I went to my first ever baseball game on Friday night. I didn’t think I’d enjoy it. It seems too similar to cricket, a game so long and boring that it feels like training for life in a nursing home.
But I was pleasantly surprised. Baseball’s a fast moving battle of nerves. When it comes down to three “balls” and two “strikes,” the guy at the bat has the world on his shoulders. If he takes another strike, his head hangs low. If he knocks it out of the park, he stands among the gods. The rules are simple and any confusion is cleared up by more beer. After two hours, I graduated from total novice to seasoned pro – shouting, “You could see the ball better if you got a haircut, hippie!” and “Hit it, don’t swat it, Zimmerman!” [That Zimmerman really bugged me. His whole technique seemed to rely on the pitcher not being able to throw. Is the man allergic to running?]
...Another, more stark, reminder of that truth is the role that military pageantry plays at a baseball game. At the start of the contest, the CIA honour guard trooped the colours and we were all invited to stand and applaud the folks serving in the US military. But nothing prepared me for the moving rendition of The Star-Spangled Banner, as sung by a female soldier in combat fatigues. The stadium stood proudly – hats clasped to chests – as she powerfully, beautifully sang the national anthem. “Does that Star-Spangled Banner yet wave/ O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?” It sure does.
In contrast, American patriotism is sharper and more certain – and more fixedly about ideas. Its promise is individual freedom. But that freedom is guaranteed – just like victory in a baseball game – by thinking and acting as a team or a nation. One of the reasons why civil society works in the US slightly better than it does in Britain is that they understand the balance of rights and responsibilities between the individual and the group. Without the security of a welfare state, Americans are acculturated to risk and sacrifice, and so (ironically) they can be a little more charitable than us. They are certainly more free.
After the game we moved to a bar and got chatting with some young marines, who were talking excitedly about the fact that they are going to present the flag at one of the ballgames next week. After that, they will fly off to war. We are lucky to share the world with a nation that produces men like these.
Repoz
Posted: April 18, 2012 at 02:23 PM |
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Works for NYC too, though obviously with slightly different associations. Positive ones though.
Edit: Coke to shooty.
I'm just thankful no one ever pointed at me and started screaming Bush! Bush!
no bathrooms or trash cans on the Great Wall.
A thousand miles of wall isn't enough for you to piss on?
A lot of East Asians (or, definitely Koreans) call him "Georgie Bushie" (different rules in their language) which I think is funny. I think of a little kid or a squirrel.
I was with a group of women I was hoping would not see me as a boor.
I was just kidding. Pissing on landmarks can get you in trouble.
When I was there a few years ago, there were several nooks on the wall itself that had pretty clearly become informal pissoirs.
I mean, I suppose it's possible that the stone they used for those spots just happened to be wet and dark and terrible-smelling.
But probably not.
(I don't speak it either.)
I hear all these stories of people saying awful things to Americans and I am left with a suspicion people are doing something wrong and not mentioning it. Even people who think Americans are dumb will admit they're usually pretty friendly, and Americans have a good reputation as travellers in Europe, unlike the Brits.
Also, as a huge rugby fan and player, the first time I went to Wales was like rugby heaven. It's the national game there!
If anyone does say anything to you, just say "Next time we'll let the Germans keep you" ;-)
As an aside, some friends and I were eating a at a TGIFridays in Moscow (seriously), when a group of college aged girls approached us and started chatting us up. They were English majors and were peppering us with all sorts of questions. At one point, one of the girls asked us what stereotypes Americans have concerning Russians. Being good lawyers, we artfully dodged the question and asked them what what stereotypes Russians had about Americans. They paused for a second, and then answered:
"You smile a lot and eat cheeseburgers."
We cracked up. That's not even stereotype; it's totally true.
Did you let on that most Americans still have this impression of Russians as "Commie/hated/despotic bastards"?
As a related note, I remember when the Soviet wrestling team visited my college and the announcer said "...and let's give a big welcome to the Russian Wrestling team!"
Interesting. When my friend lived in Ireland, he was always immediatly interrogated over whether he was Proto or a Catholic. When he said "American", the response was often "Ahhh let me buy you a drink!"
####..tell AMERICANS you're from Oklahoma and a good number will think you go to work on a horse and that the Indians live in teepees.
The Estonian part of me finds both of those names offensive. To be politically correct he would have to go with "The Soviet Russian Wrestling team plus participants from various occupied territories only on this trip to buy contraband jeans and earn a small fortune."
Ur doin it rong.
I've never gotten real anti-Amero incidents either. It's more like the feeling I assume Woody Allen has whenever he's out with Soon-Yi Previn. He knows it's there. They know it's there. He knows they know it's there. That it goes unspoken is just awkward courtesy, really.
