Week Two, What can you Write about when its raining SOOO much?!

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Day One - Monday
23.03.09

So…as you might remember from my incredibly long last blog we are in Gainesville. I woke up to a bag of dirty pants, (lovely) so I knew that chore was ahead of me, in fact I think I chose to class that as my official Zen Hostel chore, not what you call beneficial to others but it was such a laborious task I didn’t care. I did however make use of a birthday present - the brilliant travel clothes wash, thank you Ali.

I had a shower and now bearing in mind we had just come from the motel with “the most powerful shower in the world” (and I have the bruises to prove it) this, if you can imagine it was the exact opposite - it was like someone crying on you. It was even worse than Julie’s bath / showers.

Anyway we had plans to go and meet Evan for lunch as it was his birthday, we also decided to take him one of our bottles of beer as a present and try and find a makeshift bow to put around it.
We weren’t meeting him till much later though so we needed some form of entertainment. We checked out the local library (not an obvious form of entertainment) and then went to the post office where I bought my body weight in international postage stamps for all of the bloody postcards I have. We did try the info centre for inspiration but as it was raining all the woman could come up with was a butterfly farm and we weren’t really feeling that. We instead decided to hit up a cute little coffee shop where Gem got her morning laxative (aka black coffee) and I got a coke which I’m only mentioning as I choked on it in the middle of the café in front of everyone and had a massive coughing fit. Gem of course was being very supportive and not sniggering at all.

We decided to stay there and write our blogs so I got my “Angela Lansbury” on and started tapping away at Bluey much to Gem’s amusement and picture taking.
It was time to go and meet Evan and he’d recommended The Book Lovers Café which is vegetarian. A vegetarian café in a bookshop, I think all of Gem’s dreams came true, minus the fit bird from Twilight of course. We had to get our trot on as it was a bit of a walk, which half way through we completely regretted not driving as the heavens opened yet again, and we started to get that drowned rat feeling. Luckily we had stolen an umbrella from the Bridge 2 hostel in Ft Lauderdale which did a brilliant job of keeping the tops of our heads dry, the rest of us was fucked.

Obviously at a vegetarian café they don’t serve meat at all. Derr. Who would be stupid enough to think otherwise? Errr not me! I had no idea what to order as nothing consisted of the ingredients cheese and burger. So I closed my eyes and pointed and it turned out to be quite pleasant indeed. All the tables were surrounded by shelves and shelves of books so Gem was in her element. It was pretty cool. Gem went off in search of an Italian phrasebook while I made a birthday bow out of a local band flyer and a good old Sharpie pen. Unfortunately however, Evan had to cancel on us as he got caught up at work. He is opening up his own bar in a few days. It was at this point though I was regretting carrying around that bottle of beer all day. Thanks Evan!
Because the weather was so miserable we decided to go to the movies. My first USA cinema experience, so I think it understandable that I wanted to take pictures. Gem just sat back and laughed at me though.
We watched “Knowing” with Nicolas Cage. Bloody intense film with a completely bollocks ending. But enjoyable all the same.
We went back to the zen-tastic hostel where we stayed till going out to meet Evan for birthday drinks, take two. For some reason I was given the responsibility of remembering the location of the bar. Silly mistake really as I of course forgot it. We ended up walking around aimlessly for about 20 minutes. However like a bolt of lightning from god himself and had a brain surge, and with the help of some friendly policemen we found Common Ground. It was happy hour / free beer from 9-10 and we literally got the last two beers as we arrived at 10pm, bonus! It was a really cool bar, a little like The Bless but better. It’s where all the trendies hung out. There was karaoke on but we steered clear of that and instead we played that classic, age-old pub game - ‘Spot the Lesbian’.
We already had “senzione” to represent a fit bird within earshot but we needed one for lesbian, as obviously fit birds and lesbians do not always go hand in hand! We had already said that if we were uncomfortable with chatting to someone who was turning out to be a weirdo that we would say to each other “Dude, we need to go and meet Cody” - Cody being the “code” word. For some reason when I saw a lezza in that split second “Dude there’s a Cody over there” came out. Gem sharing the same mind as me, knew exactly what I meant and so now ‘Cody’ naturally has become part of our daily vocabulary.
There were a few Cody’s at this bar but of course they were either in couples or looked like old men so we went to get another drink. Who was to serve us but miserable bar bitch from the previous night - brilliant. It’s safe to say we didn’t tip her that night.
We got chatting to a girl called Ashley who was on her own as her friend she was meeting was running late. We of course befriended her and brought into the Oody circle. Her friend Kristina eventually did arrive and they were both intrigued by our travel plans so we swapped details and then proceeded to take drunken photos of ourselves doing the “Shoulder Hey” pose (see my current profile pick for my example of this) which seems to be THE pose for American girls - no doubt a bad influence from Tyra Banks.

