Been more restless by the day and longing for even a little bit of an "adventure," even the tamest of one.

So, despite the endless rain forecast for today, we did load three photocopy paper boxes of books and media, and headed up to Chattanooga after stopping by Chik-Fil-A for breakfast. It was merely lightly overcast as we started out, and we had the car windows rolled down and were listening to Gaelic Storm. However, before we got to the state line it started to pour. Thankfully the boxes had lids, as we had to shuttle them in from the parking lot—the place was packed! I guess rainy days in Chattanooga are good for visiting bookstores. So we turned in our books (this was our first time trading in books) and commenced to browse.

Two hours later...

Both James and I picked up a gift for a friend. Unfortunately, I picked out a book I already had because they had issued it in a new edition and changed the title; dang, and I thought I'd found a different book about Victorian homes. What I ended up with otherwise:

• Savage Peace, about the aftermath of World War I in the US (race riots, "red" scares, strikes and increasing social turmoil)
• Don't Eat This Book: Fast Food and the Supersizing of America (only 50¢ to boot)
• Providence of a Sparrow, about a man who rescues and raises a sparrow
• George, Nicholas and Wilhelm (a.k.a. George V, Czar Nicholas II, and the Kaiser, who were, incidentally, all cousins)
• Around the World in 80 Dates (listened to the author on a "Travel With Rick Steves" podcast; besides, it was only 50¢)
• Tony Horwitz's Blue Latitudes, following in the footsteps of Captain Cook (to replace the one I bought at the library book sale, but turned out to have missing pages)
• A new copy of Born Free because my original one, the one I had from when I was ten years old, had fallen apart because I read it so many times

By now James was relaxing in a sofa up front. I couldn't find the Christmas books, but I did go upstairs where the CDs were, looking for Aaron Copland and found some Christmas CDs: "Irish Christmas," a replacement for a cassette ("Christmas Weekend" from England), and three NPR "Jazz Christmas" albums.

Best of all, I still have almost $15 in credit left. :-)

By now it was nearly three o'clock, so we decamped to Golden Corral for linner (or is it dunch?). Since Golden Corral started as a "steakhouse," it was depressing that the steak on the buffet was so bad; they'd marinated it in something and it tasted of the marinade rather than of beef. The chicken wings and the pork ribs were better, and I had some seafood salad and popcorn shrimp as well.

We had Barnes & Noble coupons, so after finishing our meal, we circled the Hamilton Mall and found the store, which is part of the mall. I've seen Books-a-Million stores in a mall, and at least two Borders as part of a mall, but never a B&N. This was a really nice store, too; there were books there I'd never seen in any B&N in our area. I was going to buy the new "Manor House" mystery, but figured I could pick that up in Atlanta and went looking in other aisles. They had an impressive history section and I found Are We There Yet?: The Golden Age of American Family Vacations—a perfect time of year to find it, as this was the time of year we always took our family vacations.

I was also impressed by the travel section. Usually when James and I go on vacation, I like to check out the "local interest" section of bookstores, hoping to find intriguing titles about the area; most of the time the majority of these books are ghost stories. Ho-hum. But this store had an extensive section of local books, including many of the "Images of America" titles. Plus their travel titles were outstanding...almost picked up a book by Jerry Ellis, who walked the length of the Trail of Tears (he's also walked the path of the Canterbury pilgrims, of the Pony Express, and of Sherman's march through Georgia). But I was instead seduced by Route 66 Still Kicks. So what does one do with one coupon and two books you want? Which one do you choose?

Silly. Both of them, of course. :-)

It was raining hard by the time we left Chattanooga and the ride home was nowhere as pleasant as the one up. The sky lowered in more shades of grey than E.L. James ever conceived of, and every ten minutes Georgia Monsoon Season kicked into high gear. We had previously told a friend that the next time we went up to McKay's we would ask if she wanted to come along, but thankfully she had already gone there last weekend. I was really glad we didn't have to pick up Sue because it was only the two of us to worry about and not three. There was a good deal of traffic on the road, although it wasn't as bad as what was heading northbound, and between the constant spells of hard rain and the spray coming off the tractor-trailers, I was really spooked by the drive. By the time we got into "fair weather" (read: not a deluge, just showers), we were almost home and my shoulders and hands hurt from the tension of gripping the wheel, and my head ached. I'm surprised the car didn't petition me for waterwings and a snorkel halfway through the ride.

We spent the rest of the night quietly, mostly because the rain knocked out the satellite and we ended up watching MeTV: Lost in Space (a halfway decent episode from first season about the dangers of selfishness), Star Trek ("Squire of Gothos"), and then "Svengoolie" introducing the William Castle film I Saw What You Did. I've read about this movie, but this is the first Castle film I've ever seen. Two teenage girls and one of the girls' cute little sister spend a boring evening making prank phone calls. Unfortunately they call up one man, saying "I saw what you did and I know who you are," right after he's murdered and buried his wife. Of all things, Joan Crawford plays the guy's next-door neighbor who is in love with him, and who thinks now that wifey is gone he will marry her.

Of particular interest to me in this movie: Frank Weatherwax, brother of Rudd, handled the two dogs used in this film. The girls' little Yorkshire terrier looked like it was "Silky" from the Lassie series (recently retired since Lassie was now off with the forestry service), and I'm pretty sure the other dog was played by "Spike," a.k.a. "Old Yeller."

Labels: books, Christmas, dogs, food, movies, music, television, travel, weather

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