I had an absurdly satisfying meal at an Outback Steakhouse in Bangkok. For 6 weeks I'd had nothing but beautiful, healthy, fresh and delicious Thai and Lao food. So naturally I was craving some fatty Western goodness. I got a plate of french fries that was covered in bacon, cheese, ranch, and it was unbelievably good. The TV had on a replay of the big 2005 Liverpool comeback against AC Milan.
The first night I was there I got into a somewhat heated discussion with two guys at a cafe. One was a native university student named Juan, and the other guy was 50-ish who spoke no English but was fluent in French. The conversation was in all three languages. I can't remember what set it off, but the older guy said something unintelligible (to me) in French and stormed off. Then Juan took us to a tapas bar and got himself kicked out for being drunk and disorderly.
Eh. You always get by. I got by in Burma (where it is (was?) even illegal to play music`with English lyrics), others have gotten by in even crazier places.
I was in Stockholm for three months, and the PM of the client team was an older Englishman from the midlands. He wasn't outspoken, but after a few pub conversations it was pretty clear that he was a pretty solid Tory with a bit of a conservative Anglican streak to him. Another guy from our teams was 28 and from Kansas City. He was a GOP/Libertarian tweener who imagined himself clever enough to spar with the men at the table. We were talking about some constitutional something or other one night and the Brit looks at the guy from KC and says "Mate, you need to stop now, because Sam's about to have your lunch. He's been setting you up for the past two hours."
It was awesome. KC had to buy the last three rounds.
The flip side of this is the first time I was in Europe I met a gaggle of girls who all proudly claimed to be "Essex Girls". I had no idea what that meant at the time.
It's probably just because they're being polite and flattering but when I'm traveling people always act relieved when I say I'm Canadian, not American. I think people have their stereotypes, but are open-minded when they actually meet people and give them the benefit of the doubt.
Now if you want instant animosity based on where you're from, travel to any part of Canada and tell people you're from Toronto...
What DOES that mean?
We've been to Scotland once, went to a karaoke night in a pub in Glasgow. Pretty much everybody who sang chose country & western.
Haven't been to Wales yet, but it's on the short list; is it really cheaper than Ireland? We've found the UK pretty pricey (not that Erin is cheap, even in the off-season).
What's English for "Snooki?"
Oh, God yes.
Ireland is the most expensive country I've ever been to, and I live in London, for chrissakes. Even in the boonies, I was paying 50p more a pint than I was in London at the time. By comparison, a beer in Wales was 50p cheaper.
Don't ever go to Norway. $15 for a beer...
I ended up eating a lot of execrable pizza, because it was the only dinner-sized portion I could find that cost less than $35.
Not cheap. Probably in line with Norway. Scandanavia isn't cheap, period. And Stockholm is expensive itself.
With that said, Stockholm in the spring and midsummer is fantastic.
(EDIT: Notably, it's even more fantastic on an expense account.)
It is way cheaper than Norway, you can get a beer for less than 10 dollars in all but the fanciest places here, but alcohol is taxed heavily of course. Food is expensive compared to the states, but you should see all the manic Norwegians loading their cars at the border shops.
And if you get to Malmö, and don't mind jostling with poor people, you can eat out real cheap.
In Denmark alcohol is cheap, they are ludicrously liberal compared to the other Nordic nations, you can drink strong liquor to lunch on a working day there with no one batting an eyelid.
I used to live in a neighborhood which had a couple of Russian immigrants, my observations: they can drink A LOT
plus this one middle aged dude would walk around the block on 30 degree winter days in shorts and tee shirt...
Limited sample size, but yeah, these guys were really nailing the stereotypes...
Hmmn...
I don't actually live in England, but I was born there. The way I feel about the country is pretty simple. I think it's the greatest country that has ever existed, and has done more good for the human race than any other country. I don't dislike any other country, and I certainly see where the people you described above are coming from, but I think the good outways the bad by a huge factor. I'm more proud of my country than anything else in my life. I fact, it's the only thing in my life that gives me any self of pride...
That's sad.
I like reading about Hemingway and the other Americans in Paris in the 20s. One of the consistent themes is how cheap everything was - a couple hundred bucks mooched off the parents back home could keep these kids afloat for months, free to pursue their silly careers as surrealist poets and such.
Interesting; I'm British, living in London, and I feel quite the opposite. The pervasive sense of decline among Brits (the opposite of the American sentiment "our best days are ahead") feels to me like some kind of invisible drag on the country's spirits and its potential. There are many good traits that the British embody, but plenty of negative ones too, and I don't see any way in which I am more proud of being British than I am of having lived and studied in the US, or lived and worked in the Netherlands. Both of which were choices, of course, rather than accidents of birth.
Too often I think the British are proud of the wrong things? Our history! No, you inherited that. Our royal family! No, it's silly. Our sporting teams! Oh, please. The actual positive values that are demonstrated by the population day-in, day-our seem to get lip-service and no more.