Evan aka birthday boy EVENTUALLY arrived so we drank to celebrate while Gem met several other new friends, one of them Seb who was really into British comedy.
We said our goodbyes, swapped details and obviously took shit loads of picks and then moved onto the U.C.
There was a club downstairs and a bar with pool upstairs - a bit like Curzons come to think of it. More similarities to Curzons were to come when we realised the club part was desolate - bar one man dancing on his own (which obviously comes as standard in every club) so I took his photo. Gem and I by this point were incredibly pissed so we went upstairs to the bar and got another drink. We got chatting to the friendliest looking women - there weren’t many to choose from. They were really cool girls though, really intrigued about our travel plans as many of them hadn’t been out of Florida! We got chatting to Kristen and Cal and played doubles in pool which somehow we won as my pool skills had all gone to pot as I was so pissed.
Kristen at one point bought me this horrific drink - a mixture of whiskey and some other highly intoxicating ingredients, which I took one sip of and then subtly tried to hide at the back of the table. This was completely unsuccessful however as Kristen kept pointing it out. After she did this for the third time I thought “fucking hell I’m going to have to drink this” - so I downed it in one. It was rancid, it was worse than the gin.
We went back to Kristen’s friend’s house where we sat around talking bollocks and eating pizza. I also made friends with a dog so I must have been pissed!
By this point also Gem had made a new “friend” in Jenny, a Southern girl with a very thick accent. It was very cute though and me and Gem spent what seemed like the rest of the night doing impressions of her accent and copying everything she said.
I was pissed but I wasn’t that pissed not to notice Gem and Jenny in the corner getting to know each other a little better - for some reason Jenny was giving Gem a one handed massage (this is NOT a euphemism even though it sounds like one!) but she tried to do it casually while still keeping conversation with the rest of the group so we wouldn’t notice - each to their own.
Jenny gave us a lift home and once back to the Zen ranch of the peace core I left them to it to do what I can only imagine any young lesbian would be doing to say goodbye - drunkenly make out in the backseat, tightly hold each other and say “someday we’ll meet again.” Beautiful isn’t it?!



Day Two - Tuesday
24.03.09

It was time to leave Gainesville and we had a long drive ahead of us so it made sense that both of us had bastard hangovers from hell. I think at some point during the morning I spoke to Julie on MSN but I’m not entirely sure as all I could think about was crawling back into a hole to which only a “hangover coke” could entice me back out of.
I however motivated myself and we went off for shit food which we very much needed. Gem had had a recommendation from a friend to go and try Gator Dawgs. Not hot dogs made of alligator as the name suggests - it just happens to be that EVERY business in Gainesville is named after or has the logo of something to do with a gator. How unique. This café was cool though, with loads of film posters dotted around. They also had a giant bottle of red sauce which (no exaggeration) I had to manoeuvre with both hands. Of course I had to take a photo of this; it completely reminded me of Rich. Hahahaha, it made me chuckle.
Gem was going to drive as I felt so bad but the gator dawg and hangover coke made me feel loads better and Gem still felt like shite so I got my drive on and busted a move to Tallahassee.
The Motel 6 we chose to stay at only delivered us lies as in fact they didn’t have internet there so unfortunately there was no webcam action for Julie but alas it wasn’t out fault - promise.
The sun was actually out, a rarity for us so far however ironic being in the USA. We bikini’d up and hit the motel pool where some dirty old men (who we later found out were retired tramps aka Salvation Army spokesmen representing the homeless) chose to perv on us - brillo.
The sun was amazing so we lapped up every last ray. I also stupidly had the brilliant idea of having a quick dip in the pool. I didn’t realise this would give us hyperthermia when I jumped in all the way. I dared Gem to do the same thing and did she do it? Did she bollocks! Wimp.
The plans for the night were to chill out and give our bodies a rest. Since we had been to The Last Resort bar in Daytona we had a jonesing to watch the film “Monster.” Having Bluey is amazing as I could download it now. So that’s what we did - curled up in bed and watched a hooker get raped and then shoot a load of men - cosy.



