THE PRACTICE

Today’s post brought to you by: 42 remaining minutes of free onboard wifi

Grateful for: Having 2 seats to myself

Trying hard to accept: How long it takes to get anywhere in this vast country

Your typical Greyhound station. To kill time at the New Orleans one you can: eat Subway, get rid of your wallet-full of quarters in the shooting alley, pluck your eyebrows in the restroom (done!), watch Spanish TV with English subtitles, or, if you’re really bored, all 4.

It’s 1.12am and I’ve been awake for 21 hours. Like a young resident doctor, but without the big pay cheque and sexy scrubs.

Am somewhere between Mobile “Mobeel” Alabama and next place we have to get off bus, Tallahassee, Florida, at 5am.

I can’t believe that this time yesterday I was tucked up in a super comfortable king size bed in a super comfortable home in a genteel, manicured neighbourhood. My, how things change in 24 hours.

Every family has one – the chip-on-the-shoulder relation – and I met the Greyhound family’s one in New Orleans. A driver who makes US customs and border security staff look like your best friends.

Everyone got told off for some crime or other against Greyhound. I’ve now got a criminal record for printing my ticket double-sided. “Who told you to do dat? Don’t ever do dat again, you hear? Now get on the bus.”

If I wasn’t relying on him to drive I would’ve pushed him under the bus.

Thankfully we switched buses at Mobile and he drove off to harass the people of Atlanta. The new driver, Miss Sharleen Williams, is like that sweet young cousin who’s always nice to everyone.

Riding the bus can be the pits. When it’s crowded, stuffy, smelly, running 7 hours late, and when you’re forced to use the bathroom because you stupidly drank coffee 4 hours ago. But the upside is you meet the most interesting and amusing people.

Like the woman from Arkansas who thought I sounded like Joss Stone. (Doesn’t she smoke like a chimney?). And the woman with 6 missing teeth from Florida who’s on her way to visit her 27 year old son who’s just come out of prison. She’s the proudest mom now her son’s found a girlfriend, job and gotten his kids back.

Then there’s Steven from all over the place. Gave away all his stuff, bought a kayak from Walmart and spent 3 months paddling the Mississippi from Minnesota to Louisiana. “Aren’t there big cargo ships down the Mississippi?” I asked. “Yeah, there were a few hairy moments. Not sure I’d do it again”, he said with a big childlike grin.

He’s now off to walk the Florida Trail for the next 3 months. Everything he owns fits into a tramping pack and big pillow case, and weighs 35lb.

“They cut my disability ‘cause they said there was nothing wrong with my mind. Now I only get $1,000 a month.” He’s gonna buy all his food for the walk at Dollar Generals and Walmarts along the way.

He then told me he’s a Gulf War veteran – a nuclear missile specialist. “Wow, that must’ve been tough. Where’d you get stationed?” I asked, thinking Iraq, Kuwait, etc.

“Wyoming.”

Steven Action Man

On the New Orleans-Mobile leg I was lulled to almost sleep listening to 2 women chat. There’s something about the way southerners speak that sounds like a lullaby. I think it’s the softness of the accent and the flat tones. Compare to something like German which is jerky and abrupt and full of uneven tones and volumes. I can’t describe it but it’s so lovely to listen to.

And there’s no stopping and starting, interrupting or awkward silences. It’s like they each know exactly what to say and when to say it.

3 hours and no sleep later. The bus station in Tallahassee, Florida, looks like a combined homeless shelter, veterans’ hospital and prison yard. There are men with crutches, towels over their heads, and sprawled on the seats and floors.

You can buy anything in the 24-hour convenience store as long as it’s (a) been sitting on the shelf since 1978 (b) minimum 1,500 calories (c) full of more chemicals than your average high school science lab.

Old enough to have its own historic artefact listing

I bought a surprisingly good (read as: desperate) coffee and started answering lots of questions from the cashier and other passengers once they discovered there was a foreigner in their midst.

