Thanks to an unnamed snot nosed germspreader who will remain unnamed, both Debbie and Lillian have been stricken with nasal congestion. For an adult, nasal congestion is usually no big deal - take some Sudafed and blow your nose and dverything is ok. For an infant who hasn’t mastered the art of breathing with her mouth and who forms an air-tight seal when she eats, it’s so miserable that she can barely sleep. Couple this with the fact that Lillian is teething badly and you have a kid who wasn’t sleeping much tonight.

To combat the teething Debbie found an over the counter homeopathic remedy called Teething Tablets. Two dissolved under an infant’s tongue is supposed to cut down on the pain and sooth a baby enough to sleep. Debbie headed off to the alternate-world Walgreens at around 10:30pm while I watched Lillian as she slept in her swing while watching the Calm baby DVD. When debbie returned with the tablets we put one under her tongue and dissolved the other in water and administered it by dropper. Within about 30 minutes she was fats asleep. These things appear to work although Debbie was a bit nervous since we didn’t get our pediatrician’s OK first.

Yesterday ratface and his art crew had me running around taking photos of both the liquor clown and the Twin Lights in Highlands. I think they’ll be using it in some kind of collage in the movie. Here are two of my favorites:

I was up bright and early this morning along with Kevin (who was up brighter and earlier since he’s West Side) as we launched clerks2.com. He had a few changes to the look of the site but by noon or so we were able to launch it to the world.

Affectionately titled ‘Train Wreck: A video journal chronicling a disaster in the making”, this video blog will be updated twice a week with documentary style clips that detail each step of production. It will run through the entire production and hopefully a few weeks after.

I was numb and beat from the drive the night before, but that didn’t stop me from going to work bright and early the next day. I had work to do and a new site to launch. No rest for the weary.

I also ended having to go back to work after dinner to finish up a new Hold Em’ Table design for Kevin - one that had to be completed in time for an October 8th Clerks 2 kickoff party at the house. I hope O’Halloran, Jeff Anderson and Rosario Dawson dig it.

Some trip stats:

• Miles driven with a 6 month old baby: appx 1200
• PNC Park was the 3rd new ballpark that I visited this year after Yankee and Shea. It was my 5th MLB game attended this year.
• BBQ sandwiches eaten: 2
• Stops we had to make for the kid: 7 I think
• Junk food eaten: Chips, cookies, fruit snacks, Chex Mix
• Average Gas Milage: about 27 MPG

Here’s an article I found about Tepee Tim’s:

Chief and chef at his own tepee

Thursday, August 18, 2005

By Rebekah Scott, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

A tepee towers over the fast-food franchises surrounding the New Stanton interstate highway junction in Westmoreland County. It sends smoke signals to passing truckers and travelers.

The aroma’s message is simple and clear: “The barbecue grill is fired-up at Tepee Tim’s.”

Pull off at Byers Avenue and alongside the 40-foot canvas tent, and you’ll likely meet “Tepee Tim” Bossart, the decidedly non-American Indian who’s chief of this new roadside enterprise.

He’s a professional ironworker with an entrepreneurial spirit, a taste for slow-roasted pork ribs, and a fascination for tepees.

“It occurred to me that a tepee is really a big chimney, and I could put a big smoker full of chicken and ribs underneath one without it getting too hot. The smoke coming out the top is my calling card,” said Bossart, 51, of Arona.

His customers are from everywhere. New Stanton stands at the intersection of the Pennsylvania Turnpike, Interstate 70, and State Route 119, and is a popular pit stop for long-distance drivers.

The tepee came from Canada. It’s 33 feet in diameter, 30 feet high, and stands on a skeleton of 18 lodge-pole pine trunks. Bossart bought it from an aging hippie in British Columbia in the Canadian northwest, and put it up in April on a long-abandoned gas-station site.

The cooker comes from a steel plant in Madison, a tiny town a few miles away. Bossart said he designed the big black roasting, grilling, smoking, and warming apparatus himself. The oak and cherry wood burning in its heart was cut at a New Stanton wood lot.