Day Three - Wednesday
25.03.09

We decided to move to a motel with internet connection as Bluey is like an impotent man without it. There is absolutely nothing to say about this motel other than the guy put us on the third floor - I don’t know why, as we later realised there was no one else staying there. There was also a handy ice machine outside our door that Gem chose to utilise, not in a traditional sense, but instead to pelt me with ice cubes.
Before boring Motel Inn though, we got up early and decided to go and get some culture and see something else in the US other than gay bars.
We drove to Wakulla Springs State Park, a massive and beautiful place that you could take these little trails that led to natural springs, with all sorts of wildlife knocking around. We chose our trail - the shortest one but that was still 2.5 miles - more walking than I’ve done since Highground Hikers. We took some pretty pictures as well as idiotic pictures of us posing in the obligatory “wilderness” pose - arms out at a jaunty angle and looking a bit lost.
As promised the trail ended with the au naturelle spring, complete with its own wildlife, i.e. an alligator. Now, Gem had remembered a small fact from our Everglade tour that gators can jump half of their body length. This only meant now that she was shitting herself - bicycle clip time as she would say. She sent me off first to see if there were any gators on the rocks - thanks. There wasn’t but there was a big bastard in the water a few metres from us - photo opportunity. After acting like a frightened toddler wetting herself for five minutes, Gem got the courage to take one step forward and we put the camera on self-timer and documented that shit. If only I had a pair of Ray Mears shorts I would have looked a treat. There was also a very cute Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, (unfortunately minus the teenager, mutant and ninja part) hanging around near our feet. We felt very enriched with all of this nature and it was only 1.30 in the afternoon.

Other than that it was a very boring day - Tallahassee is rubbish and everything is miles away. That night we decided to stay and do some much needed catching up on our blogs and utilised the webcam on Bluey to talk to Julie. It was very cool apart from the connection being awful so we sounded like two old bastards with hearing problems continually saying “What did you say?” according to Gem, anyway.



Day Four - Thursday
26.03.09

It was well and truly time to move on and the next place on the map was the city of Pensacola, a beach town. Unfortunately for us however, the weather reports were saying rain, rain, rain, oh and possibly thunderstorms - great!
Gem drove as I wanted to type up El Bloggo on Bluey but about one hour into the drive, again from nowhere the heavens opened. The wipers were on their fastest setting going and we still couldn’t see anything other than a sheet of water in front of us. Doing 70mph on the interstate is not what you want to be doing when that happens so we pulled off at the nearest rest stop and sat in front of the nearest Subway for the next hour praying we wouldn’t get struck by lightning. This would have been a total loss if wasn’t for the footlong subs you could buy for only $5 - James you would be in 12” inch heaven - haha, like you’re not always anyway.