“Operator Johnny Stalin” our driver to Orlando took the (boudin) biscuit. He was either a southern Baptist preacher, amateur actor or prison warden in a former life.

For the past 30 minutes we have all sat up straight like school children while Johnny barked instructions at us, throwing in dramatic pauses while some offending passenger removed their headphones so they could pay full attention to the sermon from the bus aisle.

After telling us there are only three words we need to use or hear on “his bus” and those are “please”, “thank you” and “LISTEN!” he blessed us all and finally sat down, shut up and drove.

The minute his back was turned everyone sprawled their stuff out, put their headphones back on and switched on their phones.

Now watching the sun rise. Given up all hope of sleep so must be time to make a breakfast sandwich.

Thunderstorms forecast for Friday when I wake from my 100 year sleep, but I love a good southern thunderstorm. Hopefully there’s an indoor pool at The Villages so I can rediscover my muscles.

Today’s post brought to you by: A golf cart

Grateful for: Hot shower, washing machine and bed

Trying to accept: Size of this retirement village. It makes Auckland look like a small town.

Just as the bus trip to Orlando was ending I’d managed to get the gig down to a T.

Within 4 mins, 39 seconds of arriving at a truck stop in Ocala I had:

• Complimented a passenger on her choice of nail polish
• Brushed teeth
• Gone to loo
• Checked for food in teeth
• Chosen coffee from 5 different hot blends, 2 iced blends and 3 other mysterious kinds
• Chosen milk and creamer from regular, cream, hazelnut, peppermint, chocolate, cinnamon …
• Perused baseball caps for present for brother
• Scoffed warm buttery biscuit from Arby’s
• Got back to seat without being told off by Johnny.

The theory

The practice

It was all going swimmingly when somebody’s phone rang. Johnny was straight on the PA system.

“Whose phone was that? Now ladies and gentlemen. As I told you all earlier. There are 2 words you need to use on this bus. Please. And thank you. [Wonder if I should’ve pointed out to Johnny that those are in fact 3 words].

“The thank you seals the please.

“Now all I want to do, all I asked you to let me do, is drive this bus without being interrupted by your electronic devices.

“Is that so hard, ladies and gentlemen? Do you not understand English?

“I played the announcement twice, in both English and Spanish, so you have no excuses for not doing as I very clearly asked you to do.

“Now, please, turn your phones to vibrate. Do you understand what that means? If you have trouble understanding please come up to see me, one person at a time, and I will explain it to you again.

“Thank you ladies and gentlemen. I hope the rest of your day is blessed.”

I think Johnny has some per.son.al.ity issues.

Got out of that bus and away from that man as fast as I could with 50lb of bags. My friend Ben had just flown in from Minneapolis so she whisked us away to The Villages retirement community.

Florida must be funding itself with tolls. Within 20 minutes we had to stop 3 times on the interstate to pay tolls. No rhyme or reason to amounts: $1.25, then $1, then $3.25.

If you don’t have the right change they take your picture and send you down to Mar-a-Lago to spend a week with Donald and Melania.

An hour later we stopped at The Villages supermarket to buy a few provisions. Thank goodness it was only a few because it was like shopping in Saks. The prices made NZ look cheap. Next stop Walmart.

To say this place is enormous is to say I like food. There are villages within The Villages. Each one is s … hang on, what’s this? Message on my phone. AMBER ALERT. Huh?

Seems a father, somehow connected with The Villages has kidnapped his young daughter, also somehow connected with The Villages, and everyone has been sent his name and car rego number so they can keep their eyes peeled. Well if that ain’t efficient I don’t know what is.

Ok, I haven’t slept in 36 hours so will have to show you photos of The Villages tomorrow. Might have to hire a helicopter to get it all in.

Today’s post brought to you by: Apple devices

Grateful for: whoever taught the Greeks how to cook

Trying hard to accept: I have to wait another 5 years to come live here

Of the 86,000 people who live at The Villages I don’t think any of them walk from A to B. Mainly I suspect because … usual story … there are no footpaths.

You’d think they’d encourage people to walk but I guess most people move dem bones on the golf courses or in one of the many, many exercise classes.