I love a good moan myself, and Britain has problems, some of which are pervasive. But occasionally you do have to remind the Brits they don't live in the Congo or Sierra Leone, and that sense of decline (probably a symptom of not having an empire) drags the chances of actually fixing the country's problems. There's less urgency to fix problems because it's just more proof of how Britain is crap, and some people would rather just emigrate than deal with it.
Plus patriotism and jingoism are often conflated in the UK, especially as England turns into a sneering, obnoxious place when there's a major football tournament on. England must have more people who root against their own country than anywhere else in the world.
I like reading about Hemingway and the other Americans in Paris in the 20s. One of the consistent themes is how cheap everything was - a couple hundred bucks mooched off the parents back home could keep these kids afloat for months, free to pursue their silly careers as surrealist poets and such.
And it isn't just Europe, but here, too. In 1969 my GF and I spent a full month traveling between DC and Berkeley, beginning by driving up to Boston and Montreal, and then slowly meandering through Chicago, Madison, Yellowstone and Seattle before driving down to Berkeley. We started out with exactly $500 (about $3125 today), ate nearly every meal in non-fast food restaurants, went to ballgames in every ML city (Jarry Park was the highlight), and stayed in motels or hotels every night. No camping out or skipping meals. I've love to see two people do that now on $100 a day, given the price of gas and lodging.
Possibly excepting Spain, but I guess you would have to include Scotland to make a fair comparison there.
It always amuses me when Swedish sports columnists writes about English boosterism and it's just carbon copies of English whining about the same because they always turn to total mush every time a Swedish biathlete* gets a medal. And of course, every skier ever that beat a Swede were doped to the gills.
*) Sweden's favorite sports:
3) Everything a Swede is good at
2) Everything a Swede is good at involving skiing
1) Football
Couldn't agree more. The jingoism I see at times seems like it is so out of character for what I perceive to be 'British character' that it's surreal; much like the British relationship with race issue, it makes me feel that some really ugly things are bubbling beneath the surface in places. (Watching a documentary, 'The 70s', on BBC2, reminded me of the "If they're black, send them back" repatriation marches in London in that era.)
Seeing the local Portuguese deli with its windows smashed in after Portugal beat England in the 2004 Euro Championship was a lowlight. Again, an argument for cricket (or rugby) over football as the truly archetypical British sport.
I doubt they'll be living that cheaply, but I'm about to go to a friend's wedding in Calgary this summer. The honeymoon is a several month-long drive around Canada and the US (part of which I'm tagging along for!). As I say, I don't know their budget, but considering they've essentially been living their lives the past three years traveling from one place to another, working at hostels or camp-grounds until they have the money to go to the next place, I don't imagine they are spending a ton of money.
EDIT: Also second the love of bread in France. I had bread and cheese everyday and I don't think I've ever enjoyed food as much as those couple weeks.
One of the revelations I had on my long honeymoon in France was the existence of Carrefour and LeClerc, ubiquitous hypermarkets that are at least as large as the biggest Walmart you've ever seen. They have everything a Walmart does - dirt cheap pharmacies, the cheapest gas prices in the country - but they are indelibly and wonderfully FRENCH. The cheese counter is out of this world (and I used to be a cheesemonger, so I know my cheese). A huge selection of legitimately world class cheeses at the lowest prices I've ever seen in my life. (And an even huger selection of OK cheeses, the level of quality you'd find at Trader Joe's.) One I went to had a dozen different types of baguette. The wine aisles were endless - unfortunately I don't know my wine well enough to know what type of bargains were contained therein. And then of course you have the Toulouse sausages, the jars of cassoulet, pates, confits, etc.
On another trip to France I stayed in a hostel in a small Pyrenees town. In the evening there was only one place open to eat at, the local Kwik-E-Mart equivalent. I was amazed to find that in the very tiny fresh food fridge (where the American equivalent would have eggs and ... breakfast burritos?) they had duck breasts.
I've not been to the town in question, but Devon is very nice. Very pleasant countryside, nice beaches, and some decent food. You're also in a great spot to explore, via day-trip, some great areas of the country, including the Cotswolds (where I'm from), Bristol, Cardiff, and so on.
The problem that you might have is a) it'll be very expensive in that part of the country, because b) it'll be packed with holidaying Brits, with school out. July is also approximately Olympic rush hour, during which prices will be jacked up further, especially for flights. If money's not an issue, I think it's a fine idea for a trip, but July 2012 might prove to be unfortunate timing.
EDIT - in Devon, you'll probably also want to rent a car. I know Americans think nothing of this, but it tends to be more expensive in the UK, and roads in the south-west of England are usually small and hard to navigate, even after you get over the left-hand side thing. Some parts of the country you could make do with public transport with taxis for a short trip; Devon's unlikely to be one of them. Just a thought.
