Time to make a decision. After hauling out Wallace’s “Travel Guide to North America”, which he forgot he gave me in 1999, I think I’ll take the scenic route. Here’s a jpeg of George getting ready for the trip. To a lot of people, except those who work there, Disneyworld is an American institution. It turns out there are several ways to get to Orlando that show as good roads on various maps.
Wallace and I got to Lake Worth for coffee and donuts, which is the furthest north I’ve been this year. Turns out that was one of the most recommended drives in the book, didn't plan the route. I have a schedule to get to Kissimmee, but none to get back, so I think I’ll leave a day early and miss my Jimbo’s gig for the first time since things began.There was a babe in the shop today, my type and all. I couldn’t get anywhere since she didn’t react to several offerings. Too bad, that was something I’d go for any day. Or night. Meanwhile, on comes the newscast, some guy with an AK-47 hops out of his car and shoots four cops, one of them dead. Of course, the entire Broward police force of 300 begins a massive manhunt, with the same ruthless efficiency they do whenever even a homeless vagrant man is murdered.
The media were equally quick to get the most out of it, but remember local newspeople are, well, local. They call the AK-47 as a “high-powered” rifle. Wrong, the Automat Kalashnikov Model 1947 is an assault rifle, meant to be fired from the hip to keep the enemy’s head down until you get across open areas. It is not even particularly accurate. Unless the cops were standing in a very tight group, something isn’t tallying up here.
The suspect had his wife and kids in the car, and the wife gave the police false information designed to give him a head start. So they were expecting trouble, another odd fact. The police say it was an ordinary check stop because the vehicle was moving “erratically”. Is that a fact? Just like any car on I-95? Of course, the police would never use this kind of incident to conduct a massive shakedown of the whole area. What? Okay, cancel that.
In the usual rush to get the story before the facts, both the authorities and media broadcast the wrong man’s identity over the whole state. Those white suspects and black suspects are so hard to tell apart in Florida’s integrated society. Remember the unofficial police motto, “Often Wrong but Never in Doubt”. Apparently that guy turned himself in to assist police and not because he feared for his very life, that is a vicious lie, I tell you. Of course, if the police discover he has any outstanding traffic warrants, they’d let him go because that is a separate matter.
In all, this is one story I’d like to hear the other side of. A cop-killer driving a white car with a black hood? To help the helicopter spot him? Drugs are involved but so are a host of curious and unexplained details. The television version has holes big enough to their own vans through. The suspect has no choice but to run now. He can’t even turn himself in.
News from the trailer park. Around this time of year the Canadians arrive, so the park hires a team of laborers with weed-whackers and leaf-blowers to spruce things up. I sadly report that the redneck garden is no more. Wait, I have something in its place. Since Wallace left, the front patio has not gotten that much use at all. We have a tree or bush emerging between the tiles. I’ll brick of the area and let nature take over. It kind of has already but this is my first tree.
The plan takes form upon discovering a road (710) from West Palm Beach that beelines through a place called Indiantown to Okeechobee. From there good old 441 goes all the way north, crossing under the Turnpike at Yeehaw Junction. Trust me folks, you are not missing anything by not taking the freeways in this area. No matter what you’ve heard, you can never see the coast or ocean from there; you are miles and miles inland.I’ve got most things ready and could leave on Friday afternoon if I want. Disneyworld beckons. I’ll make the choice at noon tomorrow.
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