Unfortunately, Hollywood is filled with angry writers who give us dingy endings, Mr. Roarke doesn't always wave to us after our fantasy is fulfilled on a tropical island, and road trips don't always go as planned.

With most of America in the rearview mirror, Erik and I headed off across New York and New England.  The Element would pull up in front of the Big Blue House at the end of the day, we would disembark and walk into a freshly remodeled house with sparkling new appliances and glistening paint.  We would kick off our shoes, sit on the porch, and watch the crazy woman across the street.

The key factor in this story is an unseen electrician who purportedly was toiling in the depths of my basement while I drove across country.  I was in Utah; he was supposed to be in the circuit box.  I was in Oklahoma, he was intended to be running new conduit.  I was in New York; he was to be finished.  I did what I was to do.  The electrician did not.

Arriving in Portland I did not find a house.  I found a pile of construction debris, dusty moving boxes, and at least another week of waiting before I could sit on the porch with a mint julip and watch the insane neighbors.

Unwilling and unable to sleep in a house without a bathroom or six inches of clean floor, I booked a room at the local Comfort Inn...which I later learned was the hotel where the September 11th hijackers stayed the night of September 10th.  The front desk clerk was not amused when I asked for the Muhammed Atta suite. 

I may from time to time demonstrate questionable taste.  Yet, if I were planning to kill myself the following morning, I certainly would stay somewhere better than a Comfort Inn.  Virgins are lovely, but eternity is a long time and they won't be virgins forever.  Waking up a thousand years from now with seventy seven nagging wives, you might think:  "Damn, I should have spent my last night at the Four Seasons."

I am sitting seven floors above Portland at the slight more expensive, oh so much better, Holiday Inn.  The seagulls are resting from a day of chasing lobster boats, the tourists are wandering the streets, and somewhere across town an electrician is waiting outside my house for me to arrive with a checkbook.  Perhaps I'll go to a movie first.
 

Terrorist Comfort Inn (note sign for plane)	Portland, Maine
The Big Blue House debris

Road Trip 2003
Sister Betty's Photo Archive
Photo Archive:  The Skulls