As many CHUD readers can attest to, holiday traveling is about as much fun as working out to a Richard Simmons’ Sweatin’ To The Oldies tape.  At first it’s bearable, but around the twenty minute mark, you’re reduced to a jiggly, babbling mess, forced to re-evaluate your life and, quite possibly, your sexuality.  Such is my annual pilgrimage to beautiful Virginia.

 

My folks live there, so every year I pack up my thermal underwear, my Ben-Wa balls, and a bucket of hand lotion (to, you know, pass the time) and brave a series of airports in order to freeze my ass off for two weeks and gain even more weight.  Oh yeah, and visit my family.

 

Since I was born and bred in Southern California, I have no concept of seasons.  If the doppler radar shows rain in the forecast, San Diegans immediately hide in their panic rooms or take to the freeways in the hopes of driving like inebriated retards.  Virginia, on the other hand, actually has seasons.  Usually, I visit during “testicle shrinking” season.  It once got so cold there that my nuts actually disappeared.  I dusted for fingerprints “down there,” filed a missing persons report, posted flyers, the whole nine yards.  After visiting a Swedish steam bath, the little bastards finally dropped from wherever they were hiding.  That was a rough month and a half.

 

Before embarking on any traveling adventure, I usually alleviate my nervousness and anxiousness by pounding shots of Whiskey at the airport bar, coupled with some tasty beer chasers. Inevitably, I end up so soused that I ease into a restless, uncomfortable sleep on the plane, punctuated by brief moments of belligerency and horrific repressed memories.  Eventually, I’ll find myself drooling on the passengers seated next to me and, if past experiences are any indication, this means I’ll be drooling on a fat guy (who always smells like fermented White Castle cheeseburgers.  It’s a peculiar stench.  Like wet meat) and a screaming baby.  This fat guy/screaming baby combination rarely deviates, although I once sat between a fat baby and a screaming guy.  Go figure.

 

Aside from my seating arrangement troubles, I frequently find myself chosen for inspection when going through security.  I guess I have a certain “look” about me.  After enduring my tenth body cavity search, I vowed only to wear mesh shirts, flip-flops and tight, bright pink bicycle shorts to the airport.  Little did I know that this get-up made me stand out even more.  So, I’ve just given up.  Now I just slip on a tasteful muu-muu and pretend I’m a performer in one of those drag-queen revues in Vegas, all done up like Mama Cass and shit.  I’ll sing a few verses of “California Dreamin” for the security guards.  They dig that.  Then I bend over for another anal probe.

 

Layovers are also fun.  This time, I had a four-hour layover in Washington.  At five o’clock in the morning.  Travelers shuffled around barren terminals and gates like mimes tripping on acid, their faces drained of color, their expressions full of fear and exhaust.  Shit, I once battled the Ebola virus while stranded in the Las Vegas airport.  That was fun.  Nothing soothes a pounding headache like slot machines going off every two seconds.  I was so hopped-up on Advil and Chamomile tea that, at one point, I actually thought I was Jesus.  Not Christ.  Jesus, the Mexican janitor at my old high school.  All I wanted to do was buff the floors.  Man, that was a wild layover.

 

And although I’m not a superstitious person, I do find myself repeating one action every time I board a plane.  I order a single Bloody Mary.  I don’t know how this began or why I do it, especially since I’m not a huge fan of the drink (by the way, this has nothing to do with my story, but I needed to share this experience with you. The one time I broke my “plane only” rule was when I ordered a Bloody Mary from Applebee’s.  The glass the Bloody Mary came in was the size and shape of a goldfish bowl.  Crammed with of a variety of plant species, this drink was shoved full of cacti, tree branches, bark, leaves, even a couple of sea cucumbers.  Half the goddamn rainforest lived and thrived in my drink.  Just to take a sip, I had to drive to Home Depot and pick up a couple of migrant workers to trim some of the shit growing alongside the brim of the glass.  After cutting through all this crap, I finally gulped down what had to be the nastiest liquid to ever slide down my throat.  Chunks of pepper the size and texture of an old man’s kidney stones floated in a thick sea of tomato juice, tickling my uvula.  If any of you unlucky bastards ever find yourselves stuck at Applebee’s, do not order this drink.  Your taste buds and intestines will appreciate it).  Anyway, through some weird, unknown, possibly schizophrenic rationale, I usually find if I slam a Bloody Mary while flying, then the plane ride will be smoother than the skin on a Hickory Farms sausage.

 

Anyway, by taking the red eye into Washington, I soon realized that nothing in the airport is open at five o’clock in the morning.  Maybe a coffee cart here or there, but that’s about it.  So, I just wandered around aimlessly and took as many shuttle rides across the tarmac as I could.  Those things are like Disneyland rides.  Whenever the shuttle first moved, I screamed “WEEEEEEEEEEE!” while holding my hands up, as though careening through the winding tracks of Space Mountain.  Try it sometime, it’ll freak people out.

 

So, after a few days or so, I’ll have to repeat this traveling adventure, only my circulatory system will be poisoned with spiked eggnog and my belly will be full of Christmas fudge.  But, in the end, it’ll be worth it, since I don’t get to see my family as much as I’d like to.

 

So, to all my friends and family and CHUD brothers and sisters…

 

Happy Holidays!