Blue Ridge Parkway

August 23, 2009
Blue Ridge Parkway is defiantly getting on my last nerve. It hasn't been raining much over the past few days but the middle section of the parkway we still need to collect must be getting rained on every night. We drove 2 hours up there again yesterday only to be disappointed. The southern sections are dry but we have to collect the sections in order so until the middle section is dry we are out of luck.

I do have one story for the day. We got pulled over by a park ranger who decided that he was going to pull us over on the parkway where there was no pullout or place to pull over and he was going to use his siren! Are you kidding me! I guess he missed the memo that we were at the park. Most of the time I'm fine with people asking us who we are but this guy, in my mind, was inappropriate/unsafe. We are clearly a work truck and pulling over a million dollar truck on a 2 lane road with no place to pull over is pretty dangerous. I had no choice but to stop there and ruin the file we were collecting. The ranger really had nothing to say except "I wasn't sure who you were, you are with the DOT or something". Really! I think he just wanted to use his siren and put his hand on our truck because he had to touch it when he walked up, which for some reason I found extra offensive (or I'm just overly protective). I explained to him what we were doing and he said "well we don't usually like to have work done on the weekends that will hold up traffic". OK, here comes the good part....we were collecting a 12 mile section where the posted speed limit is 35 and we were going 35mph while collecting! I guess the ranger really meant to say that he didn't want us to make people go the speed limit on the parkway. I told him we were sorry but it has been raining and we had to get the work done and we work on the weekends all of the time. He said "I understand" and the whole thing ended with him saying "enjoy your stay". Uhhhhhh. We ended up junking the file we were trying to collect since the roads were still wet under the tree cover and we left anyway. The whole thing would have been much better/more safe if he would have waited so we all could have pulled off the road and not have to stop in the driving lane on the parkway!

After we left we washed the truck and did some laundry and then went to see Inglourious Bastards the movie. That was not my pick, David. It wasn't all bad. There were some good parts and Brad Pitt by far did the best job with his character. I did laugh a couple of times but I could have done without the violence. When violence is tied so close to what could be "reality" it really isn't for me.