Menu items come from several sources. Like many locals, Bossart fell in love with barbecue at Clem’s, a Blairsville landmark. He learned the barbecue business in Omaha, Neb., from a man who became his best friend. His cole slaw, chili, and wild rice soup recipes came from there.

His pulled pork is done Carolina style, he said; it’s sold by the quart for taking home. The sealed-in moist texture of the chicken quarters comes from the unique smoker design. The cornbread that comes with every dinner is a recipe he created himself.

Tepee Tim’s opened in mid-May.

“It’s kind of neat to have a tepee right in the middle of town,” said New Stanton borough secretary Mary Ann Roll. “Tim’s always busy, there’s always lots of cars over there, especially at lunch. I think it adds some pizazz to the area, especially for the kids. For a younger kid who’s been driving in the car all day, you can just hear him saying ‘Wow, look a tepee!’ ”

Roll confirmed the Tim went through the whole planning commission process before applying for his occupancy permits, just to make sure the tepee was a legal structure. No problems, everything proceeded as usual, she said.

No problems weathering the searing summer or a few fierce thunderstorms, either.

“Wind worries me, but I hope to keep open most of the year. This place will stay really warm in winter, and I’m hoping to add a nice fire pit out back. It will be a nice cozy stop in the winter.”

Business is good so far, he said, as word — and the roasting-meat aroma — spreads over the area.

“My friends think I’m crazy, but I just ask them ‘when’s the last time you ate something great inside a tepee?’ Bossart said. “It’s a fun thing to do, and the food is tasty too.”

Instead of leaving at 11:00am or noon like we usually would, we took off at about 3:30pm in order make more of Lillian’s sleep time coincide with the trip. Before we left we packed everything up and I was albe to get some Skyline Chili in as a goodby lunch. We have planned to leave at about 3:00pm and I think we did a good job only being 30 minutes later.

The trip out of Ohio was fairly uneventful and Lillian didn’t even really get cranky until we were 30 miles outside of New Stanton - and that’s only because she was hungry. We stopped at the same Days Inn we stayed at 6 days before and fed er in the parking lot. She needed a change so we went next door to the New Stanton McDonalds which was covered with NASCAR memorabilia. Inside a man and is wife were dining and asked if Lillian was going to be ok after seeing her DOCBand. I assured him that she was just fine.

There was a new roadside attraction in New Stanton that I HAD to stop at. In May 2005 a tepee was erected and a barbecue grill was put inside and Tepee Tim’s BarBQ was born. As we passed by I wondered if it was open and the smoke coming out of the top of the tepee assured me that it was open. We stopped in and we were greeted by who I assume was Tim himself. I checked out the menu and ordered up a Carolina Barbecue sandwich. I initially ordered it to go, but upon seeing how huge it was I decided to eat it there. Tim treated us to a couple pieces of his own recipe cornbread and suddenly I didn’t have to worry about dinner anymore.

We ended up stopping a couple of other times - once in Somerset and once 2 or 3 hours later at 11:00pm. I looked at the hotel reservation board and saw that King of Prussia was 37 miles away meaning that wer were about 2 1/2 hours away from home. I was itching to get there and I knew that we just a hundred or so miles away. The rest of the trip went fairly smoothly and at 1:15am or so we made it home. We survived and we’ll be doing it again 2 more times for Thanskgiving and Christmas.

Happy 31st Birthday Debbie!

The timing of this trip worked out because Debbie could now be with ehr family for her birthday. She had a few special requests for today:

1) Lunch at Buffalo Wild Wings - aka BW3

2) Mom’a Deviled Eggs

3) Mom’s french Toast for breakfast

The French Toast came up first and it was great - I had mine with Zinerman’s vanilla sugar.

We left for lunch at about 1 ot 1:30pm and went to the BW3’s near Polaris. There aren’t any good wing joints in Jersey so this was a welcome lunch for both of us. BW3 had some new lunch combos which were perfect and hit the spot. Lillian was very good and quiet throughout all of lunch.

