Episode 7 - CB's, Swamps, & Asian Road Food
We are now halfway through our six “memory lane” retro reports. For those of you keeping score, at the close of the previous episode, I had managed to squeeze in a 1 day trip to the Magic Kingdom during each of the preceding three summers.
I was now a junior in high school and still gainfully employed at the commissary. I had already decided that I was going to save up for another romp to Orlando, but this time I was going to find a way to be there three days. In addition to my regular rambling through the Magic Kingdom, I was intent on spending a day at Epcot Center and a day at the Disney MGM Studios.
The only problem with my master plan was logistics. They don’t exactly rent cars or hotel rooms to 16 year olds, and I was pretty sure that no amount of smooth talking would convince my mom to give me the thumbs up to spend three days in Orlando solo.
By the way, I now know for sure that mom is reading these little rants of mine as she called me a couple of nights ago to give me a hard time about my solo day in episode 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42. I’m sad to say that she wasn’t all that surprised though. I was never an openly rebellious teen. My method of rule breaking was to seek out a loophole. (To all of you with the quiet, well mannered teenagers at home...if you ONLY knew.)
The best strategy that I was able to come up with for accomplishing my three park master plan was to try to convince Uncle Steve and Aunt Judy to spend three days at the World. I wasn’t sure how I was going to do this, but I had all year to work out the details. My first order of business was securing transportation.
My mom was aware of my plans, but always had an excuse as to why I should not purchase my airline ticket. (Better fares after New Years, scheduling issues, El Nino, what have you.) Finally as part of our Christmas celebrations, my parents informed us (Lynnlee, Karlee, and myself) that we would be spending FIVE WHOLE DAYS in Orlando that coming summer.
I was happier than a hound dog in a rabbit hutch. (Which I gotta tell you is pretty dang happy.) We would be staying off-site in Kissimmee, and heading to the parks on four out of the five days we were there. What’s more, we would also be joined by my grandparents, Uncle Steve and Aunt Judy, Uncle Randy and Aunt Jana, and my grandfather’s brother and some of his children and grandkids. It was a grand gathering before grand gatherings were cool! Yet as exciting as all this was, I was even more elated to find that my best friend Pete was invited to join us as well!
I don’t believe it is possible to fully express the anticipation I felt for that trip. It was while planning our itinerary that I located and purchased my first copy of Birnbaum’s Official Guide to Walt Disney World (Expert Advice from the Inside Source don’cha know?). Also, as an official driver on our quest, I had to get up to par on driving and (mostly) parking my parents’ conversion van.
(My normal ride at the time was a vehicle I lovingly referred to as the Dragon Wagon. It was a 1978 Malibu station wagon that had 300,000+ miles on it. It had a V8 engine and produced so much torque, the entire frame shook when you revved the engine. I actually beat an ‘84 Mustang in a race once with that thing...at least I would have…if my mom allowed me to race at that age...which she didn’t.)
ANYWHO as the “official” park planner for the family, the preparations for our excursion were quite extensive, and I fully blame them for that semester’s performance in Algebra II. (I did NOT inherit my dad’s math gene, and no he wasn’t my teacher. Although I DID have my mom once as a math teacher in junior high which was just plain weird. It was also the only year she EVER taught math so I guess I did her in.)
The day we left, I went to work, and my mom and sisters went shopping. The purpose being, that my dad needed to be alone at the house to sleep. Pretty much every vacation we ever took was begun at night. My dad LOVED to travel at night. (In fact, my dad STILL loves to travel at night.) He would load the van in the morning, take an afternoon nap, and we’d head out around 7:00 PM. Then, we’d drive all night long, and while everyone else slept on the nifty bed thingy in the back of the conversion van, my Dad would indulge in his favorite travel activity: talking to truckers on his CB radio.
It was during these road trips that I learned such phrases as “Smoky in a plain brown wrapper at marker 143.” and “East-bound’s clear to the state line.” There were lots of other phrases I learned while listening to the truckers, but I wasn’t allowed to repeat them.
A hearty portion of the departure preparation for this particular trip was centered on the travel menu. My parents preferred snacking in the car and stopping at rest areas, as opposed to stopping at restaurants. To this end, we always packed a cooler full of goodies. For this particular journey, my mom whipped up a mess of fried chicken, gathered sandwich fixings, threw in some oatmeal cream pies, and stocked up on Shasta.
My own contribution to the journey was to prepare two pounds of my top secret, follow-me-to-grave-recipe, granny-smacking-good, homemade beef jerky. (This, between two teenage boys, lasted about a mile and a half.) Pete’s mom is from Korea so she sent along some homemade crab cakes (nothing like the American version and oh SOOOOOO yummy). She also sent along a large batch of Yakimandu. These too only lasted about a mile and a half.
Finally we had the staple road food of each and every one of my remembered childhood trips...Chicken in a Biskit crackers.
(No, it had nothing to do with the choosing of my screen name.) We never really kept them at home but we ALWAYS had them when we traveled.
