Kate leaving "T&K POB" (Portland or Bust!) on the wall of Graceland!
Tracey, Kate and a little bit of Alex in front of Graceland!
If you look really carefully, you can see John Stamos!!!!
Beale Street in Memphis!
Our dinner at BB Kings...Before
...and after... yum!So many apologies for not updating the blog last night! we are doing great - no need to worry about us! we just wound up getting in so late last night that we decided to continue the blog today.
Memphis: We left Knoxville and traveled to Memphis. The trip was quite pretty - poor Kate had to take most of the hills. We arrived at our swank airport Comfort Suites around 7pm. oh, did i say "swank"? i meant to say "stank"...not the best place - really needed a good scrub down. but, we made do. We wound up scoring a sweet deal on a ride to downtown Memphis, Beale Street, from Gary, the hotel handyman. We went to BB Kings Barbeque and had ribs, baked beans and hush puppies! There was a band playing - blues of course - and about half way through, the singer announced that her new friend, Mr. John Stamos, was in the house. And then, freaking John Stamos - yes - UNCLE JESSE!!! - jumps up on the stage! He sat in on the drums through Mustang Sally and Rocking Robin! It was the most random awesome moment! After getting over our celebrity sighting, we wandered over to The Taproom Juke Joint. The band was pretty good, but were making some heavy demands for tips. The singer announced at one point that they were about to play their number one most requested song...the title was "Tip the Band". Kate and I suspect that is not necessarily most requested from the audience, but likely the band's fave song...
We got back to the hotel around midnight and decided to hit the sack to prep for our long day of driving ahead.
Arkansas - the state that never ends!: We got up and out fairly early - around 9:30 this morning. We decided to stop by Graceland for a quick photo op. We were both pretty surprised by the neighborhood surrounding the joint. It was a bunch of strip malls on a dingy, busy street. And then, all of a sudden, you happen upon the Elvis Presley Mecca. They have built up quite an infrastructure around the entire place - parking lots, shops, special museums. We pulled up next to the actual mansion, which seemed completely out of place for the area. It was a beautiful home set on rolling grounds. We took a few photos and then headed back on to I-40. We crossed the Mississippi River, which made us feel like we were really heading west.
Then we got to Arkansas. For all you kids out there that had dreams of moving to the fabulous state of Arkansas, you may want to reconsider. From what we saw from I-40, no one actually lives in Arkansas. You may want to argue that people actually live there, but we did not see them. It was just mile after mile of rough road and empty fields. Kate did most of the Arkansas driving. At one point, we drove up a hill with a rather steep drop off. This apparently made Kate freak out a bit, while I, the faithful co-pilot, missed the entire incident, as Alex and I fell asleep in the front seat. We finally crossed over into Oklahoma and were completely grateful to be out of that place!
Oklahoma: So, we drove pretty much the rest of the day through Oklahoma. Pretty uneventful, except for the fabulous big sky sunset. We saw the sun set and the sky turn about a million different colors from the dusk. We pulled into our hotel (much, much nicer this time!) and collapsed. Tonight we are regrouping, getting laundry done, eating pizza and watching South Park reruns.
We are planning on heading out early to get to Albuquerque before dark tomorrow. We will go into the downtown area for the New Years festivities. We are both really excited about New Mexico because neither of us has been there before. And the down town area looks pretty awesome!
Please don't be dismayed if we don't blog tomorrow night - we have to get our New Years on! We promise to give you an update on Thursday! Until then, everyone have a great new years!!!!
Memphis: We left Knoxville and traveled to Memphis. The trip was quite pretty - poor Kate had to take most of the hills. We arrived at our swank airport Comfort Suites around 7pm. oh, did i say "swank"? i meant to say "stank"...not the best place - really needed a good scrub down. but, we made do. We wound up scoring a sweet deal on a ride to downtown Memphis, Beale Street, from Gary, the hotel handyman. We went to BB Kings Barbeque and had ribs, baked beans and hush puppies! There was a band playing - blues of course - and about half way through, the singer announced that her new friend, Mr. John Stamos, was in the house. And then, freaking John Stamos - yes - UNCLE JESSE!!! - jumps up on the stage! He sat in on the drums through Mustang Sally and Rocking Robin! It was the most random awesome moment! After getting over our celebrity sighting, we wandered over to The Taproom Juke Joint. The band was pretty good, but were making some heavy demands for tips. The singer announced at one point that they were about to play their number one most requested song...the title was "Tip the Band". Kate and I suspect that is not necessarily most requested from the audience, but likely the band's fave song...