After lunch we hit homegoods really quick where I was stricken with the hiccups. To remedy this I hit a newly opened $3.99 pizza buffet while everyone else went to the Les Wexner run Bath and Body Works. I was hoping that they sold carry out fountain drinks and they did - a quick Diet Pepsi later and my hiccups were long gone.

Dinner was a very good homecooked meal of mom’s roast beef, gravy, mashed potatoes and 2 kinds of squash - acorn and butternut. I think I liked the smoky flavor of the acorn squash better.

A cake was then brought out after dinner which had a brown and orange fall theme to it.

Then I gave Debbie my presents - the ones that I could carry anyway:

• New LG VX6100 (when she hits her 2 year loyalty date - i wrapped my cell phone box to approximate the size and weight
• A purple scarf
• A Sony iPod tape adapter
• a $15 iTunes gift card

Dad said the day before that we could go to 9:00am mass if we all got up in time. I got up at 8:20am and decided to skip a shower and washed my face and brushed my teeth. I was ready in plenty of time.

The church we always go to, St. Joan of Arc has a cry room if we needed it but we decided to sit with the rest of the congregation. Lillian behaved pretty well for the mass. There were a ton of other babies there so one of them was bound to act even worse.

After mass I ate leftover fried chicken for lunch and Debbie went down to the basement to help take photos. I texted Justin and Suzi and asked if they’d be around at 2pm - no problem. Debbie came up to feed Lillian around 2pm and then she and Patti were taking the kids to target to get their photos taken together.

I got to Justin and Suzi’s place on Indianola at around 2:25pm and went in. I was greeted by my two favorite people in Columbus and their dog and then we jumped in the car and went to the Cup O’ Joe on High Street. I checked out the array of extra products they sold (Dagoba Xocotl spicy hot chocolate, Oregan Chai Mix, etc). Then we placed out orders. Justin got some kind of smoothie, Suzi got some kind of caffeinated drink with soy milk and I got a medium chai. We tried to get a chocolate brownie dessert thing but all that was left was the display model. We opted for a white chocolate raspberry cake and it was awesome and awesomely presented.

We spent the next hour and half talking about finding body parts in hot dogs, I told my yakking story from the day before and we saw a guy taking eBay photos of a Nikon N65 he was going to sell. Eventually the conversation shifted to foods that make Justin sleepy: Turkey, some soy products and sushi. Just as he mentioned sushi he mentioned how he could really eat some sushi right then. I thought that was a great idea so we piled into the car and headed over to Bento GoGo. The lot behind Bento was full except for 3 spaced that were reserved for Buckeye Computing. I got out to see if they were open and they weren’t so I took the spot. Inside Justin and I ordered a sushi deluxe and a spicy tuna roll and a couple of hot green teas. We all went and sat outside.

Afterwards I drove them back and Suzi gave me some Starbucks melon syrup (the same kind they use in the green tea frappuchinos) and a book and off I went.

Debbie and I had planned to hit Schmidt’s Sausage House for dinner with the family. Instead they offered to watch Lillian while we went by ourselves as an anniversary present. That sounded great to me as it would be out first dinner out along together. We put Lillian to bed early, prayed that she would sleep the enitire time we were gone and left at 7:40pm.

Schmidt’s was actually reviewed as an out-of-town hot dog entry over at HollyEats and it got a 5 grease stain rating. We parkined in the lot behind the restaurant and headed in. We noticed on the board an appetizer balled bratwurst sauerkraut balls and we had to try them. I ordered the Old World Sausage Sampler and Debbie got the Hoffbrau Schnitzel. Everything was delicious. Before we paid we ordered 4 of their gigantic cream puffs to go.

Debbie was good about not constantly checking in on the baby. When we drove home we checked to see if her room light was on. Nope. This was looking good. We went in and didn’t hear any crying. Even better. Then we saw a frazzeled mom. It turns out she woke up right after we left and cried and cried up until 10 minutes before we got back. Dad had to resort to turining on CMT on the tv and that did the trick. This may be the last time they offer to babysit.

