A Trip Down I-55

Do you guys remember when I used to be a planner?  When I used to know how I would get from Point A to Point B before I actually departed Point A?  When the calendar inside of Louise the Blackberry was useful because I actually followed through with the plans, unlike the calendar contained within Lloyd the Droid, which appears to be merely decorative?  When I used to have maps and I followed them, instead of having multiple phone conversations a week that start with "Janey, are you in Chemung again?"  Those days when I invested weeks of planning into meeting you Invisible People instead of just posting my current location as my Facebook/Twitter status?

If this weekend had happened a year ago, it wouldn't have happened at all. 

On Friday morning, I hopped in a truck headed south, carrying my parents and their pals to the Supercross event in St. Louis.  In Springfield, we stopped at D'arcy's Pint for horseshoes and brews.  This is a horseshoe:

Bread.  Meat.  Chili.  Fries.  Cheese.  I didn't eat it.  But I sure took pictures of it.  That shot is from Lloyd the Droid, and I'm pretty pleased with the quality.

By 5ish, we were unloading luggage in front of a hotel next to the arch.  Within 10 minutes, I was climbing into the passenger seat of a car driven by CowboyFetish, who handed me a Stella Artois and a bottle opener and THEN introduced herself.  Yes, this was the first time we'd ever met.  The internet is magic, my friends.  And I only got one text that night asking me to confirm that I hadn't been murdered yet!

Ms. Fetish and I chilled out at her place for a bit, then went to Mr. B.'s for the famous toasted ravioli I was not allowed to skip town without experiencing.  I also had a cheese infusion by way of the most decadent pasta dish I've ever consumed.  From there, we headed to Mamacita's to take in a show by the Bible Belt Sinners, a band containing my pal/racer/musician/verb Johnny Murdock.  This gig was booked when I was only about an hour outside of STL and I was invited by text message, so even though most of the trip was thrown together at the very last possible minute, the Bible Belt Sinners were the icing on the lack-of-planning cake.  And boy did they Johnny Murdock that show!

I spent Friday night with CowboyFetish, who was a fantastic hostess.  Her cats didn't even eat my face off while I slept!  This one was my favorite:

On Saturday morning-ish (I slept in!  face intact!), she asked what I had in mind for brunch and I said that I am a big fan of greasy spoon diners, and Courtesy Diner fit the bill perfectly.  We sat at the counter next to two men who smelled like mulch, I had an omelet and coffee served by a sweetheart with a Sookie Stackhouse accent, and "Free Bird" played over the radio.  Americana, baby!

From there, we took a stroll through the Soulard Farmer's Market, which was amazing.  I'm super jealous of those who get to shop there regularly.  Joanie's was the next stop, to meet Fef, another invisible person, for an impromptu beer/wine before she departed for the Cardinals Game That Just Wouldn't End.

I-55 Raceway in Pevely, MO was my next stop, and I was delivered to its doorstep by the (can I say this enough?) awesome-as-hell CowboyFetish, who wins some kind of Best F2F Ever prize from me.  Meeting me in real life should not be as difficult as I made it for her, and I'll always be grateful. 

Pevely and the World of Outlaws and I have a love-love-love relationship.  It is easily in my top 3 favorite race tracks ever, and throughout my WE WERE ON A BREAK from sprint car racing, Pevely passed through my thoughts often.  I missed it much.  I haven't been there since 1999 or 2000 and I barely recognized the joint when I walked in.  I've always said that one of my favorite races of my entire life was a dash there, at the U.S. Dirt Nationals, although the circumstances of the race have been disputed by both my dad and my buddy behind the mic, who both think that the dash took place at a regular WoO show and not the U.S. Dirt Nationals.  And they could be right. 

But in my memory, I am wearing my tie-dyed Levi button-fly jeans (oh shush you), my buddy Bill was there with a non-wing car, and Mindy took me to my first White Castle in the middle of the night.  Which would make it impossible to be any year but 1998 or any race but this one.  Which was won by Andy Hillenburg, further proving my theory.  So if I'm wrong, I'm wrong.  But I'm going to remember it my way, because Andy won, I looked damn fine in those jeans, I miss Bill, and that was the night I learned to never let Mindy pick where we are going to eat at 2 am.

I spent the first quarter of the night getting to know a new friend-of-friend, Suzy, and watching the modified heats, which were piled up at the beginning of the night before any sprint car action started.  I know there is bitching on some message boards about how this race was run and what a late night it ended up being, but holy crap, I loved it. 

I watched the sprint car heats from a different section each race, moving around the place until I felt like I'd sat in every single seat, getting dirrrrrtttty.  Walking from one section to another, I heard my real name shouted from within a crowd and turned around to see . . . a guy I didn't recognize at all.  And boy, did he know it.  He quickly identified himself as Mindy's little brother and I girl-squealed and gave him a hug.  It's been easily 10 years since I've seen Nick the Nemesis, and he was every bit as cool as I remember him then.  We chatted through the B-main Last Chance Showdown (I feel like that phrase should be in some kind of raunchy bold wild west font), when he admitted that he'd seen me walking around earlier in the night but had to text his sister to find out my real name because he didn't want to shout "HEY DUCHESS JANE" at me.  Note:  I will answer to "HEY DUCHESS JANE" in public.  You won't be the first or last stranger to shout it.

While the track was getting overhauled in preparation of the mains, Nick and his coworker and I wandered the pits, stopping first to visit a modified customer in the infield.  Of course, the first thing I spotted was the Claim Area sign, because I am a dork, and I grew up attending International Motor Claiming Association modified races, and I still make motor claiming jokes to my stock car friend(s) whenever possible.

Later, I'd realize that I took so few pictures at the track that my claim sign is 33% of my total photos from this race despite carrying my DSLR around all night.  Ooops.

We walked back into the grandstands area during the modified main, just in time to see Tim Hancock take out track owner Ken Schrader under yellow right in front of us.  It's a mad, mad house, boys and girls.

The World of Outlaws A main was really great.  Joey Saldana won with a broken hand, and you'll get better results at better websites than this one.  Keeping with tradition whenever we aren't at a race together, my dad and I each claimed to be watching the greatest race we'd ever seen, but Saturday night's neener neener took place over Twitter. 

After watching the track empty and go dark, a real day-after-Christmas-type feeling, I caught a ride back to St. Louis with the man who makes his living with his mouth (who should have known better than to ever say that to a person who has a filter as inoperable as mine).  With maybe 3 hours of sleep logged, I was back in the truck, Starbucks in hand, riding towards destinations devoid of the phrase "fixin' to".

Thanks much to everyone who was part of my transportation Rube Goldberg, and to all of the invisible and partially visible people that I met or got reacquainted with this weekend.  I had an absolute blast and can't wait for the next one, which might be Saturday, POWRi midgets, Macon.  I'll update my plans for the weekend in Thursday's Take No Prisoners post.  That is, if I actually make a plan . . .

Friends, I'm fixin' to see a lot of races this year.