Spring Break: Part II

As much as we would have liked to stay for the 2 o clock tour, it was time to leave the Herr's factory. We stopped to pose in front of the giant sign and hit the road again.Paige again took over navigating duties and guided us out of the parking lot and onto the highway. Who needs a GPS when you have Paige. We were on our way to Intercourse, PA, as in order to get Google Maps directions I needed a destination and well, that was the only place I could remember. No explanation needed there, right?

We exit the highway and were enjoying a lovely drive through not-quite-Amish country when suddenly something large and red appeared on the horizon. DAMMIT! We were back at the Herr's Factory. We had managed to spend a half hour driving in a giant circle. Oh well, we all had a good laugh at that one. After pondering whether or not we should catch the 3 o clock tour we got back on the highway and figured out where we had gone wrong.

We reached Intercourse and found nothing of note there. After seeing a guy take a picture with the sign we all decided that he looked like a fool and we didn't want to be "that guy". So we drove on through. I told the gang to just shout out when they wanted to stop, Ari requested that we simply stop somewhere that she could get "horsefly pie". She meant shoofly, but she could never remember that. Horsefly pie sounds disgusting. 

We pulled into Bird-In-Hand where they seemed to have a farmers market that wasn't open, and a bake shop which was open. We stopped in search of shoofly pie, which they did in fact have for Ari. We wandered in and out of the various shops along the street and observed the glory of things you can only buy in Amish County, such as:

Porcelain dogs dressed as food

Stones with ambiguous phrases on them

Outfits for your lawn goose

Raptors playing baseball (at 5.95 per dino we almost bought one)

Fat kid playing basketball. 

It was surreal to say the least. 

The theme of the entire two day trip was "I have to go to the bathroom" traveling with our gang is like traveling with a bus load of pre-schoolers. Every five minutes someone needed a bathroom. We asked the quilt shop lady if she knew where there was a bathroom in town and she directed us to behind the farmers market. Those bathrooms were locked, much to Nicky's disappointment. Nicky and Ari got in the car so that we could go in search of another bathroom. Paige decided to make a phone call or something and didn't get in the car. We waited...and she still didn't get in. So we drove away...at a very, very slow pace. Paige flipped out and began running after the car screaming "don't leave me in Amish Country". Needless to say this amused us and we began to drive a little bit faster...so she ran a little bit faster. This is entertainment that 16 year olds in small towns usually resort to on Friday nights, and you know what? They're on to something. I could do it for hours. 

We eventually let Paige back in the car so that we could get back on the road. We went towards Lancaster because someone said that that is what they think of when they think Amish Country. Can't argue with that logic. Doesn't matter that it's actually a city, we'll overlook that. When we got there we decided to go check out Franklin and Marshall College. They play in our athletic league and I've heard a lot about them but have never seen the school. Nicky claims her grandfather went there. Among the things Nicky has claimed within the past few weeks are: 1. Her grandmother worked for IM Pei's father 2. Her great-uncle invented Little League 3. Her grandfather went to Franklin and Marshall. The last one is pretty believable, but I just like that Nicky has been throwing out random trivia about her family over the past few week. 

The verdict? F&M is nice. They look like they have quite a bit more usable money than Bryn Mawr (I say usable because I've heard BMC has a load of money but is all allotted for useless things like moving the pathway five feet to the left so that it is more in line with original campus plan. Ohhhh Bryn Mawr). We all feel bad about ourselves for a minute until we see a kid wearing an oxford shirt, khakis and perfectly white tennis shoes stroll by looking like he was on his way to a tennis match. Then we just laugh. We stopped at Turkey Hill (the Wawa of Central PA) for a bathroom break before deciding it was time to head home. 

The problem was to reach F&M we followed the handy signs that the city had put up. There were no signs leading you OUT of the city, however, so we had to guess. The city was set up in a basic grid, so it wasn't too hard to find our way out of, just a little disorienting. I felt proud when I managed to get us out without having to turn around once. 

Our ride home was fairly straight forward. We passed Dutch Wonderland, which I had always seen ads for but to my knowledge have never been. That made people excited. I also saw my first Sonic, but could not convince my friends that it was worth the stop. Oh well. 

We made it home in one piece and separated to meet again later that night. I relaxed a bit with some Watch Instantly and wondered about what I was going to do for dinner. Luckily Paige wondered the same thing and we agreed to get a pizza. Everyone wins! As we ate our pizza the rest of the gang plus a few studious ones who had skipped the trip to write joined us in Paige's room to get ready to head out. We had heard rumor that Wednesday night was karaoke night at a local bar. Since Wednesday is Doc Night, we are unable to attend most weeks. We decided to forgo Doc Night this week in order to check it out. 

We started out at Kelly's which was good because Liz realized once she got there that she had forgotten her ID. Jenny and Emily (I think...) brought it over for her and joined us for a drink. Then Megan, who had been holed up in her cave all week writing, called to say she was on her way as well, so we had QUITE the group going. As 10 o clock neared we left and headed for karaoke. 

We were apparently the only ones to get the message about karaoke because we were the only ones there besides a few people just having a drink. Everyone else seemed concerned that it was karaoke night, preferring a casual Wednesday night drink with their date instead. Too bad! As a result it turned into 3 hours of us singing our favorite songs to the small crowd. 

Ari and I kicked it off with Summer Nights from Grease. I wasn't quick enough and got stuck with the role of Danny. Liz and Paige then followed with Enrique Iglesias' Hero. Megan and Nicky brought it home with....Hit Me Baby One More Time? I think? Maybe? But that wasn't all. As the night went on no one signed up...except us. I've lost count of what we sang. I know I did a version of Janis Joplin's Piece of My Heart with Paige, and something with Liz. The golden moment came when I saw that the DJ had Convoy. Nicky and I knew we had to do it so we signed up. As if it was fate, right after we signed up my friend from my oil class walked in for dinner with his girlfriend. I'm currently writing a paper based off of Convoy and truck stops for that class, so I knew that was God's way of saying "good choice, Marianna". We got up and I dedicated the song to him. Across the room he looked up, very confused and started laughing. His girlfriend did not laugh. On reviewing the situation I realize that was a poor move, but oh well. The DJ looked at me and said "this is a first for me". I told him that I was shocked by that, I thought this was a karaoke staple. He just chuckled and shook his head. The song started and I whipped it out. I didn't even need the lyrics, that's how good I am at that song. Around the room people just looked away and shook their heads. This was not exactly a karaoke friendly bar, we noted this for later. The song ended and my friend from class was the only one to applaud, other than our gang. His extra applause made it the most successful song of the night. Win. 

We went through a few more rounds of karaoke before we decided that we were spent. We all went up to do a round of "Since You've Been Gone" and the silence was deafening. It was time to go. You could practically hear the sighs of relief as we left. We set out on the long walk home and deemed the night a success. We stopped to take pictures with the Hopes Cookies cows on our way home. Ari accidentally knocked the smaller one over, but was absolutely delighted that she could add cow tipping to the list of things she did over break. 

We all retired to bed, for we had an even busier day ahead of us in the morn. Come back later to hear about our trip to the Yuengling brewery and Drew's house.

For the record, L-R: Paige, Nicky, Megan, Ari and Elizabeth

Paige and Elizabeth whip out Enrique. 

Nicky was a judger

Cuz we got a mighty Con-voy, rocking through the night....

Note the emptiness