Jason and Dad had politely asked a week ago if I wanted to come to the OSU vs Iowa game and I gladly and eagerly accepted. I hadn’t been to a college football game since my days at Michigan and there’s no football like Big Ten Football. Dad told me that we’d all be leaving at about 8:45am so we could catch the Skull Session at the arena where they have gymnastics.

I had never heard of the term skull session before but it turned out to be a large pep rally or sorts which was free to the public and featured the entire marching band playing their pregame show and halftime show. The OSU football team and coaches put in appearance dressed in suits and said a few words to the crowd. It was pretty cool and I was wondering if all schools did this.

After the skull session we walked outside and into a very festive atmosphere. It was like a huge red and white block party on crack with tons of people, music blaring, lots of tailgating and a parking lot set up with a huge screen playing ESPN’s College Gameday. We walked across Lane ave Dad and I got a $5 bratwurst. He asked how I liked eating a brat for breakfast.

After that we wandered around the stadium looking for one ticket for Dad. Jason had two staff and faculty tickets for me and him and we had to get one close for him. We saw a bald guy with glasses holding one up and inquired about the section. Not a bad location, then we asked the price. face value was $58 - he was asking $80. No way. We moved on and walked almost all around the stadium with one finger pointed skyward when a guy came alongside us and said he had one left and would sell it at face. Better yet it was only a section over and 3 rows up from Jason and I. Perfect. Dad bought the ticket and we went in and climbed a mountain of steps. Before heading in Dad bought a pretzel and so did I. Jason got a pretzel and nachos. Then we headed to our seats.

For the first few minutes or so the seats to the right and left of us were empty. Sadly they filled up as the game went on. The crowd was huge and loud and I was trying to guess what the entire attendance was. I didn’t see many empty seats. Ohio State started dominating early scoring on their second drive. Iowa couldn’t get much going and on every third down the crowd would stand and a bell would toll. On one of these third down plays something happened.

I think it was Iowa’s 2nd 3rd down conversion attempt. I stood up with the rest of the crowd and cheered when Iowa couldn’t convert it. Just then Jason told me not to sit down. Why not? I wondered - that play was done. I looked over to my right and the guy behind us and to the left had just yakked all over the seats. Not only did he yak over the seats but he also yakked on the floor next to him and all over his sandals. It was super gross. His wife was there with him and began cleaning it up yelling at him the whole time. Not even 5 minutes into the game and the dude couldn’t hold his liquor. Jason and I ended up standing for another 2 or 3 series of plays and not one person behind us yelled at us to sit down because they had seen what happened. Evetually throw up guy and his wife left and an employee came over with the sawdust can and cleaned everything up. Ironically the two guys to the right of me who had the actual throw up seats remarked on how disgusting it was and then proceeded to whip out a can of Skoal and a little plastic cup to spit into. Nice.

Ohio State was running on most cylinders during the game and at one point the total yardage was something like 400 to 14. Still it didn’t turn into a complete blowout thanks to Ohio State fumbling the ball like 5 times.

Near the end of the game the sun came out and the game ended somewhere around 3:30pm. We stated until the very end when the marching band played the alma mater and then had a pretty easy time getting out of Jason’s parking space near the hospital. Jason and I snoozed a bit while waiting in traffic on northbound 315 before 750.

We came home to an overwhelmed mom and Debbie was were watching both Andrew and Lillian. Patti got the afternoon off to go to Jodi’s baby shower and Debbie and Mom both looked a bit frazzeled. We decided to order dinner out and that’s where it got interesting. Originally it was going to be abig KFC takeout. Then Chinese food came into the mix. I decided to go on my own and try out the City Barbecue and Debbie joined in with me. While dad went to go get the fried chicken and kung pao chicken I got a North Carolina pulled pork sandwich, a regular pulled pork sandwich, collard greens, corn pudding and sweet tea. It was pretty good.