We got back to the hotel around midnight and decided to hit the sack to prep for our long day of driving ahead.
Arkansas - the state that never ends!: We got up and out fairly early - around 9:30 this morning. We decided to stop by Graceland for a quick photo op. We were both pretty surprised by the neighborhood surrounding the joint. It was a bunch of strip malls on a dingy, busy street. And then, all of a sudden, you happen upon the Elvis Presley Mecca. They have built up quite an infrastructure around the entire place - parking lots, shops, special museums. We pulled up next to the actual mansion, which seemed completely out of place for the area. It was a beautiful home set on rolling grounds. We took a few photos and then headed back on to I-40. We crossed the Mississippi River, which made us feel like we were really heading west.
Then we got to Arkansas. For all you kids out there that had dreams of moving to the fabulous state of Arkansas, you may want to reconsider. From what we saw from I-40, no one actually lives in Arkansas. You may want to argue that people actually live there, but we did not see them. It was just mile after mile of rough road and empty fields. Kate did most of the Arkansas driving. At one point, we drove up a hill with a rather steep drop off. This apparently made Kate freak out a bit, while I, the faithful co-pilot, missed the entire incident, as Alex and I fell asleep in the front seat. We finally crossed over into Oklahoma and were completely grateful to be out of that place!
Oklahoma: So, we drove pretty much the rest of the day through Oklahoma. Pretty uneventful, except for the fabulous big sky sunset. We saw the sun set and the sky turn about a million different colors from the dusk. We pulled into our hotel (much, much nicer this time!) and collapsed. Tonight we are regrouping, getting laundry done, eating pizza and watching South Park reruns.
We are planning on heading out early to get to Albuquerque before dark tomorrow. We will go into the downtown area for the New Years festivities. We are both really excited about New Mexico because neither of us has been there before. And the down town area looks pretty awesome!
Please don't be dismayed if we don't blog tomorrow night - we have to get our New Years on! We promise to give you an update on Thursday! Until then, everyone have a great new years!!!!
3 comments:
Happy New Year, Tracey!! Glad your trip is going well. If Kate is a fellow South Park follower then you picked the right driving partner! Stay safe!
Mom
Jesse Katsopolis was born on April 15, 1963 to Nick and Irene Katsopolis. He was named after his great-grandfather, Hermes, but when he was teased so much in kindergarten, he begged his parents to change his name. He then adopted the name "Jesse," for Elvis Presley's late twin. During the first season, his full name was Jesse Cochran, but Stamos requested it be changed to Katsopolis to honor his own Greek heritage.
Jesse had an older sister, Pam, who married Danny after high school. This upset both families to the point that Jesse beat up Danny, even breaking his ribs. Jesse went on to attend Golden Bay High School, but dropped out. In a later episode, he realizes he is the only adult in the house without a high school diploma, which prompted him to go to night school graduating as a valedictorian. He gave his speech on a broken-down subway train to an angry mob during a black-out, which prevented him from reaching his graduation ceremony. His parents did not attend.
On the first episode of the show, Jesse moves with Danny to help him raise his kids after the death of his sister, Pam. However, he only expected to stay a couple of weeks but ended up staying, along with Joey Gladstone (Dave Coulier), for the whole series, without paying rent. Jesse describes in later episodes how Pam was a great influence in his life, and how despite his rebel attitude, she managed to keep him in check.
My neice was a little ticked off that you saw John Stamos in person. Her exact quote, "sooooo not fair". My son on the other hand didn't even know who he was until I told him who John used to be married to. Too funny.
I tell you Tracey, I am really jealous of this trip that you are on. It sounds fabulous. I hope that you and Kate enjoy every single second.
By the way, for some reason, all of a sudden I keep hearing about traffic back ups on the Harbour Tunnel and want to call you to forewarn you, then I remember, you aren't in Baltimore anymore. So weird.
Love you, be safe.
Jenn
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