{"id":466,"date":"2008-10-26T21:01:24","date_gmt":"2008-10-27T04:01:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/?p=466"},"modified":"2008-10-26T21:08:59","modified_gmt":"2008-10-27T04:08:59","slug":"knoxville-tantrum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/?p=466","title":{"rendered":"Knoxville tantrum"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/wp-content\/uploads\/weather.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-468\" title=\"weather\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/wp-content\/uploads\/weather-300x202.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"202\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/wp-content\/uploads\/weather-300x202.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/wp-content\/uploads\/weather.jpg 325w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>I am sulking.<\/p>\n<p>When I originally conceived the idea of scootering across country I carefully proclaimed, in my most zen-like manner, that I would be willing to accept whatever the outcome.\u00a0 If I only made it as far as Modesto, so be it.<\/p>\n<p>And so it is, that I find myself just east of Knoxville, Tennessee facing the very real possibility that I may not be able to complete this journey.\u00a0 Upon my arrival and the requisite weather.com check in, I discovered that the high pressure system that is creating so much havoc\u00a0in the midwest\u00a0is going to cost me at least\u00a0two days of travel.\u00a0 If the high winds persist past that, I will simply run out of time.<\/p>\n<p>There is nothing spiritual or even marginally adult in my reaction.\u00a0 I am pitiful and bitter.\u00a0 After 2,460 miles of eating diner food, washing\u00a0my one set of clothes in the sink of a Days Inn in a town where the only other choice was a Motel 6,\u00a0and regularly losing the feeling in the last three fingers of my throttle hand,\u00a0I am invested.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>And seriously, if one more local person says to me &#8216;yeah this &lt;insert today&#8217;s meteorological freakness here&gt; never\u00a0usually happens this time of year&#8217;\u00a0 the next time you see me will be a CNN perp walk.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Tantrum off.\u00a0 I will figure this out.<\/p>\n<p>While there may have been difficulties, there were also gifts.\u00a0 Today it came in the form of deepening autumn colors and sharing my lunch with Clarence Pickel.\u00a0 Aside from a name that just makes you smile, Clarence&#8217;s family pre-dates the American Revolutionary War.\u00a0 We met at the Huddle House in Kingston, Tennessee.\u00a0 A war veteran and widow, Clarence is soft spoken in a noisy environment.\u00a0 Off mic, there\u00a0was an endearing\u00a0softness\u00a0to his voice when\u00a0he\u00a0spoke about his daughter, Rachel.<\/p>\n<p><object classid=\"clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000\" codebase=\"http:\/\/fpdownload.macromedia.com\/pub\/shockwave\/cabs\/flash\/swflash.cab#version=7,0,0,0\" width=\"400\" height=\"15\" id=\"xspf_player\" align=\"middle\"><param name=\"allowScriptAccess\" value=\"sameDomain\" \/><param name=\"movie\" value=\"\/xspf_player_slim.swf?song_url=https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/wp-content\/uploads\/clarence-pickel.mp3&song_title='Clarence Pickel'&player_title='Clarence Pickel'\" \/><param name=\"quality\" value=\"high\" \/><param name=\"bgcolor\" value=\"#e6e6e6\" \/><embed src=\"\/xspf_player_slim.swf?song_url=https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/wp-content\/uploads\/clarence-pickel.mp3&song_title='Clarence Pickel'&player_title='Clarence Pickel'\" quality=\"high\" bgcolor=\"#e6e6e6\" width=\"400\" height=\"15\" name=\"xspf_player\" align=\"middle\" allowScriptAccess=\"sameDomain\" type=\"application\/x-shockwave-flash\" pluginspage=\"http:\/\/www.macromedia.com\/go\/getflashplayer\" \/><\/object><br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/wp-content\/uploads\/clarence-pickel.mp3\" target=_blank>Clarence Pickel<\/a><\/p>\n<p>It was the nicest part of my day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I am sulking. When I originally conceived the idea of scootering across country I carefully proclaimed, in my most zen-like manner, that I would be willing to accept whatever the outcome.\u00a0 If I only made it as far as Modesto, so be it. And so it is, that I find myself just east of Knoxville, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=466"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":476,"href":"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466\/revisions\/476"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hwireroad.org\/2008\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}