Date: Wed, 10 Nov 1999 02:11:34 -0600 From: "Rich Limacher" THE UNLIKELY ADVENTURE OF KITSCHME SIOUXME AT THE SUPERIOR TRAIL 100 Part 8 "You COULD Be a Redneck if"... ALL Your Possessions on Earth Fit in Two Tupperware Tubs "Sonnyboy Schultz said, 'Lean Runnin' Machine, Where do you want I should put all these things? I've got every kind of gear What's ever been seen, And duct tape if it tears To fix it up clean.' Lean said, 'Well, I guess there's just one thing that can be done: Set it all out on Highway 61.'" --Kitschme Siouxme (With Apologies to Bob Dylan) We're sittin' in the Northwinds Cafe in northern Minnesota and we're famished. Our tongues are on the table lapping up washrag plankton. Our fingernails are digging for residue between the tabletop edge and the chrome molding. Our teeth are stabbing for granules between the pepper shaker holes. One guy is emptying salt packets into his wide open jaws. I'm sitting there trying to absorb nourishment by osmosis. Next to me is Medium-Sized-Running-Little-Bare with ketchup on her jeans. My knee is rubbing her leg. We're hoping a waitress spots us soon. Like maybe sometime before the Apocalypse. I ask Little Bare if she'd be willing to split the speck stuck between her two front teeth and this reminds her of something. "Hey!" she wails and gnashes her teeth. "I don't have a toothbrush!" "Won't need it," says another runner across from us. "You generally brush AFTER you eat, but tonight you won't have to. You're not gonna eat." Our little party of Rough-It-and-Do-Without Riders had joined another group of starving ultrarunners and we all found ourselves seats at a long table in a forgotten wing of the restaurant. The last time food was set on this table Andy Jackson was President. And he was eatin' it! "Just the same," Little Bare continued her chime, "I'm still gonna want to brush in the morning." "You mean in the middle of the night," I corrected. "That too," she said. "I think there's a grocery next door. I'll just run over an' be right back. Don't go away!" "Don't worry," someone else says. "When you find us again, our skeletons will still be draped across the chairbacks." "Hey!" I holler after her. "You goin' to the grocery store? Bring back some groceries!!" I had started my wristwatch stopwatch function--out of habit I suppose--the minute we had all sat down to enjoy the pre-race pasta banquet at the restaurant across the street from the pre-race pasta banquet, at which there wasn't any food. So now we were sitting there, famished, passed out, tongues flopping, tonsils cobwebbed, teeth too weak to chatter for, oh, let's see...about one hour, twenty-six minutes, and seventeen seconds. And then a waitress shows up. "I'l be right with you!" she sings. And disappears. Little Bare comes back. She has a Hershey bar and an Oral B toothbrush. En masse we all jump her for the Hershey. "HEY!!! Behave yourselves!!! I'll give ya some--IF you just ASK NICELY for it!" One. Two. Three. All the guys at once: "CAN WE PUHLEEEEZE HAVE SOME OF YOUR HERSHEY BAR, BABY???" The waitress comes back. "Have y'all decided, or do you need a few more minutes?" One. Two. Three. Everybody all together this time: "BRING US SPAGHETTI! ALL WE CAN EEEEEEEEEAT!!!!!" "We just ran out," she says. "But they went to the store and now they're cookin' up some more of it. It'll just be a few more minutes." One. Two. Thr... "AAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH!!!" ============================================= When the first noodle appeared and almost hit the table but was intercepted by a half-dozen flapping fins and sets of razor-sharp teeth, I checked my watch. We had been sitting in a restaurant, resting, to be sure, but NOT eating for over two hours and eight minutes already and most of us were planning on getting up at three o'clock in the morning. The race starts at five. It was now about 9:00 P.M. We were all reduced to savages. All street-fighting men (and of course ladies too). We had become what polite society has always abhorred: hunger-crazed food addicts. If Schultzie had only had his papa's shotgun, there'd have been an incident. Maybe none of us would've started the race. We'd've all been imprisoned. Or cold dead on the cafe floor in a pool of vegetarian spaghetti sauce--WHICH TOOK AN EXTRA TWENTY MINUTES TO COOK!!! Finally, when the remaining noodles hit the table, I again checked my watch. They were vaporized in twelve-and-one-half seconds. "Waitress!" We guys all hollered. "Bring us another round of Ragu!" "Innkeeper!" Some wiseguy piped up (probably me). "Wine and fresh horses for the men!!" Finally, when the last noodle was not cared enough about to be allowed to hit the floor, I again checked my watch. "Hey! We gotta get otta here!" I said. "I gotta get some sleep!" "We're with you!" everybody chimed in. "Last guy out pay the waitress!" And everybody vanished. (Actually, I think we all just dumped our change on the table and beat hell for the door because by now the place was EMPTY and we figured, I'm sure, that if it took as long for them to find the money as it did to bring the food, the increased value of silver would take care of the tip.) (This was, after all, Silver Bay.) NOW, of course, Little Bare, Schultz, and Butch weren't too "proud" to accept a ride from yours truly and his lately rented car with the sticky interior. They all climbed in at once. "To the campground, James!" Schultzie sang, obviously high on tomato sauce and too much root beer. "Yessir," I demured. "And will ye be requiring anythin' else of yer 'umble servant this evenin', sir?" "Yeah," shivered Little Bare. "Your motel