b & b

I am staying at my first ever Bed and Breakfast. I have been to some prior in my youth. My parents friends actually owned one on the corner of some busy road in Klamath and it was painted a salmon color. Hideous color but apparently effective as it sprung immediately back to my mind. I have also had dinner prior in a place in Jacksonville but didn’t stay the night.
In my mind B & B’s credit their origin to Vermont. I am not sure where I got this idea; it may go hand in hand with my thoughts of all Connecticut houses built on cul da sacs with Volvos parked in the drive way. Skewed misconception of the opposite coasts. Anyway this room, this house, this street, this town, this state…all off the charts!
Here’s how I wound up here on a blissful Saturday. Carol was raised as a Navy brat and moved to ten different states and visited majority of them during her youth. I think a couple of more may have been added on with our “family road trips” from younger years. Here’s how our 1300 miles in four days would go. Dad driving, Carol in the front seat, and me in the back probably asking tons of questions as the hours stretched on. My dad was a long haul trucker previous to retirement and a taxi driver in his younger years. For some reason he considered us, his family, a shipment that needed to get to the end point as soon as possible. There was no stopping to look at something along the way and we only made a few rest stops. I learned very fast to pee when you could because if it wasn’t around the time to get gas, you weren’t going. If something of interest, say the Redwoods were on the wrong side of the road then we couldn’t stop. Sadly I have become this driver. “No we are not stopping, you should have gone pee before we left.” Another road trip with my grandparents was destined for Crater Lake. A little back-story on this one. My grandma, total pain in the ass, back seat driver, yadda yadda. My dad told her finally to shut the hell up or he was turning the car around. And I’ll be damned if he didn’t turn around not more than five miles before getting there. The result of this is that I didn’t see this natural wonder of the world until I was 25. Shortly there after I cut myself out of the family road trips for fear of a kidney stone.
I think Carol got NY in when I moved there and then there were two standing in her way of completion, Hawaii and Vermont. Hawaii I can understand, it’s way the hell out there but Vermont? How did you not get that? It’s right next door to New Hampshire and New York! Well she checked off Hawaii in style last month and I thought it only fair to make her puzzle complete.
We flew in this morning, rented a car and set off to Ben and Jerry’s (my want) we hit some place which made apple cider donuts, then had lunch at the Trapp family lodge (yes those singing Austrians made there way over here), tried 20 different cheeses, and some Green Mountain coffee. After that we checked in to our cozy B & B and I convinced her to walk around town and then down to watch the sunset over the frozen Lake Champlain.
It’s been a long ass day and I am dying to go to sleep but the romance of this B & B is keeping me awake as I want to take it all in. What’s funny is that I am writing out in the hallway on a couch and every single guest has walked by and said hello. Good stuff up here, I highly recommend.


Jackass moment of the day
Carol and I sat down to enjoy a freshly made apple cider donut and a coffee. The tablecloth was made of vinyl checks reminiscent to a picnic table. Upon the table was a cloth checkerboard complete with red and black discs. A couple walked over to our table and gave us a tilt of the head. I motioned for them to join us and told the guy, “sit down and I can wonp your ass in checkers!” He didn’t respond so I just shrugged it off and returned to my donut. He and his partner ended up being deaf. I felt a little ashamed for not knowing but it makes sense of why he didn't he didn't take me up on my challenge!