Late Night Driving
So I got a car. He's kind of a big deal. The plan was for me to drive this car from Saskatoon to Lethbridge. But then the guy at the car place (who had an slightly grating laugh and reminded me of Randall from the show Recess) was all like "Oh, let me READ THE CAR MANUAL TO YOU and then show you what EVERY SINGLE BUTTON DOES INSIDE OF THE CAR". He was very nice, but I was hungry, and we were there for five and a half hours. I left Saskatoon at 7:30. Do you know how far away Lethbridge is from Saskatoon? 6 1/2 hours. Well, I took the easier albeit longer route. So more like 7 hours. Also, the longest amount of time I had driven in a car by myself up to that point was an hour. Also also, I had thiiiis much experience driving at night. *holds up no fingers* My parents made me stop at every checkpoint to let them know I was alive. I had my tunes, I had my copious amounts of junk food, and I had said my extra super mega prayers that get me the good parking spots downtown. Yep, I thought night driving was easy!
1. Caffeine and sugar. A few weeks ago, my roommates discovered I had never tried Dr. Pepper, and consequently made me try it. You guys. YOU GUYYYYYS. All it took was 2 sips and I was wired for the rest of the night. Remembering this, I had my parents pick me up two litres of the stuff and a lot of chocolate before I left the city. This helped a little, but my eyelids were still pretty droopy.
2. The Mismatched Song Game. In the car I had a number of mix CDs, so I popped one in and made up a game. I would choose a style to sing in, and then the next song that came on, no matter what it was, I had to sing along in that style. Ideally, my weary brain supposed, this would require such enormous amounts of concentration that I would stay awake. I decided to sing the next song operatically. The next song was a rap song. I quit playing my game after that.
3. Roadkill Count. By this point I was getting desperate. Remembering how my brothers and I would compete to spot the most dead animals during roadtrips when we were younger, I forced myself to remain alert enough to count carcasses. One fox, one skunk, one Tim Hortons cup, and one other thing. I don't really know what it was.
4. Not-Roadkill Count. Not enough animals were dead on this trip for the Roadkill game to keep me awake for long. How unthoughtful of them! This time I counted animals that were still alive. One rabbit, two mice, and a whole lot of Bambis that seemed to pop out of nowhere.
Although they would work for a bit, none of these ideas were keeping my eyes open very long. Rascal Flatts may have wanted to ride the highway all night long, but all I wanted to do was go to bed. I just needed to stay awake to drive a little further. Desperate times called for desperate measures. I pulled over and employed strategy #5.
5. Beyonce. I pulled over at a darkened gas station in this random little town. I turned the music up ridiculously loud. I got out of the car. And then I did the entire Single Ladies dance. Booty-shaking, hip-popping, and all.
1 comments