Big Love

Savannah! The land of Spanish moss, southern gentility, pirates, and well-behaved kids. In short, everything good. We arrived on...I have no idea, as I have lost track of space and time. But we got in and checked into a hotel called...something, I don't remember and I wasn't paying attention. It was owned by two lovely people who I thought hated me at first but were just good weirdoes. They had an awesome cat that they referred to as their child, and the gentleman collected toy cars, which made me nostalgic and slightly sad for my step-dad, Kevin, who inevitably would have spent the entire trip, had he been there, discussing said cars with him.

Granted, there were two enormous dead cockroaches in the hotel room, but I've been told that's just a given in Georgia, like we should feel ripped off if they weren't there. And everything interior in the south is freezing. Just ridiculous. It's ninety outside and three degrees inside. Get some moderation, South. The first night, we meandered through town as bugs continued their assault on my legs, moving up and venturing to new and exciting spots such as my butt and arms to feast upon. We ended up at The Pirate House, which, guess what, was once a house of pirates. And stuff. And now it's a really tacky, overpriced theme restaurant, which is like eating at the Pirates of The Caribbean at Disneyland, except you can't chuck rolls at people on the boats going through the ride. Midway through our meal, which was forgettable sans my discovery that if you put crab in something, I will eat it, a pirate of indeterminate gender started avasting and whatnot to the huge number of kids who were there. Oh, and the people at the table behind us who were celebrating their eight thousandth wedding anniversary kept talking to us because they were so fucking sick of each other after all those years of marriage. So this pirate is going on and on about the history of the restaurant and pirates, all of which completely contradicted a rather Obama-hope-esque white-washing of pirates Linda and I read about at a Chicago museum. (pirates are the ultimate socialists, was that message). This was more skull and crossbones, one 'fact' being that 60% of Savannah's dirt contains human bones. Neato! The kids, because they are good, well-behaved Southern kids, were awed by this. Then came the ghost pictures, aka, fool tourists into thinking they're taking pictures of ghosts by instructing them to take pictures of glass windows with flashes on and then pointing out orbs. As much as I actually DO believe in ghosts, I was like whoa come on now.

Afterwards, we tried to find a good bar and wandered into one featuring one of those chicks who's like 'well, I hate Savannah because I moved to the mecca of sophistication that is Florida and now I've tasted liberty and can't go back but still weirdly did move back and think I'm a huge outcast cos I have a tattoo.' So we wandered on to a pub, where we met an awesome bartender named Laurie who introduced Linda to sweet tea vodka. If you are her parents, stop reading now. Okay. Anyway, we also met Colin, who is going to be me and Linda's polygamist husband when polygamy inevitably becomes legal due to the complete collapse of morality that will be brought about if gay marriage occurs, right after humans are then allowed to wed toasters and miniature horses. I, personally, am pumped, that is if armageddon doesn't occur RIGHT AFTERWARDS. What's that, you say? Iowa, Massachussets, umm some other really shamefully redneck state that is STILL somehow more forward thinking and fair minded than California haven't all turned to pillars of salt? Well, have you tried licking anyone from that state lately? SALTY. Anyway, Colin enjoys laughing at people as much as we do, and has some job we can't talk about, which duh he's in the CIA, kay.

The next day, we toured the Mercer Mansion. I'm not sure how much this will make sense because I could write an entire blog on its own about Midnight In The Garden of Good and Evil but instead I just say read the book, it has some really interesting insight into Southern culture and Savannah high society. So before the Mercer Mansion, we toured the Bonaventure Cemetery, which is where the cream of Savannah are buried. Linda may have barfed up a little sweet tea vodka there. Maybe.

Anyway back to the Mercer House. Let me provide some background: the house was owned by the flamboyant (translation: so, so gay) Jim Williams, who is essentially singlehandedly responsible for the resurrection and restoration of historic Savannah. So for a city full of history-loving southerners with extensive love and pride for their home, his 'eccentricities' (GAY GAY GAY) were overlooked and possibly even down-right tolerated. To the extent that when he killed a kind of skeazy lover of his who was essentially blackmailing him, the community totally sided with his claim of self-defense, even though by his own admission, it was primarily an 'emotional' self defense. ('He was insultin' mah pride' in Bill Compton Voice) We were told no questions would be answered about the crime itself, but our tour guide, who was a robot, incidentally, and was fond of telling us what he 'truly believed' Jim Williams would have done had he been there to guide us (he died from a heart attack in the early nineties) requested we ask whatever we pleased. BTW, from what I've read about Williams, I am pretty sure he would have let me and Linda tour the house based on liking our style, followed by him forgetting to collect money from us because he was drunk, giving us sweet tea vodka, and then sitting with us on the veranda while we all made fun of ugly people. SO. The tour guide completely referred to the murder as an 'incident' which is what I love about the South. No one can ever just call something what it is, they have to come up with a polite euphemism for it.

Then we went to Paula Deen's restaurant, Lady and Sons, where we essentially ate sticks of butter. And then went drinking. Again. With Colin and this time, bartender Laurie! She took us to a local dive bar which I will say is my first time drinking anywhere with a confederate flag and I won't lie, it made me uncomfortable. The jukebox ate our money, I somehow spent forty bucks, and a long haired guy who looked like he was in Los Lobos kept asking me what my favorite Depeche Mode song was.

The next day, we had lunch at a place called the Gryphon, which was delicious and gave me a free cookie. We perused the SCAD kids' art, which was FAR better than most art school stuff, I will admit. Then we went to a wildlife reserve where we saw almost no animals, I squealed over baby alligators for about ten minutes before realizing they were rubber, and ended up way behind schedule.

In other words, it was fucking awesome.