Tuesday, May 31, 2005
Opelousas and Lafayette
On Thursday, Eric rode from Deridder, LA, to Opelousas, LA. In Deridder, we stayed at Skipper’s Motel. That was Eric’s birthday. I mentioned that in a previous post. See, that day ended in a slightly interesting way. It took quite a lot for me to find him, considering the aforementioned cell phone problem. So, after I finished up at the library (where the librarian thanked me for asking whether they had wi-fi, which I thought was odd), I headed back to the hotel that used to be the Best Western and no longer was. There was no Eric there. So then I went to the next motel down the street, and the motel situation got less and less promising as I went along. The next one was called something like the Red Carpet Inn. No Eric there. I almost didn’t even want to check at the third place, Skipper’s Motel, but I gritted my teeth and did and sure enough, the nice Indian man said “yes he’s here. He tried to call you. You didn’t get his message?” Uh . . . no. So the man told me the room number and I went and knocked with a scowl on my face. Not the nicest way to greet a man on his birthday who had just ridden 75 miles and the final miles were on city streets with no shoulder with crazy semis and unacceptable pavement. But after I had a bit of a mood adjustment, helped along by a trip back to the library, we drove to a nearby town, Leesville (home of the Army base Fort Polk I think?). There we did some sightseeing I guess you could call it and we were also propelled by the rumor that there was a movie theater there. After no luck finding it on our own with what we thought was some sort of built-in town navigating system in our heads since we’ve been to so many different ones, we asked a family standing in their front yard.
The front-yard family was nice. One of the couples was moving to Alabama soon. For dinner they recommended that we go to the Thai place, which was “very un-Leesville,” according to them, which, as they explained, meant that the service was very professional and the presentation was nice. They also told us where the fabled movie theater was. The Thai restaurant was very nice, and since there is a military base nearby, there were actually all kinds of people eating there. We finished just in time to dash over to the movie theater and catch Star Wars. I tell you, Anakin scowled very well and I think I could learn something from that technique.
The next day, I drove Eric back to where he’d stopped riding the day before and then I headed back to Skipper’s Motel to pack up the gear and make some time for running. I went across the street to a very nice public park, actually. It was one of those fitness track parks too. I ran the route on the park, starting at about 8 a.m. and I saw all kinds of people and they were all so friendly. Everyone greeted me with “good morning.” The best part, though, was an orange cat who was lying on the path, totally relaxed and nonplussed by the people walking by. It was clear that that cat owned that park. Every time I ran past him I said “hi kitty!” But I noticed a tiny dead field mouse about four feet down the path from the cat and so I told him “I know what you’ve been up to.”
The mid-point of that day was Mamou, Louisiana. Eric and I saw one of the skinniest men we'd ever seen in a gas station there. He also was very dirty but appeared to be a farmer. He walked in to the gas station/Subway sandwich shop, which is where I found Eric (almost by accident after having driven through the town twice looking for him), and headed for the wall cooler and grabbed a Bud. He was maybe 55. He turned to walk towards the cash register and then sort of turn on his heel back to the cooler and went back to grab another Bud. Must've been a hard day. It was the kind of day for a two-beer lunch. Eric said it looked like his shirt was hanging on a hanger; that's how skinny this man's shoulders were. He was like six foot six or something. His pants were even on a little crooked. Other than this man, we saw a group of ladies in the Subway, buying sandwiches and then there were some men, with whom the ladies worked it was obvious, and they were heckling each other in a very good natured way. All of the chairs were still on the tables, even though it was noon.
Eric and I at the gas station in Mamou, with me moving towards camera
That afternoon Eric and I arrived into Opelousas, LA, a town that had clearly, like my fair Detroit, seen better days as evidenced by the empty stores downtown. We didn’t spend much time in Opelousas. I did do a walk-around the court house area though and bought a Coke at a small and very cluttered restaurant and some pens and colored pencils at an office supply place. And I bought some spray for the windshield to dissolve the bug residue. As soon as Eric arrived though and we found each other, we drove to Lafayette for two evenings of city fun and one full day off.
The front-yard family was nice. One of the couples was moving to Alabama soon. For dinner they recommended that we go to the Thai place, which was “very un-Leesville,” according to them, which, as they explained, meant that the service was very professional and the presentation was nice. They also told us where the fabled movie theater was. The Thai restaurant was very nice, and since there is a military base nearby, there were actually all kinds of people eating there. We finished just in time to dash over to the movie theater and catch Star Wars. I tell you, Anakin scowled very well and I think I could learn something from that technique.
The next day, I drove Eric back to where he’d stopped riding the day before and then I headed back to Skipper’s Motel to pack up the gear and make some time for running. I went across the street to a very nice public park, actually. It was one of those fitness track parks too. I ran the route on the park, starting at about 8 a.m. and I saw all kinds of people and they were all so friendly. Everyone greeted me with “good morning.” The best part, though, was an orange cat who was lying on the path, totally relaxed and nonplussed by the people walking by. It was clear that that cat owned that park. Every time I ran past him I said “hi kitty!” But I noticed a tiny dead field mouse about four feet down the path from the cat and so I told him “I know what you’ve been up to.”
The mid-point of that day was Mamou, Louisiana. Eric and I saw one of the skinniest men we'd ever seen in a gas station there. He also was very dirty but appeared to be a farmer. He walked in to the gas station/Subway sandwich shop, which is where I found Eric (almost by accident after having driven through the town twice looking for him), and headed for the wall cooler and grabbed a Bud. He was maybe 55. He turned to walk towards the cash register and then sort of turn on his heel back to the cooler and went back to grab another Bud. Must've been a hard day. It was the kind of day for a two-beer lunch. Eric said it looked like his shirt was hanging on a hanger; that's how skinny this man's shoulders were. He was like six foot six or something. His pants were even on a little crooked. Other than this man, we saw a group of ladies in the Subway, buying sandwiches and then there were some men, with whom the ladies worked it was obvious, and they were heckling each other in a very good natured way. All of the chairs were still on the tables, even though it was noon.
Eric and I at the gas station in Mamou, with me moving towards camera
That afternoon Eric and I arrived into Opelousas, LA, a town that had clearly, like my fair Detroit, seen better days as evidenced by the empty stores downtown. We didn’t spend much time in Opelousas. I did do a walk-around the court house area though and bought a Coke at a small and very cluttered restaurant and some pens and colored pencils at an office supply place. And I bought some spray for the windshield to dissolve the bug residue. As soon as Eric arrived though and we found each other, we drove to Lafayette for two evenings of city fun and one full day off.
# posted by jnewwave @ 2:40 PM 
