Itinerant Air-Cooled Greetings From Atlanta
Posted: Mon Aug 26, 2013 2:08 pm
Well, truth be told, I am missing the west. Still, this sight on I-20 eastbound has always given me a little jolt, Atlanta, Georgia, Under The Southern Summer Sky:
Chloe, as ever, just trundles along in the right lane at 57 - 60 mph, past city skylines one after another, through sandy deserts to scrub brushy rockscapes along meadowy fields over tree-clogged lanes to vine-festooned tropical lushlands, we are at mechanical homeostasis. Haven't touched the breaker points since, oh I don't know, I think it was last year, the last timing adjustment was a little rap on the vacuum advance can as I slowly came down off the mid-continent plateau after the Curtis4085 appointment, and this engine has spent hour upon hour spinning along back in that engine compartment, sitting there looking the same as ever when I check the oil, I added some once. With the odometer error at .81 recorded for every mile, the odometer now says 22,100 miles, that is 11,500 recorded miles since I left Pensacola back in May, but the real mileage on this itinerary is 14,197, so far.
What an unassuming little trouper this car is, parked alongside any number of blingy Suburbans and Rams and Expeditions and Land Rovers, you wouldn't guess that thing has eaten up the roads of this country and half the dirt paths too. Just yesterday morning, an amorous Alabama couple came up around the bend and stared dumbfounded at my bus while I color-sanded the rockers . . . the trail up was so badly eroded from torrential rains that the gate at the bottom had been knocked sideways, and the tire ruts were a good two feet deep.
"How did you GET up here?", the guy asked.
"Drove around the gate."
"But how did you GET here?"
"Avoided the trenches, lucky I guess."
"We was just going up for a . . . picnic."
"Sure, bugs are pretty bad though."
"Yeah, we live around here, figured as much."
They went up the overgrown hill for about five minutes, when I heard her coming back down.
"No WAY, stupid bugs there's a SPIDER WEB, eww eww eww . . . "
Visiting zabo + clutch in an hour if the traffic will allow. See, here in Atlanta, I do a Google Search for Atlanta Traffic and see that I-20 eastbound is red red red. Construction. Closed every lane but one.
Welcome to the New South, same as Ol' L.A.
Colin
Chloe, as ever, just trundles along in the right lane at 57 - 60 mph, past city skylines one after another, through sandy deserts to scrub brushy rockscapes along meadowy fields over tree-clogged lanes to vine-festooned tropical lushlands, we are at mechanical homeostasis. Haven't touched the breaker points since, oh I don't know, I think it was last year, the last timing adjustment was a little rap on the vacuum advance can as I slowly came down off the mid-continent plateau after the Curtis4085 appointment, and this engine has spent hour upon hour spinning along back in that engine compartment, sitting there looking the same as ever when I check the oil, I added some once. With the odometer error at .81 recorded for every mile, the odometer now says 22,100 miles, that is 11,500 recorded miles since I left Pensacola back in May, but the real mileage on this itinerary is 14,197, so far.
What an unassuming little trouper this car is, parked alongside any number of blingy Suburbans and Rams and Expeditions and Land Rovers, you wouldn't guess that thing has eaten up the roads of this country and half the dirt paths too. Just yesterday morning, an amorous Alabama couple came up around the bend and stared dumbfounded at my bus while I color-sanded the rockers . . . the trail up was so badly eroded from torrential rains that the gate at the bottom had been knocked sideways, and the tire ruts were a good two feet deep.
"How did you GET up here?", the guy asked.
"Drove around the gate."
"But how did you GET here?"
"Avoided the trenches, lucky I guess."
"We was just going up for a . . . picnic."
"Sure, bugs are pretty bad though."
"Yeah, we live around here, figured as much."
They went up the overgrown hill for about five minutes, when I heard her coming back down.
"No WAY, stupid bugs there's a SPIDER WEB, eww eww eww . . . "
Visiting zabo + clutch in an hour if the traffic will allow. See, here in Atlanta, I do a Google Search for Atlanta Traffic and see that I-20 eastbound is red red red. Construction. Closed every lane but one.
Welcome to the New South, same as Ol' L.A.
Colin