the side of a city street two blocks away from the bus station. The passengers could have walked there with all their baggage before the bus actually arrived. We got to the station at long last and Martin's friend Lisa and her friend Rob were waiting for us across the street. We packed up their car with our stuff and Martin went back in to file a formal complaint. Once Martin complained and they confronted the bus driver who lied in the face of his supervisor and four other passengers including Martin. The bus driver's supervisor then asked Martin to fill out a sheet and find as many people as he could to also fill one out. I had been waiting in the car by this time and Martin grabbed me back out and we both filled one out.

Our time with Lisa and Rob was very pleasant. We went to a place called the Ale House and had a great dinner of seafood (him a combination plate which included dolphin and me having Bourbon Salmon). After this we went to the beach and milled around for a few, enjoying the sand and picturesque ocean and Martin took five pictures of a wavy-looking hotel building. We toured some of the more ritzy areas of town and went back to the bus station around 9pm. Our bus was late getting started and two security guards were checking everyone's carry-on items. That sent me into fits since I had a small amount of weed stashed in my computer bag plus the fake weed in my backpack. I brought my computer bag to the bathroom and stashed the bowl and weed into a secret pocket and then nonchalantly brought my backpack to the bathroom and flushed the fake weed. It turned out I did not have to worry about my computer bag since he wasn't being very thorough. We got on the bus and tried to sleep, but the folding bathroom door was vibrating and I could not sleep. In Tallahassee, Florida the bus lost about half its passengers and we found out the back seat (which had three seats) was empty and Martin stretched out and had a nice snooze. I stretched out over two seats and also had a nice dreaming sleep.