I knew it was trouble when my friend J ordered shots of whiskey. Two reasons for that: a) he's known as the cheapest man on earth, and b) it meant he was working up to a strange request that he assumed would not garner a favorable response from me. We were in my local bar in Queens, O'Hanlon's, end of the line, right under the N Train subway station. J was visiting from Delaware--we had gone to high school together back in Maryland.

Sure enough, just as that white-hot slug of Jack blazed its way through my sternum, J had a proposition for me. Via the Internet, he had made a deal to pick-up a used and disrepaired VW camper van (not Beethoven) that was sitting in a towing yard in Auburn, Massachusetts. Road trip!

At first, I thought the idea was ludicrous. He was buying this van from people on a "Used Volkswagen" Website for $300--this model normally goes for a minimum of $2,000. The van had broken down just outside of Worcester, so they had it towed to a nearby junkyard and were leaving it there when J answered their ad the previous week. And, since he was halfway there by being in New York . . .

I figured, what the hell, otherwise we're just going to get too bombed again in O'Hanlon's tomorrow night.

So we set sail in his pick-up truck. We decided to use Yahoo map directions that, much to our chagrin, tend to choose the shortest distance between two points, even though it means leaving a high-speed interstate that will get one there quicker, but isn't as short a physical distance as a rickety backroad state route. This is not good to find out a few hundred miles from places either of us live.

We get in the general vicinity of Auburn after nightfall. It's a warm early fall night--in the 70's. This is where the directions fall apart. We just drive, looking for signs of life along these rural New England roads that look a lot like where we're from back in Maryland. Panic hasn't set in, but we're wound up in that special way people can get only when they're far from home and totally lost.

Soon, we come across a place that looks like a high-school gym. But there's no high school. No one is around, but cars are in the small parking lot, and the gym is lit up. There must be people here we could talk to about directions.

We drive around this building . . . and turn straight into a snow bank. This is the metaphysical monkey wrench we need to unscrew our minds, and we start laughing maniacally. We look around and see a kid carrying a hockey stick into the gym. Ah, a hockey rink--and this huge snow bank is ice shavings recently deposited there. We immediately got out and pissed our names in the bank, as it seemed like the thing to do.
We drive around to the front. The first person we see is a coach type with a whistle around his neck who gives us the evil eye, and for a minute, I feel like asking, "Excuse me, sir, do you know where we could find some prepubescent boys we can play horsy with in the field beyond the parking lot?" That seems to be what his look is insinuating. He reluctantly gives us instructions to, at least, the Auburn Mall, where we can then make a phone call to the towing yard and have a reference point.

So we drive a few miles to the mall. The Yahoo directions weren't bad, but we're a good 10 miles off our destination. We pass a dozen strip clubs along this backwoods stretch of Route 20. I can hear the theme from Twin Peaks in the back of my head. We pass a great-looking diner that exactly resembles the one on the front of the Hall & Oates "Abandoned Luncheonette" album.

We finally find the towing yard. These things are always run by dufuses, old Navy guys with Dobermans named after The Seven Dwarves. The one at this place is no different--this wiry old man in a CAT hat sees us walking up to the office, walks out five yards and blurts out in a gruff New England accent, "Who the fuck are you?"

We explain who the fuck we are, why the fuck we're there ("because we heard you were so nice, you wonderful old codger!") and get the keys for the camper van out back. This place feels like the junkyard at the end of the world--I expect to poke around and find airplanes lost in the Bermuda Triangle.

The camper van is a piece of shit. It's an '82, but looks like a '62, with orange plastic seats and a design like a VW Econoline van with a no-frills sink and refrigerator in it. It's filthy. The engine is in the back, in the actual sitting area of the car, which must make taking a nap during a trip quite an adventure. I can picture Cheech and Chong riding around in it, only replace the pot smoke with diesel fumes, and the steering wheel with one of those chain-link wheels.

It's not even worth $300. I recognize this immediately, but J keeps trying to rationalize it, saying we have to find a U-Haul office tomorrow for a trailer so he can take it back home, insisting that he can fix it up and get $2,000 for it.

We decide to sleep on it. The goon behind the desk insists that this chalet village down the road is the real deal. So we drive through the woods some more, and come across one of those motels made up of small bungalows strung with Christmas lights. It's like something out of a David Lynch movie. Two bikers sit in front of one, smoking weed on the porch. A vaguely Dennis Hopper looking type sits in front of another, bone thin arms and a pot belly. Everyone's sitting outside their bungalows, and it looks like Lynch could show up here, roll the camera and have his next movie. J said he saw a bearded lady in front of one, but I think he was pulling my leg.

While it would have been fun, we said screw it. We're tired, hungry and in no need of more weirdness. We double back to Worcester and find a Hampton Inn, as every other place we stop along the way is full--something to do with Holy Cross College holding some kind of event nearby. We expected to see Joseph, Mary and their ass out in the parking garage. It's about 10:00 at night, and we need food. We notice this Polynesian/Chinese place behind the hotel--Aku Aku, maybe named after the Styx song. It's a combination restaurant/comedy club. The desk manager warns us against it, but he just might be pissed off because J pronounced Worcester "Warchester."

We walk in and are faced with a life-sized poster of Emmanuel Lewis, a.k.a. television's Webster.

Jesus Christ! Webster is doing a comedy show here tonight! I have visions of heckling him with, "What you talking about, Willis," hoping to goad him into an outburst over another clown who's mistaken him for Gary Coleman. We can't believe our luck. To drive all this way, walk into a club, and fucking Webster is there!

But, we're wrong--he's there next month. So, we opt to eat, and notice something a little odd. The place is empty. Not a soul there, a ghost Polynesian restaurant, with all the sad-eyed tikis staring down from the bamboo walls.

Eventually, a waitress comes by, and we're seated. J tries to substitute shrimp with broccoli instead of chicken, to which the waitress, a nasty-looking middle-aged woman with big black hair like a bad wig, replies, "If it's not on the god-damned menu, then you can't order it."

At this point, we notice people pouring into the comedy club, and they look like refugees form an Eddie and the Cruisers casting call, all big hair, bobby socks and leather jackets. I didn't know what the hell was going on--maybe that night was the Michael Pare musical review? Maybe Sal the pragmatic bass player was playing all of Eddie's old hits like he did in the movie?

We got our food--no rice. First time I've ever had Chinese food without rice. Something tells me had we called back the surly waitress, she'd have pointed out "white rice" as a menu item that we would have to actually order with our meal. We ate as fast as we could and got out of there. At that point, simply going back to the hotel and catching another lame Saturday Night Live was more than enough.

J didn't even buy the camper van. In the cold light of day, it was even more ugly. Any lessons learned? Hardly--the whole point of any road trip I've ever been on. A long way to go for nothing, but it was quite an adventure that neither of us regretted.