"Remember the Alamo" - Southern States  DAY 5 - Wed., 13 March 2002

So, as promised, I took pictures of Vanderbilt University.  And again, no one seems to have realized it was in Tennessee.  Go figure.  So, I'm in front of one of the many entrances, where I found that it's safest to be on the sidewalk, or when absent, the curb.  They may be more educated than the average folk, but it doesn't mean they can drive. It's a private university it seems, based on the historical marker.  And of course, the predictable campus sign pose.

The clerk last night deliberately gave us a room with a view of the city.  It wasn't spectacular, mind you, but along with the fog this morning, we still have a superb view of the gentleman's club. As you'd expect in a college town, there are a number of strip clubs (a girl's got to pay her way through college, eh?), bars (to forget having worked in the clubs, or guys who can't get any lovin'), tattoo parlors (enough said), and restaurants and eateries when the other three aren't appealing.  And with that observation, we were back on the freeway and putting Nashville behind us.

Which then put Spring Hill, Tennessee before us.   True to form, Saturn does have a welcome center for its customers and other supporters.  We park, making us car number six in the lot; there are four Fords, a Chevy, and a Jeep.  Not a single Saturn.  Go figure.  (One of the cars was a vendor who was trying to figure out where the north gate was; with nothing more than the map he has in his hand, I pointed him in the right direction.)

So we began wandering around the place.  We got to sit with the crash test dummy, which was fabulous.  I was able to learn how they used foam molds, then submerse it in molten steel, which dissolves the foam, and the steel takes the shape of the foam to create the engine block.  If you look at the finished product, you can even see the dimples of the foam in the final steel product.  So, I opted to pose with a dual overhead cam 16-value engine with automatic transmission, a single overhead cam 8-valve with automatic transmission, and even a 16-valve valve head.

We left.  I made the boy stop at Frankewing, just because it had the key words "Frank" and "wing" in it, which just seemed fitting.  We passed through Fayetteville, TN, which is an adorable little town, complete with its darling little downtown and what I can assume is the town square complete with the traditional cannon.  Of course, all of these small town whistle stops means it took us longer to arrive in Chattanooga, but no one seemed to mind. 

Our back road adventure also took us by two concrete park benches not 10 feet off the road, with a sign and an arrow pointed to the benches, which read "Roadside Table".  Duh... but, the more important question, is, why?  Do people actually stop there and want to picnic?  Perhaps it's members of the Beans Creek Primitive Baptist Church, which was not two blocks down.  Of course, there's nothing wrong with Baptists, but to put the word "primitive" into the title seemed a little, well, primitive.  Along that same vein, why is every (other) Baptist church we've seen the "First Baptist Church"?  I'm sure I'm not the first people to take note of the fact that there can only be one "first".  Sure, share the name, but then it's got to be unique, like "Saturn of Knoxville" and "Saturn of Tampa".  Unless you're doing the "Wendys" thing where every branch has the same name, but a different city.  If that's the case, are the churches part of a national franchise, but each house of worship is independently owned and operated?  Just curious.

The weather during this portion of today's travels was not what you'd call clear (crystal?), but it didn't rain at all, although, as we were between exits 134 and 137 on I-24, passing over a mountain, visibility went to poop with fog.  We were able to see maybe 50 feet ahead (or whatever five dashed lines of lane markers it -- but it's not much).  And naturally, this is when it was my turn to drive, and the boy was asleep with his precious little blankey on his head.  What a turd.

Right.  So, Chattanooga, Tennessee.  The home of the Chattanooga Choo-Choo, made famous by the 1940s song.  And of course, there's yet another mention of the war of northern aggression.  Someone took the time to explain the significance of the whole choo-choo thing, and of course, the mandatory pose with the aforementioned locomotive.  And then back in the Green Spam Can and onward and upward... well, mostly just onward.

Knoxville.  Home of the Sunsphere, a legacy of the 1982 Worlds Fair.  Contrary to what TV taught me, the globe today does not house a wig store.  And the photo opportunity was courtesy the United Methodists Church, in whose parking lot we stopped (despite not having a permit) and took the picture.  A quick trip to the local Wal-Mart (store# 2932 on Parkside Drive) rendered the oil changed in the transport vessel, and we were back on the road to... well, we weren't sure.

But at 4:32 p.m. (EST), we crossed into North Carolina.  We were greeted by two tunnels through the mountain within the state, and a friendly "Tunnel - Remove Sunglasses" sign.  Good advice.  There was also a single-vehicle accident on the opposite side of the road, leaving a three mile backup while the sorted things out.  Since the road cuts through the mountain (literally, in some places), obviously, there's no detour option, and nowhere even to turn around.  Sucks to be them, but it was okay for us.

We ended up in Gastonia, North Carolina, which is a hair outside of Charlotte, NC.  The logic of the Tall One is that smaller towns are cheaper for hotel stays, and by staying on the correct side of town, we miss morning commute traffic of people pouring into town.  We'll see if this was the correct place tomorrow around 6:30 a.m. (EST), but so far, his theory has held up.  Except on the subject of church names, for which he could offer no explanation..