Non-Itinerant Greetings From Virginia
Posted: Wed May 04, 2016 7:20 pm
If you look at the Itinerary, it had an entry for May 2-3 in West Virginia. After twenty years, I got to see those hill-billy kids I lived with for a year in 1996 all growed up. Cindy and I had moved in with her cousin and her four children to "help out" . . . and we did, but it turned out to be so much more where I was concerned. These kids and their mother were Mentors In My Book Of Life, they absolutely lanced and cauterized my politically-correct "kindness" and gave me a raging thirst for ground level honesty. They redefined my understanding of "help" and "charity" and they turned off my fealty to "politeness" and they exhausted and exhilarated me on an almost daily basis. I fell in love with them, but because Life Is Tough, I left with nothing more than a broken heart in May of 1997 after my usefulness was used up. For twenty years I have held my breath, wondering if they would survive the chaos, these souls I had come to love.
Well, they are still kicking all right. And I still love them, but you have to be careful with hill-billy kids all growed up, they don't have time or inclination for sentimental nonsense. Fine. I had to tone it down from whatever lofty insights I had into their essential selves to more of a tattling on them. I had stories. Stories for their kids, stories for their spouses, and I had photographs they had never seen, photographs of themselves as children. For me, it was yet another amazing display of how we adults are wrought from our childhoods. I loved seeing the kids they were inside of the adults they are.
If given permission, perhaps I can do "before" and "after" photographs.
It was a punishing day for NaranjaWesty, and NaranjaWesty repaid me by punishing me back, just like that damn brown cow Chloe did when I pushed too hard trying to get to Walla-Walla last year to visit spiffy.
From Tennessee to Charleston WV, Naranja behaved just fine:
It was a beautiful day:
Did my first big hill climb on I-77 to the East River Mountain Tunnel that straddles (undergirds?) the Virginia/West Virginia state line:
The sound of a Type 4 engine in a tunnel is a fine automobile engine sound, better than anything else but an air-cooled Porsche 6:
Coming up on the exit, I accidentally hit the warp drive button . . . :
. . . and escaped this dimension through that black hole:
. . . into a wondrous otherworld:
. . . . known as West Virginia:
Now, I had to visit these four kids/adults all in one day, so I had to keep hoofing. On my first extended third gear pull, the engine started to get pissed, little bucks. Pulled off the shoulder and cleaned the fuel filter.
"I see," said the Gas Tank Removal Procrastinator, "this bumpy-ass interstate is dislodging the remaining varnish in the fuel tank."
At the crest of another fine hill pull, I had to remove the screaming fuel pump, wire it up directly to the battery and reverse its polarity whilst simultaneously trying to feed it straw streams of WD-40:
Some more lovely afternoon driving in West Virginia, my old stomping grounds with Cindy and her extended family back when I had a life amongst People:
Crested a hill and rounded a corner and saw this handsome cloud bank:
That is when the engine started bucking and the fuel pump started screaming again. Pulled off into a WalMart shopping center and cleaned the thankfully clogged again fuel filter (thankfully > as in "pump had a good reason to be screaming"). Visited the 12 year-old Hill-Billy Child-come-32 year-old adult outside of Charleston:
Then I had a 245 mile jaunt to visit the 6/8/14 year-old Hill-Billy Children on the eastern side of the state of West Virginia. Here is before my profoundly dumb assumption, just driving and taking in the impressions of this beautiful Adult creature I had just visited:
My dumb assumption is photographed below . . the MapQuest directions looked insanely complex had I cut across the state further down. I decided to go up I-79 a bit further, and take US-50 across the state. I remembered US-50 as a nice four lane highway. Not here!
Such a work-out of shifting and braking and steering, and this is a Westfalia, NOT a svelte little seven-passenger, I could really feel the inertia on this 85 mile torture track:
It was on the uphill past this hairpin that I heard a loud bambambambam under load from the left rear wheel. Pulled over HERE:
Jacked up the wheel, checked all lugs, checked CV joints for movement and too much heat, everything seemed OK, and I was right at the appointed visitatin' time. Called 6-now-26 year-old Hill-Billy Child, but our conversation was cut off by a lousy signal. Drove gingerly in the middle of nowhere, thinking about those new Lobro CV joints I left in Atlanta ("I don't need these, this car has only 47,000 miles!).
