When you get to New Orleans, turn left. Otherwise,  you’ll wind up in Florida. And while there’s certainly nothing wrong with Florida, it wasn’t on this trip’s itinerary. It was time to start heading north and east, keeping our eyes on the prize of the mid-atlantic and northeast. We left the city of New Orleans regretfully, our hotel with an enormous sense of relief, and, why deny it, the state of Louisiana with a slightly perverse desire to see what damage the hurricanes had wrought. Sure enough, along the highway we followed north into Mississippi, you could still see ruined homes and fresh reconstruction. We stopped for gas in Laurel, Mississippi, and a sign in the gas station window reported that the town had had to demolish 400 homes following Katrina, most of which had been rebuilt. Imagínense, since Laurel is 140 miles (abt 200 km) from the coast.

Anyway, we left New Orleans on a mission, but one which did not involve food of any kind. Our route took us the long way through Mississippi (our routes typically took us through each state the longest way possible), until south of Tupelo. All along the route, we kept a close eye out for signs of Mexican restaurants, and wouldn’t you know it, in some of the little towns like Laurel, Meridian, and West Point we saw Mexican stores or storefront restaurants. There was even one called La Costa Oaxqueña, but we did not stop.

After fulfilling my family obligations in Tupelo, we forged ahead to Memphis. I think under other circumstances I would have liked Memphis; I love blues music and barbeque (as long as I don’t have to get messy eating it), and the river give the city a pseudo coastline. But as it was,  we got to Memphis tired, broke, and ready for some relaxation. Frustratingly, we found a hotel that was even worse than the one we stayed in in New Orleans — little did we think that was possible. Yet we did it! Go us. Al otro dia, we woke up early, partly to make sure we would have enough time to pay homage to the patron saint of Memphis (Mr. Elvis Aaron Presley), and to undertake the enormously long drive that would finally plop us out in our nation’s capital. (We had initially planned to spend a day in Nashville but DC beckoned…).

Graceland was toda una experiencia.

From the headphones they make you wear to shepherd you expeditiously through the mansion, to the orderly way in which you are shuttled across the street, to the sheer size of the EPE (Elvis Presley Enterprises, I assume), Graceland is  even  more astonishing than I had imagined. And yet, the mansion was much smaller than I anticipated; I had been expecting something along the size of Versailles, but the house itself is a moderately sized place, in comparison to  some of today’s McMansions.

And yet the inside is really, really entertaining. Part of it is just the fashions of the day, preseved in  their dubious glory for eternity; part of it is that Elvis had enough money to do whatever he wanted with the place; and part of it is that there is this intense sense of reverence about the green shag carpet on the ceiling of the Jungle Room. It’s not overexaggerating to say that Graceland has a sense of religious sanctification. And yet, it’s so totally absurd, because you walk into a room and  there are like five massively bedazzled jumpsuits. Max was delighted to find the one  with the Aztec calendar — the picture isn’t entirely clear  but you can get a general idea.

So after wrapping up our devotions in Memphis, we hit the road, to drive to Washington. We were — of course — driving through both Tennessee and Virginia the long way.  The trip that day was no mean feat; 900 miles of Appalachia were traversed in about 13 hours. We stopped once to eat, an  event which I am supposed to be  chronicling here but am actually trying to postpone discussing. You see, Max is trying to get a sense of allll the different kinds of Mexican food available in the states, and por ende decided that the trip would not be complete without a stop at Taco Bell. He graciously offered to let me out at some other fast food joint if I wanted, but I figured teamwork is teamwork, so I tried to suspend my judgment. I have to admit, the fact that the cashier who greeted us had green and blue teeth was a little offputting, but them’s the breaks in White Pine,  TN, or wherever it was that we stopped.

Max had the Volcano Box — a combination whose flavor is SOOO BIIIG (I’m paraphrasing,  sort of) that it comes with its own box. And yet, for anyone who has actually ever eaten Mexican food, the flavor is less BIG than chemical. Despite the advertisements that it was SERIOUSLY SPICY, Max still loaded the burrito, taco, and chalupa up with hot sauce. Curiously, or perhaps not, the burrito was loaded with rice, not meat, as a way to provide more food for less money, and to lend as much spice to the burrito without having to actually put in much food. It also had these shreds of red (red=spicy, of course) tortilla strips, which tasted like aged  cardboard dipped in spoiled Tabasco. But wait! I am trying not to be judgmental. Continuing. There was also a little paper pack of what we both assumed were chicharrones, and were both astonished to discover were little bits of fried dough with cinnamon and sugar. Of course, that fact was printed on the paper holder, but as has already been discussed in this space, reading directions is not one of our strong suits. But imagine biting into what you think is going to be a salty porky thing, and having it be a sweet, cinnamony one instead. Weird! It also made me think that as unhealthy as US fast food is, there is something even too extreme about the idea of “fried pork skin” that would prevent chicharrones from being marketable in a mainstream place like Taco Bell. Speaking of  fast food and  Mexican food,  I think — and I don’t know if any of you US readers agree with me here — that US consumers do not associate Taco Bell specifically with “Mexican Food” but rather with fast food. Despite the company’s exhortations to “Think outside the bun,” when people want Mexican food, they do not “head for the border” at Taco Bell. When they want fast food, they do.

I had a burrito, which was  not at all wonderful, but  was on the whole less espantoso  an experience than it could have been. I guess. The restaurant itself was weirdly decorated, with these sort of fake oil paintings trying to give the place a sort of hip and cosmopolitan vibe. But mostly it was functional and, despite the bright colors, anemic.

At least Taco Cabana had a salsa bar with limes and  lemons and salsas that were from identifiable  ingredients. Taco Bell had three containers of hot sauces (mild, hot and death) with apparently arbitrary sayings on  them. It was also freezing inside, we were in the  middle of this endless drive, and all in all, I would not repeat the experience. One of the philosophical or political problems of eating at a place like Taco Bell, of course, is that the reason they can provide 79 cent tacos or 99 cent burritos is that the supply chain is so massively exploitative, and the work conditions for everyone who is involved in the business cycle — from the people who work feeding the chickens to the slaughterhouses to the prep plants to the cashiers and servers — is treated so badly and paid so poorly. But is the solution to say, this company treats its people so badly so I’m not going to eat there ever? Does a micro boycott like that work, when you serve 2 billion people a year at 5800 restaurants?

For whatever reason, the universe decided to liven things up for us by sending a hurricane to accompany our drive for the next two hours or so. So from northeast Tennessee until about Lexington, VA, we drove in blinding rain, massive lightening strikes, and dire tornado warnings (none of which, thank goodness, materialized).