Ah, now let me tell you about the classes and other things on offer here. Nobody could ever act like a kid on school holidays and whinge “I’m bored.”

Today, for example, I could’ve gone to: any of 10 different art classes, any of 23 new release movies, every exercise class under the Florida sun including Bone Builders (osteoporosis be gone!), or air gun club, pool, bridge, learn-how-to-use-your-Apple-device (I really should go), book clubs, or Angel Snugs knitting for kids with cancer. And that’s just the ones I can remember. (Feels like The Generation Game conveyor belt.)

I was too late for first choice (yoga) and second choice (Pilates) and third choice (one-stroke painting) so aqua aerobics it was except that I wrongly thought I’d be able whack off half the estimated walking time and be there with 20 mins up my sleeve to chinwag with the locals, but alas had to admit defeat with 3 minutes left to walk 2 miles and call into the next pool I saw.

On my power stroll I saw 659 cars, 1,654 golf carts, 1 cyclist and 1 obviously-visiting-from-overseas pedestrian zipping across 4-lanes of traffic and traipsing along grass verges.

Everyone’s so friendly here. One woman even stopped, holding up a line of traffic, to offer me a ride. “Aren’t you freezing?” she asked.

It’s 20-something degrees!

Ben told me that Starbucks has opened its largest store in the world – 4 stories high – and guess where it is? Yip, Chicago. And guess who’s going? Yip, you and me Izabela. And guess what we’re NOT ordering: anything with the words Christmas, spice, eggnog or cream in its name.

This arvo I decided to walk to Walmart except that Google maps tried to kill me and send me straight onto a vacant lot with a train track running across it so I called by one the guard houses and asked John for advice. Seems the train track might’ve been the best option because John shook his head and said the other route would see me doing a kamikaze sprint across 6 lanes of very very fast moving cars and trucks.

Admitted defeat (again, eeek!) and walked 1.5 hr round trip to Publix supermarket past The Villages regional hospital – bigger than Wellington hospital -and every specialist medical facility you could ever want.

Two interesting things I found out from Ben which should make you lot in the antipodes very grateful you live there. Number 1: no such thing as the dole in the US. You only get a state-funded unemployment benefit if you lose your job. Never worked? No benefit.

Number 2. The level of your state-funded pension is based on your previous income. The higher your salary while you were working, the more money you get when you retire.

Oh, three actually. When you start a new job you get this many annual leave days: 0. After a year you get this many annual leave days: 5.

Here are a few squillion pictures. And good news – there’ll be more tomorrow. And the next day …

Typical street in the village we’re staying in. There are about 10 villages, each with its own manned guard house and collection of shops and golf courses and pools and other stuff I’m yet to discover. Jill-in-the-pool this morning was bemoaning how quickly The Villages is growing. More new homes = higher fees.

Guard house at our village.

Goes without saying there are more golf courses than you can swing a putter at.

This is “yes m’am” Jake the paramedic. There are 9 medical centres here. Told me he loves his job – probably partly because he never has to fight his way through blocked intersections to reach patients.

About to jump into 1 of 20 outdoor pools and meet Jan (Michigan summers; Florida winters), Laura and Jill.

If only I could’ve fitted this in my bag. I met Andy and Kathy, owners of Estate Sales Ltd, at the house next door. They get so much work at The Villages they don’t need to go anywhere else. Everything next door was for sale: half-used box of ground pepper (50c), travel-size shampoo nicked from hotel (25c), and right-up-my-street wooden bed frame – Cape Cod style – $150. If only I could’ve fitted THAT in my bag.

I know how much you love seeing what I ate so here’s tonight’s. Normally I have as much time for lamb as I do for the Labour Party but if I wasn’t so skinny-and-money-conscious I would’ve gone 2 rounds of this gyro. Think beyond the 2am kebabs of Courtenay Pl and imagine a highly seasoned with Christmas stuffing flavours, almost schnitzel-like, incredibly soft piece of deliciousness.