The bang-bang-bang started up again, only under load. I was temporarily distracted by the gorgeous countryside, a facet of West Virginia I never knew about here on the Maryland/Virginia side. This is Highway H (US-48) through a beautiful unspoiled east coast panorama of picturesque:
Made it to the little kid now not little and her husband and three children only one hour late. Then we drove up and over Highway H AGAIN to visit the two other kids now-not-kids with their kids, and I am praying for the CV joint, and the fuel pump, and the filter, too, because now it is raining in West Virginia, and West Virginia roads can be death traps in the dark rainy night. Crushed the two of them both with 20 year hugs, told more stories and showed the pictures again and I still love all of these creatures too, under their adult wear and tear and responsibilities, and we are going to do such a cook-out next year when I come through. Said good-bye at 10:30PM, and drove off into the rainy night. BAMBAMBAMBAM said the left rear wheel in rain in Capon Bridge WV at 12:00AM. Pulled into a Romney Realty parking lot and ducked under the cabana. I was so utterly exhausted, been up since 6:30AM outside of Charleston, my heartache is huge for deep reasons, the car has been a pill all day, not its fault weighs on me (I shuddawuddacudda repacked those CVs), and here I am about to grenade an original German CV joint in the rainy night. My decision-making is faulty, I am having a bout of petulance. Flashlight and wet pavement and dripping undercarriage, and I just want to take a nap under there.
In the dripping night under the car, I had a thought. I thought, why not pull the boot away from the driveshaft and squirt oil from the oil can in the outboard joint, then hit the road to spread it around? I did exactly that. The driveshaft quieted right down, too. And I promised poor NaranjaWesty that I would repack the CVs at daylight:
The oil did a fine job:
. . . . but this was the actual offender, the inboard joint had finally lost its lubrication film and was pushing and pulling the driveshaft as the balls started jamming on the tracks. Just by virtue of moving the driveshaft around trying to get the oil can spout in the outboard boot, I had articulated the inner joint balls into some grease at the ends of the tracks and won a brief respite:
Just in the nick of time, too:
It was an interesting picture there on the side of the road.
"What is that dad gum boy doin no how?":
Trying to drive across the country, that's what.
Colin
Well, they are still kicking all right. And I still love them, but you have to be careful with hill-billy kids all growed up, they don't have time or inclination for sentimental nonsense. Fine. I had to tone it down from whatever lofty insights I had into their essential selves to more of a tattling on them. I had stories. Stories for their kids, stories for their spouses, and I had photographs they had never seen, photographs of themselves as children. For me, it was yet another amazing display of how we adults are wrought from our childhoods. I loved seeing the kids they were inside of the adults they are.
If given permission, perhaps I can do "before" and "after" photographs.
It was a punishing day for NaranjaWesty, and NaranjaWesty repaid me by punishing me back, just like that damn brown cow Chloe did when I pushed too hard trying to get to Walla-Walla last year to visit spiffy.
From Tennessee to Charleston WV, Naranja behaved just fine:
It was a beautiful day:
Did my first big hill climb on I-77 to the East River Mountain Tunnel that straddles (undergirds?) the Virginia/West Virginia state line:
The sound of a Type 4 engine in a tunnel is a fine automobile engine sound, better than anything else but an air-cooled Porsche 6:
Coming up on the exit, I accidentally hit the warp drive button . . . :
. . . and escaped this dimension through that black hole:
. . . into a wondrous otherworld:
. . . . known as West Virginia:
Now, I had to visit these four kids/adults all in one day, so I had to keep hoofing. On my first extended third gear pull, the engine started to get pissed, little bucks. Pulled off the shoulder and cleaned the fuel filter.
"I see," said the Gas Tank Removal Procrastinator, "this bumpy-ass interstate is dislodging the remaining varnish in the fuel tank."