Lillian slept pretty well in crib Mid-West last night and I think she’ll do allright here. I slept until 9:45am and then went downstairs to start work. I had to register some domain names, set up a poker table design and a blog. Debbie and Mom took Lillian to the Carters store to do some baby and Unlimited Designs shopping and I stayed back to get some work done. I was thinking about hitting Skyline Chili for lunch but Debbie called and offered to pick me up a burrito from Chipotle. When they returned at 1:30pm I chowed down as much as I could eat - about half - and saved the rest for later.

At 3:30pm I moved the laptop into the sun room and worked while watching the Cubs play the Astros. I was sending good vibes towards and Astros and Willy Taveras and Russ Springer who had thrown me balls the day before. Sadly Willy K-ed with the bases loaded and the Astros took a big loss.

After Dad got back from work we all went out to dinner at an Italian pasta place near Sawmill. It was called Bienvenici something. I noticed that next door was a kabob joint so I went in to grab a menu. sadly it looked like a franchise and not that great. The italian place was a order at the counter and we bring it out kind of place and Dad placed the large order. Wild mushroom ravioli for me, mushroom pasta for Debbie, cheese ravioli for mom and Jason, shrimp and scallop carbonara for Dad and angel hair for Patti. The place was very loud due to an influx of kids and infants. In fact I think the kids and infants outnumbered the adults. Our dinners came out and mine came out wrong - I poked into the ravioli shell and saw just cheese so I took it back. Mom’s was ok but it was cold. Once corrected the dinners tasted just fine.

Before I begin on the events today, I have to mention 2 great things that happened:

1) Lillian pretty much slept through the night in room 230 of the Days Inn in New Stanton, PA. It was amazing. She woke up once at around 4:00am when I went to the bathroom and after feeding and a change, went right back to sleep until 7:30am.

2) The fine, fine folks at Rosenthal Acura in Gaithersburg, MD had my radio anti-theft code on file!! I decided to call them and see if by some longshot they had it. The lady who answered at the service department asked for my name and then confirmed by then Maryland address to me and then just gave me the code. Just so anyone who reads this will know what it is if this happens again, the code is 34332.

Prior to calling Rosenthal I was making plans to head to Smail Acura which was 8 miles away. They weren’t listed in the Nav and they had a funky address so I wasn’t really looking forward to going there. I also wasn’t looking forward to having my radio ripped out of the dash just to get a serial number. The service department didn;t open until 8am and that was cutting it close to get to PNC Park at the time I wanted. Thank you again Rosenthal Acura.

After getting that magical code to work, Debbie fed Lillian and then we headed to the lobby for our free continental breakfast which consisted of bagels and cream cheese and Rice Krispies plus OJ and coffee. Not bad. The people gathered in the lounger were watching coverage of the impending doom of Hurricane Rita. Most of them were firefighters gathered there for some kind of convention. After breakfast we packed up the car, got some gas and headed to Pittsburgh. It was shortly after 9am.

The trip to Pittsburgh took about 38 minutes and I started getting excited when we passed the PPG building. Then we passed a bridge which afforded us a look right into the 3rd baseline stands from across the river. I made my way onto the Clemente Bridge and then started to look for the best parking for the price. The lots next to PNC were $18.00 and $15.00 so I took the lesson I learned from Yankee Stadium and looked on. I made a couple of circles before deciding on a nearby garage at $12.00. We parked the car on the 4th floor (the Alfred Hitchcock level, all the floors were represented by a photo) and went down to the stadium.

We timing things pretty perfectly because by the time we walked down to street level the Clemente Bridge was closed off to cars. We took a walk around the stadium and went by the players entrance and saw some autograph hounds. On the way back I talked to a guy who had been camped out near the garage entrance and had just got Doug Strange’s autograph.

