Yesterday, I got up at 2am and drove to San Francisco via a side stop in LAX to pick up the Small Child. Which is pretty much like getting up and driving non-stop to Sydney, but putting a massive stressful big spaghetti junction of highways somewhere around Coffs Harbour which was really difficult to navigate and on which everyone was speeding. Now this in itself mightn’t be so bad… but we went to a show the night before which ran from 10pm to midnight.
By the time we got back to our hotel, finalized the packing we started earlier and had a shower, it meant that I was going to bed at 12:50am and setting an alarm for 1:45am hoping for a cat nap well any type of fucking nap really.
No such luck. Just lay there waiting for the alarm to go off. Hit the road in full darkness and headed out of Las Vegas. Unbelievable how much traffic was on the highway all the was to LA given it was 2am on a Saturday morning. Managed to pick up the Not So Small Child without incident after a 4.bit hour drive, and set Sondra to take us to San Francisco.
After much more white knuckled swearing and cursing at the freeway system we eventually popped out of the city and were speeding through agricultural countryside going north. By now it was about 8am, and I was starting to get tired. So I’m having a Red Bull for breakfast (fuck that shit tastes foul), and trying to stay awake knowing there’s about 4-5 hours more driving ahead.
The countryside was so dry and arid it’s amazing anything was growing there at all. Every now and again you’d go through a green section near an irrigation channel that was obviously getting access to water. But every few kilometers or so, I was seeing signs that said ‘Say No to Congress Created Dust Bowl!’ And I have no real idea about but could make a pretty good guess. Nonetheless about 40% of vehicles on this highest were carrying produce – tomatoes, lemons, onions, rock melons and so on. None of which is overly exciting as you’re hurtling along with two sleeping passengers.
So I’m driving with Adele for company and slowly but surely turning that music volume up and up (frog in a boiling pot style) to keep me awake but not disturb them sleeping. I was turning the air con up much higher than needed and kept flicking the vents so one side of me would get really cold and then the other. I was shuffling in my seat and constantly pfaffing with the cruise control to keep my mind alert. But my most effective tool in keeping awake on this ridiculously long and solitary drive was turning my head.
Now I’m pretty sure this won’t work for everyone but I’d been in Vegas on too soft beds for four nights and no access to heat packs so my back pain was in full gear before I even left. My neck and shoulder muscles were as stiff and sore as if I’d spent the week painting the house, not playing tourist in one of the worlds biggest playgrounds. So I was at the point where turning my head in any direction, putting my chin down towards my chest, looking left of right, leaning it over towards my shoulders – any movement really – was causing sharp pain. Which meant whenever I felt myself getting drowsy all I had to do was lean my head over and I had sharp pain jolt me alert again. :S
If I felt really bad, I used my air con frozen hands and just poked myself in the neck or shoulder muscles a bit and ow, ow, ow, fuckity ow, I was wide awake again. We made it safely to San Francisco… but I one big mess of absolutely shattered right now.