At the crest of another fine hill pull, I had to remove the screaming fuel pump, wire it up directly to the battery and reverse its polarity whilst simultaneously trying to feed it straw streams of WD-40:
Some more lovely afternoon driving in West Virginia, my old stomping grounds with Cindy and her extended family back when I had a life amongst People:
Crested a hill and rounded a corner and saw this handsome cloud bank:
That is when the engine started bucking and the fuel pump started screaming again. Pulled off into a WalMart shopping center and cleaned the thankfully clogged again fuel filter (thankfully > as in "pump had a good reason to be screaming"). Visited the 12 year-old Hill-Billy Child-come-32 year-old adult outside of Charleston:
Then I had a 245 mile jaunt to visit the 6/8/14 year-old Hill-Billy Children on the eastern side of the state of West Virginia. Here is before my profoundly dumb assumption, just driving and taking in the impressions of this beautiful Adult creature I had just visited:
My dumb assumption is photographed below . . the MapQuest directions looked insanely complex had I cut across the state further down. I decided to go up I-79 a bit further, and take US-50 across the state. I remembered US-50 as a nice four lane highway. Not here!
Such a work-out of shifting and braking and steering, and this is a Westfalia, NOT a svelte little seven-passenger, I could really feel the inertia on this 85 mile torture track:
It was on the uphill past this hairpin that I heard a loud bambambambam under load from the left rear wheel. Pulled over HERE:
Jacked up the wheel, checked all lugs, checked CV joints for movement and too much heat, everything seemed OK, and I was right at the appointed visitatin' time. Called 6-now-26 year-old Hill-Billy Child, but our conversation was cut off by a lousy signal. Drove gingerly in the middle of nowhere, thinking about those new Lobro CV joints I left in Atlanta ("I don't need these, this car has only 47,000 miles!).
The bang-bang-bang started up again, only under load. I was temporarily distracted by the gorgeous countryside, a facet of West Virginia I never knew about here on the Maryland/Virginia side. This is Highway H (US-48) through a beautiful unspoiled east coast panorama of picturesque:
Made it to the little kid now not little and her husband and three children only one hour late. Then we drove up and over Highway H AGAIN to visit the two other kids now-not-kids with their kids, and I am praying for the CV joint, and the fuel pump, and the filter, too, because now it is raining in West Virginia, and West Virginia roads can be death traps in the dark rainy night. Crushed the two of them both with 20 year hugs, told more stories and showed the pictures again and I still love all of these creatures too, under their adult wear and tear and responsibilities, and we are going to do such a cook-out next year when I come through. Said good-bye at 10:30PM, and drove off into the rainy night. BAMBAMBAMBAM said the left rear wheel in rain in Capon Bridge WV at 12:00AM. Pulled into a Romney Realty parking lot and ducked under the cabana. I was so utterly exhausted, been up since 6:30AM outside of Charleston, my heartache is huge for deep reasons, the car has been a pill all day, not its fault weighs on me (I shuddawuddacudda repacked those CVs), and here I am about to grenade an original German CV joint in the rainy night. My decision-making is faulty, I am having a bout of petulance. Flashlight and wet pavement and dripping undercarriage, and I just want to take a nap under there.
In the dripping night under the car, I had a thought. I thought, why not pull the boot away from the driveshaft and squirt oil from the oil can in the outboard joint, then hit the road to spread it around? I did exactly that. The driveshaft quieted right down, too. And I promised poor NaranjaWesty that I would repack the CVs at daylight:
The oil did a fine job:
. . . . but this was the actual offender, the inboard joint had finally lost its lubrication film and was pushing and pulling the driveshaft as the balls started jamming on the tracks. Just by virtue of moving the driveshaft around trying to get the oil can spout in the outboard boot, I had articulated the inner joint balls into some grease at the ends of the tracks and won a brief respite:
Just in the nick of time, too:
It was an interesting picture there on the side of the road.
"What is that dad gum boy doin no how?":
Trying to drive across the country, that's what.
Colin