I have often wondered just exactly how they get the chicken into the biscuit. After all, we’ve been shown multiple television commercials which illustrate how they get the cheese into Cheese Nips, yet we are left in the dark on this particular process.
Having spent significant time pondering this quandary, I believe I have hit upon a probable conclusion. First, the chickens are required to lay an egg which is set aside for later. The unaware poultry are then fitted with magnetic rollerblades and loaded onto a ramp. They are then given a gentle push down said ramp, which itself is lined with electro-magnets. Once the birds get going, these magnets are then activated. Interacting with the rollerblades, they propel the chickens forward at an extreme velocity. (I.E. the Rockin Rollercoaster)
At the bottom of the ramp, the rollerblades catch in a locking mechanism, releasing from the chicken’s legs, and propelling the birds through the air. The extreme velocity change overcomes the poor beasts and they are thusly “dispatched”. Each carcass then crashes through a duct tape barrier that strips off the feathers which are then sold to Trading Spaces as decorative wall decor.
The now naked and dearly departed chickens then land in a hopper where they are fed through a “processing machine” which was created out of a concrete mixer and parts from a 1968 Ford Fairlane. After being fully adulterated, the meat is then cooked, dried, and ground into a powder.
Finally, the chicken remains are dumped into a pile of flour, combined with the eggs which have been saved from before, and baked into the square and tasty treat I know and love.
I seem to have gone off on a tangent...better bring the ship back on course before Auto takes my plant.
We set out around mid-evening and our traveling party consisted of myself, my best friend Pete, sister Lynnlee and sister Karlee (as in siblings, not nuns), and finally my parental units. After much eating had ensued, many chapters of Anne McCaffery & Terry Brooks had been read, and several games of Spades had been played, I was finally tapped to take over the piloting duties.
Feeling like a bomber pilot about to set out on a crucial mission, I got strapped in, completed the requisite “radio check,” and set a course east. Little did I know that shortly afterwards, I would find myself driving a ridiculously large conversion van on one of the longest bridges in America (over 18 miles long to be exact), through the heart of a Louisiana swamp, in the middle of monsoon-like rainstorm.
I could barely see 10 feet in front of me. There was not a way to pull over and change drivers, and the only way off the bridge was to either keep going or to plunge to our deaths into gator-infested waters. I lost three years of my life that night, and those passengers who were awake for the ordeal no doubt lost twelve.
Yet by the grace of the Almighty, we made it across the bridge and arrived unscathed in Florida around dinner time the next evening. Our first order of business upon our arrival in Lakeland was to head straight to Krystal burgers. (If you’ve never heard of the place, think southern White Castle.) At the time, we didn’t have one in our neck of the woods, and it was one of my favorite spots to stop when traveling to Florida,
We ordered up 60 cheeseburgers and brought them to Aunt Judy & Uncle Steve’s house to split among the kinfolk. As it turned out, they had eaten earlier and so we had a lot of burgers to go through. (Pre-cell phone days were fun weren’t they?)
Not wishing to allow good food to go to waste, Pete and I ate 34 of the 60 between us over the course of about 3 hours. For you ZZUB fans who’ve ever wondered how to induce a number 4 without actually visiting the Japan pavilion, let me just tell you that eating 17 Krystal cheeseburgers will get you as close as you ever want to be. TRUST me on this one.
After all the rejoicing, hugging, reminiscing and other requisite family rituals, we stayed up playing games and getting our land legs back from our 22-some-odd hours of voyaging in the van-boat of doom. We finally crashed on our living room floor pallets at some point in the wee hours of the morning and slept like logs; blissfully unaware that the threat we encountered the night before would soon be stalking us again.
Coming up on Episode 8 - A Near-Death Experience and learning to pronounce Kissimmee
and prayers for your family and the others affected by the layoff.
apparently - you have lots of company...unfortunately.
) At any rate, it was fun to stay on property and to get the full experience. Of course, there were still only 2 parks at that point. And I'd say that trip was as hot as this one was for you. It was the first week of September, so pretty close to August. We, too spent mucho hours ducking into whatever air conditioned attractions we could find. That may be my only trip to Epcot in which I saw EVERY country's movie. Hey, when you're hot you're hot 
I've enjoyed your witty banter on Mel's TRs, so when I saw your name pop up in the TR boards, I had to give it a looksy.
I love me some fine writing and engaging storytelling, and you, sir, have got that goin' on! Really - I'm loving this so far and I'm in for the entirety. 
I had a CB radio in my room. I used to love talking to truckers (and learning all sorts of cool things to say 
I just found your Journey through memory lane today and I am loving it. Subscribing. Can't wait to read more
) is the HR director of a local plant and the last year has been a nightmare for her. She is currently working week to week while everyone else is on mandatory leave. What a mess.
And Moon Pies.
I can't imagine. 
I think it's just a regional thing--Krystal's is really popular in TN and I can honestly say they have never given me heartburn! probably built up a tolerance over the years.