Flaming saganaki, Batman!! Normally I have as much time for cheese as I do for The Green party but I’d never say ochi to one of these.

Today’s post brought to you by: A Chevrolet ute

Grateful for: Ben, Joanne and Jerry

Trying hard to accept: The ringing in my ears

Those are my legs. That’s a loaded Ruger .22 caliber revolver.

Today has been one of the best days of my trip. It can be broken down into: people, food and guns.

Let’s start at the very beginning. A very good place to start.

Ben’s friends Joanne and Jerry invited us to their house about an hour into the back of beyond to eat a fish fry.

Drove right into the heart of Trump land. See those baseball caps, Peter? See your head? Put 2+2 together. Just kiddin’, my little redneck.

Across the road from the Trump stand I was struck with my new career idea. Buy smokes at $2.99 a packet, fly home, sell them down the pub for $39.95. Easy as cherry pie (which Joanne made for dessert tonight, served with Cool Whip. Yum).

Joanne and Jerry farm bees and have a shop up the road that sells … would you believe it … honey, and lots of other things like pickles made by local Mennonites, soaps, BBQ sauce, seasoning, candles and more.

Out in the parking lot, Don was cooking up boiled peanuts.

“What’s a boiled peanut?” I asked Jerry when we’re out in the Chevrolet. “You ain’t never had a boiled peanut?” he asked incredulously.

Before I had a chance to explain that peanuts don’t exactly grow on trees in NZ (first one to point out the obvious wins a prize) he’s on the phone to Don getting him to mix me up a half-regular, half-Cajun order.

Now, like me I’m sure you’d think that buying peanuts from a roadside truck would mean a small bag. Well think again folks.

Out in these parts it means a low-country boil. Jerry jumps back in the ute carrying a box the size of 3 phone books. In case the peanuts got lonely there was corn, carrots and potatoes. And if you think boiled peanuts sound pretty bland you’d be pretty much mistaken. They are unbelievably good.

Joanne and Jerry built their house in the 70s. And I mean built with their own 4 hands.

It’s on a huge section with the bees of course but also a massive processing and packing ‘shed’ built by Jerry, 14 utes, trucks, tractors and ride-on mowers, a great big lake next door and a menagerie of wild animals including alligators, turkeys and black bears.

Jerry said he’d show me the Ocala national forest up the road. Disappears off to the bedroom to grab something. That something turns out to be a Ruger revolver.

I asked the same stupid question everyone asks when confronted by a real gun for the first time. “Is that thing loaded?”

Well it sure was. Bullets the size of your middle toe. As was the other revolver and the 4ft high shotgun that also shared the room.

When I picked it up it was so heavy I almost dropped it. Would’ve really shot myself in the foot then.

It was scary, thrilling, scary, and unreal. It’s like all those movies you watch coming to real life. The revolvers were so heavy I couldn’t imagine how you’d whip one out of your buckle, release the catch, point it and shoot all before the other guy beat you to it.

“Us good old boys out here never go anywhere without our guns. We just don’t”, Jerry explained as we drove and I held the gun like a baby, with my gob hanging open. “You typically have one down your boot and one in your buckle.”

Then he told me all these stories about what happens if someone comes onto your property, how it helps to know the local judge’s brother-in-law, why you should never stop if someone waves you down on the side of the road, and why there’s no need to instal an alarm on your property.

We drove into the pine-laden Ocala national forest across white quicksand tracks that’ll claim your vehicle in 5 mins if you don’t know what you’re doing/don’t have an all-wheel drive.

Past campsites with anti-bear metal trash boxes and right up to the lake edge. Half expected a black bear to come leaping out of the trees. Lucky it didn’t ‘cause the revolver was only strong enough to injure it, which I can imagine is something you don’t want to be doing when your ute is parked facing forwards in the bleedin’ lake.

We returned home to start frying the fish. As I’m sitting at the kitchen table trying not to eat all the boiled peanuts in one go, Jerry comes in from the deck and asks if I want to fire the revolver.