Debbie, Lillian and I then walked down to the center field Riverwalk entrance and went in. My bag was searched and I was forced to throw out my bottle of Mt. Dew Pitch Black II - apparently they don’t allow soda in the stadium. Weird. Upon entrance we were presented with a Willie Stargell Upper Deck card. We took a few photos along Riverwalk and at the other end I asked an usher the best way to get to our seats once the gates opened. He saw the stroller and offered to take us down one floor down the elevator and through the handicapped entrance. This got us a look at an indoor tunnel leading out to the right field.

We found our awesome visitors dugout seats easily and our usher Ray wiped down our seats for us and talked to Lillian for a bit. Debbie decided to get Lillian out of the hot sun so I headed for left field when the Pirates pitchers came out for warm ups. I said a hello to pitcher Matt Capps and watched as they threw balls back and forth. A couple overthrows occurred but I wasn’t in their paths and other people got the balls. I noticed Matt and Ryan Vogelsong finishing up and I moved closer to them. I put my glove up and Ryan threw me the ball. Nice. Matt then came over and I greeted him by name. He shook my hand and said that he was glad to see me out today. Pure Class.

I headed by to my seat and switched the Pirates hat for an Astros one and stood behind the dugout. Russ Springer and Chad Qualls had just finished tossing a ball in front of the dugout and Russ tossed me the ball before heading into the dugout. I returned to my seat and gave Debbie a call to see where she was. She was feeding Lillian at First Aid so I went to the main concourse and took a look around. I found the Primanti Brothers stand and checked out the menu. Then I met Debbie at our seats and we headed back up to find the pierogi stand. I asked someone at the hot dog stand and she directed me to the Willie Stargell food court and told us to look at one of the last booths. With a lot of looking we finally found it. Why do they hide all the good food at ballparks - I don’t know. After Debbie ate I got some bland garlic fries. I then got my sandwich and set it down under my seat. I noticed more Astros throwing and warming up so i grabbed my glove and waited behind the dugout. Willie Taveras had a ball and made a nice throw to me. I put my fist in the air and thanked him and he gave me the “I love you man” sign - two hits to the heart and a point. Awesome.

I took some photos of our wonderful seat location and then settled back as the game started. Debbie and Lillian sat with me for awhile but the sun was pretty intense so Debbie moved back about 25 rows under the shade. I loved the seats we had and wish I could have that location for every game. I took bites of my sandwich between innings and kept score with my glove on, hoping for a foul ball. None came too close but I did note the good foul ball locations behind and slightlu to the left of the plate, and down the 3rd base line in foul territory.

The game went by fairly fast and as Lillian became more cranky, we decided to leave after the 7th inning stretch. We watched the Pittsburgh gametime tradition - pierogi races and then headed back to the car. Then it was off to Columbus.

The drive to Columbus to took about 3 1/2 hoursa dnwas fairly uneventful. We did stop at a McDonalds on the way to feed Lillian and while we were there a tour bus pulled up and I had to block the window so the people on the bus wouldn’t get a free show.

We arrived in Columbus at about 6:00pm and were greeted by the whole family and Suzi. Dinner was Whole Foods salmon, rice and green beans. Lillian sat at the table and Andrew played in the Baby Einstein gym. It was kind of cool how we were once 6 and we were now 8.

Visit the Gallery

Today was the beginning of our big trip to Columbus with a 6 month old baby. The trip is to be split into 2 parts which will hopefully make it easier for her. Part one consists of driving from New Jersey to New Stanton, PA. Usually this trip takes about 6 hours start to finish with one stop for gas. This time - who knows as we’d be stopping to change and feed Lillian. There was no way she would sleep for the whole trip so we hoped she wouldn’t get too bored or cranky or both.

Scott has asked the night before if I could take some photos of Jersey for the movie. Before that I had to stop at the office to send a fax. We also had to pack up the car. I was on a slight deadline because I had to do all of that before 8:15am so we could get to Lillian’s DOC Band appointment on time. Not a problem though as Debbie thoughtfully packed most of the car last night and the fax and photos didn’t take too long.

