The drive down there actually isn't too bad. My mom and I practically live off the same road, it's just a really long road. It's a 45-minute drive and about 35 of those minutes are spent on Rte. 26. It goes through one area where it's 2 lanes, but the rest of the time it's only 1 lane. Of course, right away I got stuck behind this.
It's not unusual to get stuck behind a tractor or a truck on 26, but usually there are opportunities to pass them when the double yellow line becomes dotted. Not last night. When this guy wasn't drifting OVER the double yellow line, completely blocking my view of oncoming traffic, there were cars coming. So I was behind him for the entire trip. And he was not going fast. Especially when it came to hills.
There was a long stream of cars behind me and I felt really bad because I'm sure many of them were wondering why I wasn't passing this guy. He was only going 50 in a 55; I've been stuck behind tractors going 20 many times, so this really wasn't horrible. But I didn't like that my view was obstructed. Yeah I might have been following him a little closely, too. But here's the truck in Sykesville- this was taken about 25 minutes after the first one.
Do you see what I mean about my view being obstructed? Besides not being able to enjoy the country scenery, I have no idea whatsoever why this guy is braking. (And PS- why are his brake lights so tiny? This is a huge truck, I would expect more significant warning when he's planning on stopping.) There weren't any stop signs or traffic lights ahead (I've been taking this trip many times per month for about 10 years now....I know where the lights are!).
So finally, just after Sykesville, my turn came and I was freed from the selfishness of the truck. And I was able to enjoy the view:
This, my friends, is CowTown at its finest. You can click on the photo for a larger view to get the full effect. I'm considering adding Smell-o-Vision to my site to enhance this. These cows rule the city with their apathetic mooing and fast-moving all-encompassing stench. There are no horses in Wville, no chickens or pigs. Just cows. There is one goat, but he mostly stays to himself.
I brought some of my friends to meet my mom for lunch one day before my wedding. And as we were passing the very farm that is in the photo above, a cow wandered right into the middle of the street. For some odd reason, the fence was gone. (And by fence I mean piece of string tied between two posts. If you look closely at the photo above, you can see the white line from the road in the bottom left corner. Try to find the fence in the photo. Go ahead. Look. Yeah. That's CowTown for ya!) My friends freaked out- they had apparently never seen a cow wander into the road before. City folks......
So you pass the cows, and you pass Cleatis' shack (I wish I had thought to get a photo of this, it's SO stereotypical country redneck shack-dwelling cat-crazed maniacal) and you get to my mom's neighborhood. For the record, my mom doesn't live on a farm and she doesn't have cows.
My mom is a character. Now that her kids are gone, she has turned into a crazy lady. Let's look past the fact that she greeted us at the door in a Nine Inch Nails Closer t-shirt. Yeah, she doesn't have any clue who that is. If I had to guess I would think she doesn't want to F anyone like an animal. I think she excavated the shirt from a pile of stuff I was trying to get rid of from my teenage angst years.
Her house is a really nice house. Or it was before she got hold of it. She wallpapered everything. Shelves, doors, closets, the inside of the garage door (the big one your car passes under). And she never bothers to line up the strips.
She collects things. Most recently, she's been working on Gatorade. This is the stock she keeps in the living room:
Yes, I said living room. If you look behind the bottles, you see bricks on the right and the fireplace on the left. She put this huge wall unit from Ikea in front of her fireplace. It holds the radio that she doesn't know how to use, CDs that she never has used, and various other useless knickknacks she has collected over the years. She's never used the fireplace either, although she didn't put the barricade until a few years ago.
Here's the Gatorade collection I found in the spare bedroom (I shouldn't complain- it could be bottles of vodka):
My mother, like all grandmothers, dotes on my daughter. She's her only grandchild and freakin' adorable so I can't blame her. But in my opinion, this on the back of the front door......just a little creepy.
I guess it's better than having it on the outside of the front door. There's a matching collage on the inside of the garage door and on the fridge. But at least it's normal on the fridge.
I didn't spend very long there yesterday because the truck set us a little behind and I wanted to get in a full 45-60 minutes of swimming. But a quick trip to the bathroom reminded me of another one of my mother's quirks. She hangs calendars everywhere. This is in the downstairs bathroom. The one company would use.
It's practical, really. Just in case you forget what day it is while you're sitting on the crapper. Man, I hate when that happens!
Honestly, mom, who hangs a calendar in a bathroom? And on the window??? At least it was open to the right month. In the kitchen it was March and in the mudroom it was May.
I had to leave. On my way to the pool I passed the other notable part of CowTown. This might actually be part of Frederick, and not Wville.
Ah yes. The Maryland Odd Fellows Home. Screw you politically correct bastards! We're Frederick and we're going to call them what they are! Odd Fellows! Not insane, not mentally handicapped, not socially unacceptable or whatever other mumbo jumbo you come up with to spare the feelings of these guys and their families. No, this home is for the Odd Fellows. Of Maryland.
I passed this quite frequently for years before I realized it didn't say Maryland Old Fellows Home. Not that that would have been much better.
What's even more amusing is that there is a neon sign on the actual building bragging that it's the Maryland Odd Fellows Home. Seriously it looks like something out of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. In order to get a shot of that I actually have to go up the driveway. But it might be worth it.
To be fair, it might not be a looney bin, it might have something to do with this. Which would make sense since the building shares a campus with the Banner School. But I like my version much better.
Ok thus ends our trip through CowTown. I hope you enjoyed the ride. Please come back and visit sometime!
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