Home again, home again! The Yellow River Chronicles staff has returned to faire Shanghai for a bit of R&R, some tasty noodles and to do some laundry. And what laundry it is! There is just no telling how many times you can wear that trusty Grateful Dead T-Shirt. We took that question to the outer limits of test tolerance during the Napa, Naptown and Napalm tour for near entire month of October. Why? Well, we'll tell you as we Throw the Krez from the plane!
Originally the YRC Master plan was to leave Indianapolis for Shanghai on Sunday, October 16, drop our gear and supplies from the US tour and then grab new gear for the week-long Saigon visit. We would take a plane on Tuesday for Saigon. But, that was NOT to be as neither our bags nor the YRC staff arrived in Saigon on schedule.
Lean closer, as we begin our cautionary tale of Life in the Visa Lane. Listen closely while we reveal that a Certain Unnamed Member of the YRC Staff caused Another Named Member of the Staff to be unceremoniously thrown from a plane. Yes, dear readers, the luggage did not make it to Saigon because of a staff medical intervention! Read along as our story unfolds...
The scene now cuts to the back story as the drama builds. Da dum. Dum dum. Dum da.
The story begins in early October with four days of partying in good old San Francisco as a warm up for the wedding in Napa. We have, of course, reported on the San Francisco/Northern California run in an earlier edition.
This repetition is not a cheap attempt to recycle old material. Noooo, not here at the most righteous YRC! This content is to provide rich narrative for the back story so our dear readers have all the facts.
Leaving the mayhem of Northern California behind us, we then spent another three or four days in Napa, celebrating a wonderful union (no, we still don't have the pictures yet). We toured Napa in a stretch Humvee to sample, well, gallons of wine. This, too, we have documented, dear reader.
Now well-primed with ten days of solid partying on the West Coast, we headed to the Midwest and Naptown, aka, Indianapolis. There we sampled many fine micro brews with friends and neighbors on the week prior to the Big Party. This included small group gatherings at many fine establishments. The momentum continued with the arrival of the family clan for the pre-post-wedding party.
To keep this relatively concise (we are still building tension thematically), as planned, we wrapped up 15 days of straight festivities at The Large Party Saturday night at the family estate on the banks of the dreamy White River. The Party ended at one or two in the morning as the campfires burned down and the beer ran out. There is no photographic record of the Napalm section of the tour, by the way.
We now return to our narrative. The parts that are still in focus, of course. Our flight for Saigon via Shanghai left quite early, so we loaded up the Mighty Rented Tahoe (thanks Doug!) and headed for the airport. Being seasoned travelers, we arose after two hours of sleep and loaded up on multivitamins, ibuprofen, water, and other restorative potions.
We were operating with a large cumulative sleep deficit, so the short run from the hotel to the airport presented some challenges in navigation, but we safely arrived at the United Air counter. Things seemed....hazy at the time, but we were proceeding with check-in until a large group of medics tackled your correspondent. Apparently there was the slurring of words and the demonstration of lobotomized motor skills. Against protests of being "fine", Team Medic ran many medical tests, asked tough questions like "Who is the President" and then pronounced the Assaulted One "goofy" but medically in tip top shape.
This, unfortunately, was not enough for the now alert United staff. They struck like cobras and unceremoniously yanked the YRC staff tickets. As condition for flying the next day, there would need to be a medical test from a physician to certify the offended party of the YRC staff was able to fly. With the EKG contacts still glued to my body, we retreated to another hotel to regroup. Hell, we weren't going to FLY the plane, we just wanted to sleep while they drove, for Christ's sake.
During the post-mortem, we determined that one key and highly influential member of the YRC staff was concerned that the other member of the staff had finally stroked out, or....something. To explain, one staff member's family acts immediately and assumes the worst in medical situations. He is acting goofy, therefore let's have a large group of medics attack him and get him thrown off the plane. The "Just to be Safe" approach, one might say.
The other party's preferred methodology (known as the "Travel Nazi") is to keep going like the Marine, carrying your dead and never stopping until you get to the top of the hill, or they kill you. We can bandage it on the plane, after all.
True, the difference was just a matter of style, but it made for some merry discussion the next day. You can imagine. To keep the story moving, that afternoon the required letter was obtained at a Immediate Care Center (this being Sunday and all other things closed). We were good to go, clean and green, and flight-ready.
We returned the following early Monday to the usual horrific litany
As we got on the plane for the 20-hour flight, we rationed out the sleeping pills for the journey and realized.....we were one short. The YRC staff monitors pharmaceutical inventory very closely, we must say.
