The Last Captain

[Greg]

I spent the week worrying and buying more crap.

It's a tremendous case of CYA. Maybe I have incipient incompetence but it seems on every interview something has gone horribly wrong. During the second interview, I spent twenty minutes with what I thought was a faulty microphone cable only to find out it was because I didn't hit one of the switches on the recorder to power the cables. Twice now the video recorders have died for no apparent reason. It happened during the Iszak interview. I managed a work around using AC power instead of  batteries. When I tried to recreate the problem at home during the week, the video recorder worked fine for hours.

One of HK's digs at me is that I am constantly changing batteries. Which is true, but in my defense a camera sucks a lot of juice on those little batteries. I tried to find an AC work around for them, too,which I did find, but then I'm dealing with another set of electrical cords snaking around my feet. 

And you know what happens when a power cord gets next to a microphone cord? It creates this really lovely hum that trashes the recording. Decisions, decisions.

So, now, I make sure my camera batteries are fully hot before we start the interview. Same goes for the batteries for the Video recorders. But the camera batteries are still going to die an hour into the shoot. The big video recorder batteries I bought seemed to last a long time, except for when they didn't work at all. It's madness, I tell you.

I thought I had lost two of the camera batteries so I bought more. As soon as I hit the send button for the purchase and the overnight delivery, the missing batteries turned up. I am cornering the market on batteries.

My missing camera battery charger also turned up. This just reinforces the policy of always putting things back in the same place from where you got them from. When I opened the pouch and saw the missing charger, I immediately remembered shoving it in there in my rush to get out of the location.

My dad has been very vocal about how afraid he is about me and my dangerous trip across the country by myself with all this gear. He was so worried that he was going to volunteer to ride shotgun on the trip. Thankfully, he resisted the urge to offer. Not that I would have taken him up on the offer in a million years. That man goes to the bathroom more than I do and I go a lot. It would have taken us weeks just to get on 280. My father was also asking my sister to see if she wanted to join me.

When I first thought about this trip, I didn't give danger a second thought. I would hop in the rental van and cruise to New York. But now my Dad has got me all twitchy. I bought locks and cables at Home Depot so I could lock the bags in the back of the van. I also bought a cart so I could roll the gear to and from my hotel room every night.

I picked up my lovely Toyota Sienna Mini Van from the Double Tree in downtown Los Angeles. The Double Tree is in a great neighborhood. I made Cindi leave before too many drug abusers congregated around her car. The van is nice. The guy renting it was only twenty minutes late. He raced through the check out procedure and gave me the van with only a quarter tank of gas. When he told me this, I asked him what was I supposed to do with a quarter tank of gas if I was heading out on a big trip right away, especially in rush hour traffic? He just brushed me off.

There is also a lovely cigarette burn hole right in the center of the driver's seat. This van is ready to be sent to the big car graveyard in the sky. The car is a year old and it already has 35000 miles on it.  But it drove home okay and it has an audio jack for me to plug in my phone so I can listen to bad podcasts and Hungarian lessons.

I made the decision to leave one of the mini-van seats at home. This got me a few stares from the dogs and the Queen as I dragged the offending seat to it's new home in my office.

I have way too much gear. I have six big bags and a mountain of little pieces like tripods and a boom pole. Plus, there is clothes and food. One of the big fears is putting on a hundred pounds of weight on this trip because I don't exercise and I eat out every day. So far that is right on the money.

The first leg of the trip has taken me to lovely Tuscon. It took me about seven hours to get here, because the base speed limit in Arizona is 75. Good times, people.

I'm staying at the lovely Best Western Royal Sun Inn and Suites. It is not in a nice section of town. Or maybe my father's fears are getting to me. I walked in the 100+ heat to a restaurant and I walked by a lot of homeless people. I can't imagine living on the street, but the fact that it is hotter than the sun outside can only up the order of misery. Most of the shops I passed sold medical marijaunna or did tattooing. My kind of town, right?

I ate at Lindy's on 4th. They had one of those meal challenges were if you ate this eight pound hamburger concoction in under twenty minutes, your meal was free. In this day and age, the thought of gorging on food as sport repels me. Yet, there is TV show that celebrates it and I wouldn't be surprised if Lindy's was on one of their episodes.

And yes, I was the crazy one walking in the heat to and from the restaurant. But I knew I had made it to the South when my waitress asked me I wanted a To Go Cup of Iced Tea to take with me. Does a bear shit in the woods? Probably not in this heat. The point is the nice lady gave a free iced tea to go.

Tomorrow, I drive to Midlands. For some reason, I blame the guy doing the planning, my trip is two hours longer than today's trip. Plus, once I sweep into Texas, I set my clock forward two hours.

On a planning note, that I don't think is my fault, I've run into a conundrum regarding the HK pick up. I got it into my head it would be simpler, if I just picked up HK a couple days into the journey and made him fly home at the end of the interview portion. I'm not exactly sure why I did this arrangement. I think it does save us a few bucks. Plus, I don't think I wanted to be in the Car with HK for twenty two days. That might have put a bit too much strange on the partnership.

I told him I would pick him up at the Dallas Fort Worth Airport since that was on the way from Midlands to Shreveport and was the closest major airport to Shreveport or so I gathered. HK made the arrangements and gave me the time for pick-up.

Now, I was hoping that HK could just drop by the Hertz desk and add his name to contract, so I wouldn't have to go into the airport proper. No such luck. Hertz wants to see me, HK, and the contract all at the same time. I was trying to get the logic of it, but the guy at the Double Tree couldn't give me a satisfactory explanation. Something about drug deals and slipping over the border into Mexico.

I went online to find out where the closest rental counter was to the Southwest arrivals gate. Much to my surprise, I found no mention of Southwest Airlines at DFW International. Ques? I tried multiple searches and came up blank. Oh, look, it's my old friend worry come to pay a visit.

I went to the Southwest web page and determined that when SWA flies into Dallas, they end up at Love Field. That's a different airport all together. Either HK has given me the wrong airline or the wrong airport. Hopefully, my lack of knowledge will be rectified in the near future.

So, I'm staying at the Best Western, listening to the AC run and smelling things growing in the shower. But it's a nice room. The pool is right outside my door. My plan to use the treadmill was derailed by the lack of AC in the fitness room. The one jarring item in this idyllic picture is the fact that as an amenity they have left ear plugs in my room. Two sets. What are they trying to tell me? Are the walls paper thin? Is the neighborhood gunfire that loud? Although, after the last couple of weeks in Montecito Heights, I'm pretty well accustomed to loud explosions at night. I guess I will find out at as the evening progresses. 

Maybe I'll go check out the Karaoke in the hotel lounge. Maybe I'll continue to quiz myself on what I forgot to bring. Maybe I'll keep peaking out the window to check on the car.