We set out at about 8:17am with a quick stop at McDonalds because I hadn’t eaten breakfast yet. The traffic up to Paramus was pretty bad. What is usually a 1 hour trip at most took almost 2, but Debbie was well prepared for it and that’s why we left so early. We made it with plenty of time to spare. The person at Cranial Technologies said that the progress was great and that it would be another 3-4weeks. She also mentioned that if we really wanted her head to be perfect that getting another band after this one would be an option. I think the progress has been so great that there is no need or desire.

After the DOC band appointment we headed to grandma’s thinking she would want to head out for lunch or something. She mentioned that her cleaning lady would be coming soon and that she wouldn’t be able to leave the house so we just hung out with her for an hour and met both her cleaning woman and the Meals on Wheels lady, who actually did stop to talk to her and play with the baby. All those silly Meals on Wheels commercials were right.

We hit the road for New Stanton at 1:00pm. Since we hadn’t stopped for lunch we were getting hungry. We mapped out a trip to Yocco’s in Bethlehem as our lunchtime destination. As we drove through New Jersey and started heading for the PA border I remembered that there was this hot dog joint called Toby’s Cup that I always wanted to try. As we got closer I asked Debbie to look for it on the right and then it appeared. Before pulling into the lot I remembered that I only had $5 in cash on me and that we had a budget to work with.

Luckily having only $5 was no problem. the dogs were only 90 cents each (up from 75 as stated on the menu at Hollyeats.com) so I was able to get 4 of them plus a can of soda. We sat outside and ate our dogs. The dogs were delicious by the way - deep fried and topped with mustard, onions and a pickle slice.

Now that I wad down to $.45 cents I decided we had to find a bank and get some money. We pulled into the shopping plaza where the Yocco’s was and I went off to find a phone book so I could find a Wachovia branch. Oddly enough the Verizon store did not have a phone book handy so I went into the Kaplan next door and they had one. I used that to find a nearby branch and on the return trip to the highway we decided to stop back at Yocco’s. I got a dog and Debbie got some pierogies. On the way out I noticed that Yocco’s offered free wireless access.

We stopped again once in the parking lot of a Target and fed and changed the kid. I picked up some fruit snacks and mini cookies from Target. The best ting about road trips is all the junk food.

At about 5pm or so we hit a rest area to get a break and to feed Lillian. I stupidly left the car out of accessory position and when I went to start up the car the battery was just dead enough to hinder the starter. Crap! We walked over to the Sunoco station to see if we could get a jump to no avail. No what? Debbie noticed a highway truck had just pulled in to get gas so she went over and asked them for a jump. Luckily they had cables and got us up and running 10 minutes later. Thank you God. I was just feeling some relief as we left the rest area and started going again. Then another issue arose.

I went to turn the radio on and noticed that it said ‘CODE’. Crap - I had heard of this before - apparently if the car battery is disconnected it activates the anti-theft code on the radio and makes it inoperable. 5 more hours on this trip, 2 today and 3 tomorrow with no music or XM? This was really bad. I sore I had the anti-theft code in my glove compartment binder but it wasn’t in there. All the Acura service departments were closed and the 24 hour hotline wouldn’t give me the code without the radio serial number. I didn’t have that either. They informed me that I would have to take it to a dealer and have them pull the radio out to get the serial number. Only them would I be granted the code. This really sucked and with the silence of the trip occasionally broken by the screams of a crying baby, the next 2 hours to New Stanton seemed like 100.

Before hitting New Stanton we stopped in Somerset and ate dinner at the King Family Restaurant. I got some chicken fried steak with sausage gravy with a side of fries and sausage gravy. The calories and fat made me feel a bit better I think. Debbie and I kind of taught Lillian to drink from a straw and we shared a dessert called a ‘Frownie’ which was pretty good - and cheap.

We hit New Stanton and the famous Days Inn an hour later and made the big move into room 230. The sign out front has boasted ‘FREE HIGH-SPEED WIRELESS INTERNET ACCESS’ which did not work very well if at all. I ended up using the cell phone as a modem and found an Acura dealership 8 miles away that I decided I would take the car to in the morning.