June 25, 2007
Time of departure: 7:30 A.M.
Temperature: 71 degrees
Elevation: 449 feet
Total Mileage: 140
“It was at this point, the Rebels were not able to achieve penetration.”
Being a teacher, I thought my type of humor was affected by the people I am paid to teach, namely 16 year olds. Over the years, I’ve learned to laugh at, how shall I say it, sophomoric jokes? O.K. Who am I kidding? I’ve always been that way. But, I thought I was in the minority.
I did, anyway, until the above quote was said.
Meredith and I were at Shiloh National Battlefield, watching the battle synopsis video at the visitor’s center.
Unfortunately, after the penetration comment, I lost all composure. Thankfully, so did several other “adults” in the room, ruining my hope that my dirty sense of humor was from my profession.
We visited the Battlefield last year and had a good time. But the video drew us back for a second helping.
Picture, if you will, a video made in the early 50’s, with production values somewhere around a high school play. Actually, I’ve seen quite a few high school plays with better acting and production.
To give you an idea of the quality, somewhere in the video, a young male with blond hair comes on screen, with a black beard, although, it really wasn’t a beard. It looked more like shag carpet glued, I think by a three year old, to his cheeks.
I kept giggling, and Meredith kept telling me I would have to be quiet. Then, she started laughing. By the end, everybody in the room was having a grand time.
Enter General Grant (a 17 year old, with carpet on his jowls). The voice-over(I actually think they got Vincent Price for this) comes on and says, “General Grant commands the troops to dig mass graves.” And the whole room gave a collective, “wha-ha-ha!”
We had too much fun to be at a Battlefield. We left with a smile on our faces.
On down the road, we soon passed into Mississippi. The terrain became flatter and bottom land more prevalent. Pine trees became the dominant tree.
We knew, from last year, at some point we would come to a swampy area crossed by the county road. Last year, the water was maybe 70 yards across, a couple feet deep. I figured there to be less water this year from the drought.
I was wrong. The water was farther across and deeper. It seems the local beavers had been at work and had the water backed up better than last year.
We walked across to see how deep it really was. At the deepest point, it was crotch level.
I cranked my bike. I decided to ride it across. Three-quarters across, the bike died. I was afraid the bike had sucked water since the water level had been higher than the rear wheel. Luckily, I was in too high a gear. It re-fired, I geared down, and I pulled out.
I decided it would be better to walk Meredith’s bike across. It proved to be about the same level of difficulty as riding mine.
We were lucky. Water that deep can swallow a motorcycle if I were unfortunate enough to drop it.
I hope the video to the right shows you what I mean.
Afterward, we made our way to our destination of Holly Springs, MS.
Tomorrow we hope to be on the Mississippi River. It will be a short day. We need the rest.
See y’all down the trail.
Ron and Meredith