room." "Huh?" "You SURE you don't have any extra space on your floor?" "Aw c'mon," sang Schultz. "This is great adventure! We're camping under the stars tonight! We're in the Great White North! This is fabulous!!" "This is f***ing freezing," said Bare. And the rest of us, naturally, did a double-take. Then Schultz started. "Ya know, if you go campin' at an in-town trailerpark without any trailer, you COULD be a redneck!" "And if you go into that camp at 10 P.M.," I added, "when everybody else is asleep and THEN wake back up at THREE IN THE MORNING when everybody else is asleep and THEN BREAK CAMP when everybody else is asleep, you know, you COULD be a redneck!" "And if I don't get into my motel bed in ten minutes from now," Butch contributed, loudly, "YOU'LL ALL BE DEADNECKS!!!" Butch and I dropped off Little and her boy outside their tent at roughly 10:14 P.M. and told them on no uncertain terms to have the whole thing broken down, packed away, and be ready to boogie in less than six hours. And they agreed. "Ya know, you COULD be a redneck..." Schultzie started again as we pulled out of their campsite. But we ignored him and laid rubber all the way back out to Highway 61. (And you thought I was a-kiddin' you about the Bob Dylan parody. Hey, that IS Highway 61. Look in your atlas!) I peeled back to The Ancient Mariner and double-parked across the last TWO remaining parking spaces (Butch's van was in Grand Marais). We both jumped out and, on solemn promise of pain of death, told each other that "first guy up calls the other guy, OK?" "OK." "G'nite." "Good night." Boom. Inside the room. It's a mess. Quick. Call the wife. Where's the phone? The bed's still a mess. WHERE'S THE F***ing FONE??? I got a billion things to do before sleeping. I gotta take a shower because there won't be time at THREE IN THE MORNING! I gotta sort out what I'm gonna wear in the race. I gotta find my BIB NUMBER! WHERE IS IT??? Oh, over there. I GOTTA FIND PINS!!! Quickly, I dial the spouse. It won't work. I redial, or repush, or whatever the hell we redo these days. I get an operator. I explain how I'm trying to reach AT&T and use my Calling Card because it's AN AT&T CALLING CARD and NOT a "Northwestern-Dot-Com-Calling-Express-Platinum-Moose Card" and therefore NOT subject to their outrageous surcharge! She disconnects me. I redial. I repush. I repull. I recall the front desk. Oh, hell, HE's no help! I call the Minnesota operator. I DEMAND TO BE PUT THROUGH TO AT&T. I shout! I kick! I scream! And, just like magic, it happens. "Hello, Sweetie? Yeah, it's me. I'm safe. Can't talk. Gotta sleep. Bye!" The phone rings back. "YOU FORGOT TO SAY YOU LOVE ME!!!" "Right. Sorry. Love ya. Bye. OK? I GOTTA SLEEP!!!!" "OK, bye-bye. Love you." "You too. Bye." Click. Click. RACE! Jeezesiss! I'm doing a RACE!!! I gotta brush my teeth! Ten minutes later, with room an undeclared disaster area, I'm horizontal. But... ...of... ...course... ...I... ...can't... ...sleep. I toss. I turn. I go back to the first position. I return to the second position. I get up. I pee. I go back to bed. I toss. I turn. I retoss. I return. I think. Oh, Jeezesiss. Do I ever! And, of course, I rethink. I imagine. I conjure up. I terrify myself. There's wolves. There's moose. I think I see this huge snapping turtle at the bottom of Lake Superior. It's mouth is wide open. Inside, wrapped around its razor-sharp teeth, is a wet noodle. I leap out of bed! (Whew.) I guess it was only a nightmare. I go pee again. I climb back in the bed. I toss. I turn. I let a vegetarian spaghetti fart. Suddenly, I think, maybe...yes...I drift off to... BRIIIINNNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGG!!!! It's the f***ing fone. It's Butch. "You up, buddy? It's 3 A.M.!" In a white, sticky car, approximately one hour later, there are two riders. One is asleep in the passenger's seat. One is asleep at the wheel. Somehow, miraculously maybe, the wheel steers itself back to the campground. And by some other sheer miracle, Schultzie and Little Bare have everything broken down and packed away, yes, in TWO great big plastic Tupperware Tubs--waterproof, thank you, with lids tightly sealed...and duct-taped shut. "Ya know," Schultzie says, "you COULD be a..." "Don't start," I mumble. And then I stare at these two gargantuan Tupperware Tubs. "OK," I say, "now what in the Sam Hill are we supposed to do with THOSE?" "The camp guy said we could leave 'em in the laundry room." "Oh great. Where's the laundry room?" "Just over yonder." "Good. You put 'em there. Wake me up when you get back." "BUT YOU GOTTA HELP ME!" "Wha????" "They're too heavy! I can't carry 'em all by myself!!!" Wellllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll... What does THIS do for our hero's early morning grogginess? What sort of slap in the face is THIS kind of "Skin Bracer" before a brisk predawn workout at the health club? And just how far is our hero expected to "help carry" these eight-hundred-pound dead weights anyway? The nearest laundromat's in Duluth!!! Stay tuned next time, radio fans, when...ha! YES! Indeed! I promise!! We're FINALLY gonna get to the STARTING LINE!!!! (Eight chapters and 80,000 words later... and now, finally, AT LAST we're ready to begin the story.) Don't hold your breath, of course, because who-knows-what interruption might just postpone it [again], but if all goes well according to some weird, twisted, and other-worldly plan, "The Further Adventures of The Sleepy Sandman and His Two HUGE Boxes of Sand" will continue being shoveled at you with Part 9, and spread--just in time for winter--all over Highway 61. Kitsch Limacher TheTroubadour@prodigy.net