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George steered his Bug into the right-hand lane.
"You hungry?"
"Only a little."
"Mind if I stop?"
"Go ahead."
George pulled off the highway and down the ramp, underneath a lush canopy of green trees. I saw as he turned that there as a McDonalds down the street, beyond the gas stations. "McDonalds again?"
"Sure, why not?"
"We've eaten there 6 times since we left home."
"Well, I'm hungry."
"Yeah, but there's a neat looking diner right over there."
"Eh, I don't know about diners. The food, it's all, you know...at least with McDonalds, I know what I'm getting. And it's neat to see all of the other things that they server that we can't get back home."
"I don't get it."
After George ate, and we got back in his car, we drove for a while down 95, further and further south. As the sun started to set, I said "We should find a place to stop and get some rest."
He grunted "Yea, alright"
Within minutes we were sitting in front of a Holiday Inn. "What's this?"
"A Holiday Inn. What's weird about that?"
"Well, there's that place across the street that looks cool."
"That looks like a local place."
"What's wrong with that?"
"You never can trust them. What if the service sucks?"
"I've had bad service at chain hotels too."
"Well, this is where I want to stay."
I relented. It was just better to not piss George off.
We got two sixes of Rolling Rocks at the gas station and sat on lawn chairs in front of our hotel room, watching the sun set over the swimming pool.
I turned to George. "Hey, I was looking at a map, and I saw that there's a road running almost parallel to the highway for 100 miles tomorrow. It was the old highway, but we get to drive through some nice countryside and see some old historical sites. What do you think?"
George took a long draw from his beer and looked out at the sky, turning dark red over us. "I don't know man, that seems kind of dumb."
"Why?"
"Well, we could hit local traffic, and it might take longer."
"Yeah, but we're ahead of schedule, and it's not like we're on a schedule anyway."
"I just want to stick with 95."
I knocked the bottom of my beer on the arm of my lawn chair.
"Dammit George, you want to stay on the highway, and avoid local roads. You only want to eat at McDonalds, and you only want to stay at chain hotels. Everything's the same...boring. I can't tell one day from the next!" I was getting pissed. "Why did you even come on this trip anyway?"
George looked at me for a second, considering. "To get away from it all and try something new, of course".

Doing some more unpacking in my house I came across a container filled with some old writings. I found a sketchbook filled with writing and poetry from 9 years ago, and this caught my eye...

Now I lay me down to sleep
- on this unkempt bed with sheets astray
I pray the Lord my soul to keep
- or keep these dreams beyond my head
And if I die before I wake
- like I do so often when I dream
I pray the Lord my soul to take
- whoever thought the dead could scream?