I took over the driving once the rain had fucked off and drove straight on through to Pensacola. We rolled up on the Western Inn or as it was becoming blatantly apparent the Shit / Horrid Inn : The Sequel. Gem did later read a review of the place from a woman who wouldn’t let her kids out of the room at all when they stayed there - so a homely place as you can imagine.
It did however have a laundry next door, which we desperately needed to do - it was a Laundromat like in Friends when Rachel sits in the washing basket on wheels so that bitch doesn’t take it - Rich you know which one I mean! I really wanted to sit in one and recreate the whole thing and obviously take a picture but the woman running it looked as though she would have shoved me in one of the machines if I had. She had already told Gem off for her pants hanging out of her ass but then I tell her that all the time too (to no avail) so laundry woman gets bonus points for that.
That night we were in two minds whether to go out as everything was an age away but we started drinking to make that decision a little easier. Also earlier that day I bought new straighteners (no offence Em, the ones you so generously gave me just didn’t heat up enough) so I wanted to show off nice hair for change.
We found lesbo bar, the Red Carpet Lounge - terrible name for dyke bar, sounds like period pubes.
Anyway, we weren’t sure how far it was as the streets are so long and we didn’t want to get caught in a flash rain storm so we called a cab. The bar was literally around the corner so minus the starting fee the ride cost us 75 cents - idiots! We turned up at 10.30pm thinking it was late-ish and the bar was dead. They hadn’t even turned on the music. We found out it was a mixed bar now (which we presumed meant gay guys and gay women) and that it was amateur drag night. It was also happy hour all night and hip hop evening so we got our drink on. Spirits were so cheap and they didn’t have draft beer so I opted for the gin. I’ve come the conclusion that America does not know what lemonade is as nobody serves it! I was royally screwed as this was definitely the kind of bar you have to get pissed in. By this I mean people were just not interested in being sociable even after several attempts to make conversation. It definitely wasn’t as friendly as the other bars we’ve been to. As there was no lemonade I was trying to come up with a concoction which meant I couldn’t taste the dryness of the gin but still had that bit of fizz to it, so I ordered gin and tonic with orange juice. I don’t know what you’re all thinking about this as a drink but I can safely say it’s awful. A drink that makes you wince every time you take a sip, not something I’ll be trying again…probably. The cool thing about this bar though was a dedicated wall of dollar bills stapled to it. All of the bills had been written on and signed and stuck up there over the years covering the whole wall. With my crude maths skills I worked out there was over $500 there. The woman behind the bar, when she managed to string a sentence together told me it started in 2004, and some people come back every year to write a new one and staple it over the original. Gem and I of course wanted a piece of this history even if it was in a terrible bar. We of course wrote something terribly Ood-inspired and well and truly left our mark. I think it said something along the lines of “where are all the lesbians?!”
The bar was busy now but by this point we had realised that “mixed” meant gay and black men. It was like combining Curzons with Deez, it was very unusual. It would have been cool, me loving the music and us both loving the gays but everyone in there were such miserable bastards that it just wasn’t fun anymore so we left to go and satisfy drunken munchie pains.
This was the part of the night we ate shit, took about a million photos of Gem posing against a Whataburger sign; (a fast food place that every time we saw the sigh we sang “What-a-burger, being's believing” to the tune of Flashdaces’ “What a feeling”) and then stumbled back to the Dodgy Inn, so I don’t need to go into detail. I’m sure it will all be documented on Facebook.



Day Five - Friday
27.03.09

5am we both awoke to horrendous thunder and lightning that was shaking our door at Horrid Inn and masses of rain pouring down. I barely remember it though as I completely fell back to sleep. Gem on the other hand was well and truly awake - aw the noise sensitive poor girl. Apparently it went on all night and looked like there were no signs of it letting up. The storm apparently was passing west to east and in the midst of passing us (we hoped.) But our next destination was New Orleans. We all know of the history there so we didn’t fancy going while they had flood evacuation warnings. Unfortunately due to all of this, we were stuck in Pensacola till Sunday to ride out the storm - brilliant. Like I said before this is a beach town so we are going to have to get creative for entertainment.

We knew we had to stay but we both knew there was no way in hell we would be staying at Shit Inn so we moved on over to the local cheap and cheerful, Motel 6. All we did that night was go to the cinema and watch “Push” - a very cool film, I would recommend. We just chilled out. I had the world’s smallest bath and wrote about a million postcards. They better get there!



