Been away from Florida for a week and head back to Havana
tomorrow. This has been the first of two little vacations while on home leave.
Home leave itself is not a vacation, or at least it’s not a
vacation for me. I have been spending most of mine in doctors’ appointments or
the yard.
One of the things I learned this home leave is that azaleas
can be weeds. Never knew that, but oh, man, they are beasts. I have been down
by the road, trying to tame the azaleas closest to Kocur’s grave. I wound up
just cutting them all to the stubs and then burning them. That last step was to
get rid of the pine straw stuck in them and to try to kill the viney things.
Those things are awful, and my last step on the azaleas – not
yet complete – has been to dig up the tubers, which will never, ever end. I
have spent several hours digging up the roots and filled multiple wheelbarrows
full of the suckers. I have raked until the cows came home. And it’s still not done.
I took off this week to take Zippy to Nashville, and from
there we went to visit Karen/Henry and Charles/ML, with bonus family members at
each stop.
Nashville, and Tennessee in general, are just fun places,
and way more pretty than Florida. (And I say that as a proud Floridian.) Hills,
mountains, lakes – just a much prettier drive than on I-10.
Anyway, after the first day of games, we hit the Grand Ole
Opry, which was cool to see. We’d done
the Ryman on a previous trip so this completed the circle, so to speak. Had a
nice time and caught a glimpse of Sara Evans, who was backstage for some
reason. (There weren’t any shows that day; not a clue why she was there.)
We exited a different road than we went in, as we drove a
little way down the street, we saw “Cooter’s Garage.” My driving class
instructor from a couple weeks ago would have been so proud of the hairpin turn
I made to pull into the driveway. I mean, come on, if that wasn’t draw enough,
it was right next to the Willie Nelson museum! How could I pass that up?
The chintz-o-meter rocketed off the charts. It was fantastic.
No place anywhere in the world could have more “Dukes of Hazzard” props and
memorabilia, plus a whole room full of merchandise. I loved it, I loved it.
They had the door from Uncle Jesse’s house, Dixie, Cooter’s
truck (Zippy claims absolutely no memory of Cooter, and I do not know how that
is even possible), several pairs of Daisy’s shorts and of course, the General
Lee. The best display was a mock kids’
room that had every TV-tie in toy created. Little General Lees, posters, action
figures and everything else.
Sadly, our Nashville trip was a bit mis-timed. Not only did
we miss a free Keith Urban concert that had been a few days earlier, but we
also were there just a week earlier than a Bo and Luke appearance: John
Schneider and Tom Wopat (be still my heart!) will appear at Cooter’s Garage on
May 21.
Home leave is a Congressionally-ordered time that foreign
service officers have to spend in America to get back in touch with the
countries they represent. And, possum on a gum bush, what better way to get
back in touch with America than to spend time in Nashville and with the Dukes
of Hazzard?
Yeehaw!
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