The Mystery of the Goofy Non-Stroke Victim was solved! Soooo funny.
Comedy after all, is tragedy plus time. And next time, the vitamins and sleeping pills go in different bottles.
So, before this column puts you to sleep dear reader, we are going to pack it up. Tune in next week when we begin our "Indiana YRC and the Temples of Gloom" tour! Thanks for reading and be sure to check your meds!!
Originally the YRC Master plan was to leave Indianapolis for Shanghai on Sunday, October 16, drop our gear and supplies from the US tour and then grab new gear for the week-long Saigon visit. We would take a plane on Tuesday for Saigon. But, that was NOT to be as neither our bags nor the YRC staff arrived in Saigon on schedule.
Lean closer, as we begin our cautionary tale of Life in the Visa Lane. Listen closely while we reveal that a Certain Unnamed Member of the YRC Staff caused Another Named Member of the Staff to be unceremoniously thrown from a plane. Yes, dear readers, the luggage did not make it to Saigon because of a staff medical intervention! Read along as our story unfolds...
 |
| Party at the Castro Street Fair |
The story begins in early October with four days of partying in good old San Francisco as a warm up for the wedding in Napa. We have, of course, reported on the San Francisco/Northern California run in an earlier edition.
This repetition is not a cheap attempt to recycle old material. Noooo, not here at the most righteous YRC! This content is to provide rich narrative for the back story so our dear readers have all the facts.
Leaving the mayhem of Northern California behind us, we then spent another three or four days in Napa, celebrating a wonderful union (no, we still don't have the pictures yet). We toured Napa in a stretch Humvee to sample, well, gallons of wine. This, too, we have documented, dear reader.
 |
| Rolling with the New In Laws in Wine Country |
To keep this relatively concise (we are still building tension thematically), as planned, we wrapped up 15 days of straight festivities at The Large Party Saturday night at the family estate on the banks of the dreamy White River. The Party ended at one or two in the morning as the campfires burned down and the beer ran out. There is no photographic record of the Napalm section of the tour, by the way.
We now return to our narrative. The parts that are still in focus, of course. Our flight for Saigon via Shanghai left quite early, so we loaded up the Mighty Rented Tahoe (thanks Doug!) and headed for the airport. Being seasoned travelers, we arose after two hours of sleep and loaded up on multivitamins, ibuprofen, water, and other restorative potions.
We were operating with a large cumulative sleep deficit, so the short run from the hotel to the airport presented some challenges in navigation, but we safely arrived at the United Air counter. Things seemed....hazy at the time, but we were proceeding with check-in until a large group of medics tackled your correspondent. Apparently there was the slurring of words and the demonstration of lobotomized motor skills. Against protests of being "fine", Team Medic ran many medical tests, asked tough questions like "Who is the President" and then pronounced the Assaulted One "goofy" but medically in tip top shape.
This, unfortunately, was not enough for the now alert United staff. They struck like cobras and unceremoniously yanked the YRC staff tickets. As condition for flying the next day, there would need to be a medical test from a physician to certify the offended party of the YRC staff was able to fly. With the EKG contacts still glued to my body, we retreated to another hotel to regroup. Hell, we weren't going to FLY the plane, we just wanted to sleep while they drove, for Christ's sake.
During the post-mortem, we determined that one key and highly influential member of the YRC staff was concerned that the other member of the staff had finally stroked out, or....something. To explain, one staff member's family acts immediately and assumes the worst in medical situations. He is acting goofy, therefore let's have a large group of medics attack him and get him thrown off the plane. The "Just to be Safe" approach, one might say.
The other party's preferred methodology (known as the "Travel Nazi") is to keep going like the Marine, carrying your dead and never stopping until you get to the top of the hill, or they kill you. We can bandage it on the plane, after all.
True, the difference was just a matter of style, but it made for some merry discussion the next day. You can imagine. To keep the story moving, that afternoon the required letter was obtained at a Immediate Care Center (this being Sunday and all other things closed). We were good to go, clean and green, and flight-ready.
We returned the following early Monday to the usual horrific litany
 |
| Drawing courtesy of the Ambien Blog |
The Mystery of the Goofy Non-Stroke Victim was solved! Soooo funny.
Comedy after all, is tragedy plus time. And next time, the vitamins and sleeping pills go in different bottles.
So, before this column puts you to sleep dear reader, we are going to pack it up. Tune in next week when we begin our "Indiana YRC and the Temples of Gloom" tour! Thanks for reading and be sure to check your meds!!
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