Day Six - Saturday
28.03.09

Baring in mind the only reason we’re in Pensacola for SOOO long is because of the bloody weather so it’s just our luck that the sun is out! The plan is to go thrift shopping so we put Bluey to good use and found about ten in the area. We had gotten halfway through the list when it just seemed too silly that it was too hot and we weren’t sat around enjoying it. We decided to go back to the motel and hit the pool. We sat there for all of 20 minutes before the clouds arrived and we sat there like desperate Britons clawing to any glimmer of sunlight. I was putting my sunscreen on longer than I sat there. Never mind, it’s unlikely I’ll get brown anyway with my Mum’s genes in me - no offence Mum!
We decided to hit up our third cinema trip for the week and saw “He’s just not that into you” - chick flick with a difference. The last two times we had been to the movies was during the day. In the evening it’s a whole different experience. There was some women in there that were giving us sound effects and a running commentary, for example, when someone in the film cheated on his bird we heard “Oh no you did-unt!” Gem of course wanted to join in, in her own quintessentially English way and shouted “Kick him in the bollocks!” it was fun.
Tomorrow is Sunday, aka no rain day so we’re driving to New Orleans. It’s like a three hour drive. We both can’t wait, we both heard good things!


Day Seven - Sunday
29.03.09

As we have come to realise we should have left Gainesville and driven straight on through, passing Tallahassee and Pensacola completely. We had been given this piece of advice by a couple of Gem’s friends which we either foolishly forgot or didn’t listen to. New Orleans is a breath of fresh air.
Once we navigated ourselves through the horrendous one way system (which meant we were fucked if we missed our turning) we found our home for the next two nights - Bourbon House. The guy running it, Reese was what I can only describe as a massive stoner (you could barely understand what he was mumbling) but a really nice guy. It was a very cool hostel, modern inside with a really nice deck outside where you can sit and chill and also play pool! It was a real contradiction compared to the area it was in - it wasn’t rough outside but you could tell it wasn’t in an affluent area and we definitely wouldn’t be walking back at night. It was fine during the day though.
After being stuck in a motel for a few days we were dying to go out. It was only 12pm, we had already got a three hour drive behind us, but as soon as we got there we were out of the door straightaway with map in hand. We were on our way to the French quarter - THE place to be for food, bars, art, culture as well as many other touristy things. We were making our way down the street when we saw Tommy (as we later found out), a New Zealander also staying at our hostel. He was equally sticking out like a touristy sore thumb, probably even more than us as he was holding onto his map for dear life and scratching his head a lot. We figured we would be going to the same place so said hello and took him under our wing. I only sound so patronising as Tommy turned out to be so incredibly shy. He was nice enough but was pretty draining, us feeling as though we were entertaining him with our witty repartee. Anyway we found the French quarter and more specifically Bourbon St, the street where “it” is at. It was just off the corner of Camp and Canal St, which I thought was rather funny - please don’t say I need to explain why!
The town square was home to all of the hustle and bustle and was ultimately the tourist trap with a load of Sally Morgans dotted around - for anyone who is not my Mother, that means psychics. There was also loads of live music and street art so it was very cool - definitely the injection of energy we needed. We went for dinner at what turned out to be the most expensive restaurant ever, but that was okay as we hadn’t eaten all day. I wanted something typically New Orleanean, and nothing like a fucking Whataburger. I had jambalaya, bloody spicy but very very tasty - definitely something for the next black history.
We found the LGBT (the local lesbo info centre) to do some recon for later that night.
It was time to go back to the hostel to chill and general fuckeries before night activities. We met a fellow Brit called Gaz from Bradford, a lad’s lad waiting for his friends to come out and meet him. He was a laugh though and we sat drinking and chatting and playing pool - it was so much better compared to the week previous.
Around 11pm we decided to bust a move to el gay bar, Rubyfruit Jungle. Now, you might have a little déjà vu here as the barmaid at this pub told us that Sunday nights are dead and Monday nights the bar was closed! We plan everything so brilliantly. The barmaid was fit though so we had something to do. Gem later was vibing with her and bumming over drum kits so maybe the possibility for more fun there (har-he-har!)
We also met Britney - a lesbian who at the age of 22 had already been married and was in the process of getting a divorce - mad! She also had a massive tattoo of a triceratops on her torso - Hmmm lesbians! It was time to stumble back to the hostel and bumble around loudly getting ready for bed - we have become known as “those 4am girls.” But in a good way.

Till next week, kids.

:D

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Comments

[Anna seddon]

Lovely to read .. keep them coming ... my you girls do get up to some mad things A x