Road Trip II

There is nothing like a good road trip to occasionally feed that wanderlust born into freespirited independents. It helps keep the creative stuff coming and produces some great blog-fodder. As a testament to that fact, I have a 2005 Subaru with over 60,000 miles on it. My last good road trip was to New Orleans last year, where I encountered the Giant El Chick-amino of Lower Alabama, and saw Jon Banquer on his way to SolidWorks World. Memorable and heady stuff.

This trip was somewhat less romantic, and lacked that mythical Odyssey feeling of Ulysses battling Scilla and Charybdis. Nevertheless, wandering through the vast wastelands of Upstate New York was bound to produce a tale or two.

It starts on a personally tragic note. I was going to start the trek in Niagara Falls, NY to visit some family, including my great uncle. Unfortunately, he passed away just before I started out on my trip, so I was travelling to a funeral rather than a simple family visit.

As an independent contractor, portions of trips like this become tax deductible if you can show that you actually did some business while there. I realize it’s crass to talk about turning a relatives funeral into a tax deduction, but that’s how this one panned out. So, I contacted some friends and business acquaintances in the area and mentioned that I would be making a north east swing, and before I knew it, I had 2 paying customer visits and 2 friendly business associate visits all lined up, intermingled with personal and family visit time. Now you know why I don’t fly when I do things like this, because it would be impossible to schedule. Of course everything changes at the last minute too.

My first stop was in bustling Elbridge, NY. There are two motels in Elbridge, and one of them was full, so you know which one I got to stay in. Right. The other one. Visiting Elbridge was a reminder of exactly how much the rest of the world has changed in the last 60 years.

40 bucks! What a bargain! When was the last time you paid 40 bucks for a motel room? (on second thought, don’t answer that) I was given the key (yes, and actual metal key) to #6. It was one of those places where you sleep on top of the bed in your clothes. It had all the modern conveniences, like a rotary phone, a heater, and a color television. The old woman in the night gown at the front desk explained that I would have to use the dial on the TV set because some one had been taking their remotes. I didn’t bother to ask about wireless internet access.

The real test for me in a place like this is the bathroom. If you turn on the lights and nothing runs away, you can stay there. The only thing that ran away when I flicked the lights was me. Wow, that is a serious 1950s shade of whatever it is.

One of the things I guess I miss about Upstate New York is that it is always gray and rainy/snowy. I left Virginia in the bright sunshine, and somewhere after Binghamton it started getting cloudy. I’ve owned 5 vehicles that were gray or silver because I thought that was the color of the sky. Anyway, it was raining in NY, and I felt a little bit at home.

So the next day, feeling refreshed and secure in the future of humanity, I went to my appointment at a manufacturer of carbon fiber structures. A definite high tech contrast to the previous evening.

You’ve got to remember, this is Central New York State. This is the place where Edgar and his lovely wife (played by Siobhan Fallon who is actually from Syracuse and pronounced Edgar as “Egger”) lived before Edgar was taken over and worn as an “Edgar suit” by a giant interstellar cockroach in the movie Men In Black. Stuff like that happens there.

From there it was over to Orchard Park to meet with my friend who does a lot of work for Fisher-Price, and then on to Niagara Falls. Orchard Park is a trendy upscale bedroom community for the dwindling city of Buffalo. It is a stark contrast to the 1940s sheik of Niagara Falls. Huge chemical plants, power generation works, wedding chapels, and signs of the aging tourist trade here. Attending a funeral with scores of people I haven’t seen since the last funeral just seemed dismally appropriate here. My memories of this area and these people from so long ago are fond, but remind me again of the changes that have effected the rest of the world in the past several decades.

And now for the long, 8 hour drive from the extreme western corner of the state to the extreme north eastern corner. I travel this state more than Hillary! How Hillary ever came to be a New Yorker is beyond me. I wish she had gone back to Arkansas, but a great liberal state like NY was where she felt she had the best chance to get elected. My parents would like me to move back home, but quite honestly, I can’t afford the taxes. NY is 3X as expensive to live in as Virginia. The gas price in VA when I left was $2.94, and the next day in NY it was $3.35. Property tax is insane there, even in the rural expanses. There is no wonder that businesses are packing up and moving out. Thanks Hillary! From the time that you arrive in NY, if you listen to the radio, all you hear is advertisements for payday loans and bankruptcy attorneys. There are a lot of things I still love about this place, but there are also a lot of reasons why I could never move back.

It was early November, and in Western NY, that means that you could get instantly buried in snow at any moment. There was 4 inches on the ground in sections of Buffalo. I had to drive that dangerous gauntlet from Buffalo through Syracuse to Watertown, around the southern and eastern shores of Lake Ontario. Luckily I got through it without any of the dangerous lake effect snow that the area is so well known for.

And then it was on across the wilds of the Adirondack park, where nothing ever changes. If the rest of the state is stuck in the 1940s and 50s, the Adirondacks are stuck much earlier than that. I think that’s a good thing. The Adirondacks are a beautiful place, and I love going back there because it isn’t as over run by commercial insanity that infects every other place you go. If you want strip malls, go to Poughkeepsie, but keep the Adirondacks wild.

After a few days with my parents and Mozart, their miniature schnauzer, it was on to visit Rob Rodriguez. Rob was also being visited by Marlon Banta and another fellow from SolidWorks Corp to talk about Photoworks. I had wanted to spend time talking to Rob, but since these guys were there, we all went to lunch, along with Mindi, one of Rob’s co-workers. I don’t know what it is, but when ever I run into guys from SW I wind up giving them an earful. That really wasn’t my intention this time, but it still happened.

Adding to the comedy of finding SolidWorks employees outside of their natural habitat in the wilds of northern Vermont, Rob explained how it happened that he showed up to work that day with two different shoes on. This was the sort of absent minded stunt that I thought I was the only one who ever pulled stuff like this. It really is darker in the morning at this time of year in northern VT.

Well. That was an adventure. Rob’s company, Rock of Ages makes memorials and all sorts of things out of granite. Not surprisingly, they are located on the side of a granite mountain. Very impressive place, and not your typical SolidWorks using company.

The next stop was in a place called Walpole, New Hampshire for a consulting engagement. From there, I was supposed to head over the the Central MA/Northern CT SolidWorks user group meeting, but I was frankly worn out, and it would have added a day to the trip. I missed out, because they had an entire cast of characters including Jeff Ray, Jon Hirschtick, Scott Harris, Mark Biasotti, and Sal Lama.

So it was a long slog, but I love trips like this. It was good to get around and see friends and family. Maybe the best thing about a trip like this is that it makes coming home again a fresh and welcome experience.