I was out on that deck faster than a bear swiping a honey pot.

“Hold it like this, pull the catch, line it up, hold tight, hit that bucket square on. Easy.”

Pretend you’re Farrah Fawcett, hold it with two hands because otherwise you’ll drop it, line it up, hold tight, completely miss the bucket, and jump in fright at the force of the kickback and the incredibly loud, high-pitched noise that probably reached The Villages and rings in your head for the next hour.

I then went and shot more things, namely the breeze, with Jerry while he fried the fish and hushpuppies in big cast iron pots over gas burners.

This is a fish fry. It was a plate of pure southern delight. Go clockwise from 12 o’clock. That’s corn on the cob. Obvs. Then:

• Boiled peanuts
• Pickled okra
• Giant hushpuppies
• Cornmeal coated and deepfried snapper
• Cornmeal coated and deep fried orange roughy (you know that stuff we pay $42/kg for in NZ!)
• Cheese grits
• Broiled (grilled) snapper
• Shrimp in butter
• Homemade beans kind of like Boston baked beans made with pork and honey and spices
• Carrot and potato from the boiled peanuts feast.

I can’t even begin to tell you how delicious that whole plate was. I can’t even give out my usual best-thing-on-the-plate award because it was all so very very good.

Joanne and Jerry made me feel so incredibly welcome and invited me and Ben back for the big family fish fry on New Year’s Day. If only …

Here comes the sun! There goes the sun. Oh well, it’s still hotter than mid-summer Wellington.

Decided to be industrious and do some ironing before breakfast (oh have to tell you there’s this easy-iron spray stuff that supposedly makes ironing easier – I don’t care about that, it just makes your clothes smell so good. Cheapest perfume out).

So manage to make cup of filter coffee in the machine. Manage to turn iron on. Manage to turn TV on.

Next thing I’m up to channel 734, trying to find a non-Fox news channel … keep going … get into the Spanish TV section … up to channel 1,027. Probably broken the ‘channel’ button pushing it 1,027 times trying to get out of cable TV land and back to zero.

It’s funny, even though I’m in a country which is culturally similar to NZ I’ve often felt like a fish out of water just negotiating everyday things.

Working out how to use the coffee machine (remembering to stick the filter in!), avoiding accidentally racking up cable TV charges, working out how to set the iron to ‘cotton and linen’, paying for anything with scary eftpos-sign-name-on-screen machines. The list goes on.

Part of it is because I live a very simple life in Wellington. The fact I can use this iPad is worthy of an OBE. I haven’t owned a TV since the days they sat on cabinets and weighed more than your fridge. A microwave or dishwasher will never darken my doorstep.

I’m so used to doing things for myself without need for a car, machine, anything electronic, computerised or smarter than me.

So to find myself in the land where you can buy anything you ever imagined and are yet to imagine, full of things that think and act for you and anticipate your every move two days in advance, is at times overwhelming, fun, oh so tempting and downright scary. Have I broken it? Have I said/done the wrong thing? Have I offended someone?

Of course there’s only one solution to this. Practice makes perfect. So I need to move here.

If I could make a cake (if I could turn the oven on first) of:

• 2 cups of NZ’s work-life balance and welfare system
• 1/2 cup of southern sunshine
• 6 tonnes of biscuits, chicken fried steak and gumbo
• 3 cups of Chicago’s architecture, style and class
• 4 cups of southern hospitality
• 12 stones of a wealthy, absent bloke to pay for the whole thing, and do my tax returns.

Then I’ll be as happy as Larry. But not Larry King ‘cause look what happened to him.

We called into The Villages sales office. Where ‘office’ is defined as a palatial mansion with more Tiffany light shades, crystal bowls and unused rooms than I’ve ever seen in my life. Here I am in the parlour.

Tomorrow we’re going on a sales pitch tour round The Villages in an old tram. If you all chip in $80,000 (tax free!) I’ll buy you a pad here. Scrap among yourselves who gets to use it when. I’ll be down the road in a much flasher house, without my wealthy, absent husband.