Life in the fast lane

My Mazda RX-8 finally got to go zoom zoom on Saturday, November 15, as Bill and David joined a group of fellows for a Road Rally. That's Grant 2nd from the left with his friend Shep who organized the event, saying he had wanted to do this since he was a child. Bill and David are on either side of my car which is 5th from the left. And, yes, that is a 1969 Corvette on the far right. I was proud of myself for identifying the Mini Cooper, 3rd from the left. The other 4 are (from the left) BMW M3, Lexus IS250, Mustang Roush, Nissan 350Z. And, by the way, for historical purposes, in the midst of this bitter recession, yesterday Ford Motor stock was trading at $1.25/share and General Motors at $2.79 although they are trading at $2.20 this very minute. They say that we baby boomers aren't going to be able to retire when we thought we would. That's pretty scary considering we already did.

Meanwhile, back to the topic at hand, the first stop was outside the Tennessee State Prison, the impressive building in the background. Currently closed to all but movie and TV sets (The Green Mile and The Last Castle were filmed here), this state prison was opened in 1898 and closed in 1992. Built with 800 cells meant to house 1 prisoner each, 1400 walked through the gates on day 1, insuring overcrowding conditions from the start. No heat or ventilation in the cells either. Ouch! Several interesting batches of escapees and prison riots.

The guys then went to the square in downtown Franklin, out onto the curvy Natchez Trace and on to Lynchburg, ending with a tour of the Jack Daniels factory located there. Finally back to Nashville. Winning the Rally had to do with getting cards at each stop and having the best poker hand at the finish. Bonus cards could be obtained by getting things like speeding tickets, etc., so I'm happy that Team Vandy didn't win. My rules had included the stipulation that REX come back in one piece for it ever to zoom zoom on another Road Rally.

Mojo missed Bill so much that he took 2 naps in his cage (something he has never done before - he doesn't dislike the cage, but I've never seen him just go in there). I managed to take my nap on the sofa as usual.