Southfields, here I come!

Today started out inauspiciously: I awoke at 3:40 a.m. with a pain in my left side that was almost certainly a kidney stone. My reaction was what you'd expect: "Oh, shit! Not now, of all times!" I took a couple of Aleve pills, knowing that they are just about as effective against a kidney stone's pain as a thimble against a flood, but needing to do something. Then I lay in bed with my cat Marie stretched out against me, trying to figure out how I could rearrange my plans for this trip if I was laid up for a week. But lo! After about half an hour the pain gradually diminished, and I was able to get back to sleep. It must have been a really tiny stone. I'm hoping for no recurrence...at least in the next three weeks!

If you've read about last year's fall trip ("North to Maine"), you know that on that occasion, after a series of screwups, I arrived at my first day's destination five hours behind schedule. I was determined not to let that happen this year, and I pretty much succeeded. A carefully prepared checklist helped, as did taking a day off earlier in the week to get many of my chores out of the way so that I wouldn't be doing them in a last-minute rush.

Around 1:00 p.m. I checked off the last item ("SHUT OFF TOILET"*) and said goodbye to my cat, Marie. I'm really going to miss her for the next three weeks! But she's 16 years old and used to living in my apartment...a trip of this length would be too much for her. My friend Carol will be stopping by to take care of her, so Marie will be fine...it's just that I'll be without her for a long time, and she's a good companion.

I headed out the door with the last few items that hadn't been loaded yesterday. I keep Gertie well stocked with nonperishable food and clothes for all seasons—I like to be able to take off on a whim without making a big deal of it—so there wasn't really that much packing to do. Gertie started right up, and I headed to the Shoprite to fill the fridge, which I'd precooled that morning. I loaded up on fresh vegetables and fruit juices, and added a couple of bottles of salad dressing to go with the pasta salad I'd made this morning and brought with me. Pasta salad, as you may know from my previous journals, is my favorite traveling food. It's tasty, colorful, and is ready to eat anytime. One big batch is good for about a week; typically I'll add some new items each day so that it's never the same salad twice. I make it with at least as many vegetables as pasta, so it's really quite nutritious.

The supermarket was a zoo, so shopping took me longer than expected. After loading the groceries into Gertie's cabinets (the new pantry closet sure comes in handy!) and fridge, I headed up the New Jersey Turnpike and then the Garden State Parkway toward the New York borderline. Just over the line, past the little towns of Sloatsburg and Tuxedo Park, Rick Farmer lives in a condo development up in the rugged hills of Southfields.

Rick is an old friend of mine from the company where I work; he came to us as a computer support tech in the early Nineties fresh out of the Navy, where he was a submariner or "squid." He didn't know a lot about computers when he started, but he soaked up knowledge like a sponge, and with a little coaching from me he was soon one of the more knowledgeable people we had. We had lots of common interests—subs, Macs and animation, to name a few—and got to be good friends. When Rick left after a few years to pursue more ambitious goals, we stayed in touch...and now, many years and (for him) many jobs later, he's one of my best friends and one of the smartest people I know.

When I pulled into Rick's parking lot I was met by Taylor and Jessica, the daughters of Rick's downstairs neighbors. "Hi, Andy! We remember you! Can we look inside your motorhome?" Since I had refused them the last time I had Gertie here, I felt they deserved a chance...so I let them clamber through Gertie and try out the"upstairs bedroom" while I showed Rick the improvements I'd made in the past year.

Lying on the overcab bed, Taylor spotted the clock on the bedroom ceiling and reported "There's something wrong with your clock!" "Oh? What's that?" "It says 16:40." "Well, gee..." (showing her my wristwatch) "...my watch says 16:40, so the clock must be right." "But that's impossible! There's no such time as 16:40!" I grinned and said "Oh, yes, there is!" to which Rick added "Ask your father." Taylor made a face, but within five minutes she had figured it out for herself. "You don't start over at twelve, right? You go on counting...so sixteen would be the same as...four p.m." Smart kid!

Rick's wife Edith is down in Disneyworld, so it was just the two of us for dinner. Rick is pretty much strictly a meat-and potatoes man, but he had prepared chicken in my honor—an excellent breaded version with large helpings of fried potatoes and onions on the side. We ate this tasty meal off black china plates with a subtle Mickey Mouse ears motif as a border, using silverware with the famous Mouse silhouette cut out of the handles, while I admired his Mickey Mouse toaster. (It produces the mouse silhouette on your toast and plays the Mickey Mouse Club theme song when the toast pops up.) Rick is a serious Disney fan. ;-)

As we ate, he filled me in on the house in Clifton he and Edith are about to buy. Their condo apartment in Southfields is lovely, and the rugged hills make a great view...but with a son expected in November and both Rick and Edith planning to work at home, they need more room than a two-bedroom condo can offer. They were very lucky to find an affordable place only a few blocks from where Edith grew up, and luckier still to sell their present place for triple what Rick paid for it only four years ago. So they're hoping to move in a month or two—before Edith delivers!

A chocolate pudding in a flaky piecrust made a surprisingly sumptuous dessert. We sat up late talking about politics, the prospects for war, the latest animated films, and Rick's honeymoon trip to Australia. Rick showed me his didgeridoo, a strikingly handsome instrument—nothing like the usual tourist dreck—and with a wonderfully resonant bass tone. The shopkeeper who helped Rick pick it out from a storeful of didgeridoos also taught him to play it, and Rick was happy to demonstrate.

Rick gave me a commemorative boomerang imprinted with "Rick and Edith - November 3rd, 2001"—surely the most unusual wedding favors I've heard of! As it happens, I know how to throw one of these, having read about it in "Popular Science" magazine (of all places) when I was a boy. This is no cheap trinket, either—it's a Bhingi, one of the older and more respected brands.

By ten o'clock I was running out of energy, so after promising to meet for breakfast tomorrow we retired—Rick to bed and I to Gertie. The weather is still warm and very humid, and tomorrow promises rain and thunderstorms all the way form here to Ithaca—my next stop.

* My friend and coworker Doug went on vacation last year for two weeks. Shortly after he left, his toilet tank cracked and the toilet ran and ran and ran. He and his family came home to a literal wall of water: the whole house was flooded, in some rooms to a depth of two feet. And there was a notice in his mailbox from the insurance company telling him his policy had been cancelled (due to a clerical error). It all worked out in the end, and the repairs are just about finished, but you can imagine the stress and the financial losses! Since hearing this story, I've been careful to shut off my toilet when going away for more than a day.