I doubt they'll be living that cheaply, but I'm about to go to a friend's wedding in Calgary this summer. The honeymoon is a several month-long drive around Canada and the US (part of which I'm tagging along for!). As I say, I don't know their budget, but considering they've essentially been living their lives the past three years traveling from one place to another, working at hostels or camp-grounds until they have the money to go to the next place, I don't imagine they are spending a ton of money.
Probably not, but then we weren't consciously trying not to spend, and we stayed in hotels or motels every night. Of course back then that meant as little as $4.00 a night ($25.00 today) for a clean hotel on a main street or a cabin on an old U.S. highway, with gas ranging from about $1.69 (in Berkeley, believe it or not) to $2.25 a gallon (in Chicago) in today's dollars. That's what you can't duplicate in 2012.
We've all said this to them as well so I don't really know if we'll be able to make it. It could very well be a $5,000 expense or more.
Because standards have changed. Every room has AC now. Every room has a color TV with cable. Most have wi-fi or internet access. So on and so on. When I lived in Kenosha/Racine they still had the bungalow motels of the 50's and 60's and that is basically where the crackheads and one night stands stayed. You could rent a bungalow for $100 a week but that isn't what most people nowadays think of when you talk about hotel/motels/inns. Traveling cross country nowadays is a completely different experience (in terms of goods needed, wanted, and have) compared to a cross country trip 40 years ago.
Gas is more expensive but cars are more efficient thus we can go further on a gallong of gas. I don't know what the MPG were in 1969 but according the government cars were at 13.5 MPG in 1975. In 2010 the average new car apparently is getting over 30 MPG.
There is a bar I go to a lot in Hanoi that plays baseball and can do a creditable hamburger. Not even good, really, just creditable. But after awhile overseas you just desperately want it.
Overseas, I've gotten a ton more #### for being American in Europe than in Asia. Asians are mostly excited about it, especially in Vietnam. I've had many weird experiences talking to Vietnamese with cockney accents* about how America is the best country in the world.
*because that's who taught them english
Yeah, as I said, people in Asia mostly associate America with things that they think are awesome.
Americans are also more exotic and thus exciting. I went to a nightclub in Udon Thani, Thailand, where there was a band that played nothing but American alternative music (Nirvana, RHCP, etc). After the show the band wanted nothing more than to hang out with the white faces that had been dancing in front of the stage. I had a million conversations with people that didn't really speak any English that mostly consisted of exchanges like:
Thai teenager: Ehspidelmanu.
Me: Ehspidelmanu?
Thai: Ehspidelmanu!
Me: Spiderman?
Thai: Yesss, Ehspidelmanu!!!
Such an interchange seemed to be unspeakably exciting.
We had an experience in Manado where I had to for a meeting (taking me six ####### flights to get to) where a buddy and I went out to basically the one club in town on a thursday night to listen to the ridiculous cover band. It was empty, we had a bunch of drinks, had a great time, were proclaimed everybody's best friend forever, etc.
The next day, we decide to roundup people up and go back. My friend goes first with a big group, and they ask him for a huge cover fee. He speaks Bahasa, and says, "hey, we were here last night, we were best buds, why are you charging me the boole price?"
They say, "No, we've never seen you before, stop trying to scam us, pay the cover."
He insists, but no dice, and since it's the only game in town he decides to stay.
I show up an hour later, the guy at the door is thrilled to see me, no cover, waves me in.
I go find my friend, say I had no trouble, and we wonder why they remember me and not him, especially since he speaks Bahasa.
About five seconds later the staff comes over to him and basically says, "Oh my god, we're so sorry, you were here last night. All white people with black hair look the same to us, but your friend Redbeard we recognize. He's the only person with a red beard we've ever seen."
Because standards have changed. Every room has AC now. Every room has a color TV with cable. Most have wi-fi or internet access. So on and so on. When I lived in Kenosha/Racine they still had the bungalow motels of the 50's and 60's and that is basically where the crackheads and one night stands stayed. You could rent a bungalow for $100 a week but that isn't what most people nowadays think of when you talk about hotel/motels/inns. Traveling cross country nowadays is a completely different experience (in terms of goods needed, wanted, and have) compared to a cross country trip 40 years ago.
Tell me something that I don't know. But what that means is that while people who can afford it can travel in better minimal style today than they could in 1969, people who can't afford that style are out of luck, when the choice is between springing for 21st century "necessities" like wi-fi and cable TV on the one hand, and looking out for crackheads on the other. It's simply one more example of the sort of income polarization that's occurred over the past 40+ years.
Gas is more expensive but cars are more efficient thus we can go further on a gallong of gas. I don't know what the MPG were in 1969 but according the government cars were at 13.5 MPG in 1975. In 2010 the average new car apparently is getting over 30 MPG.
Since our trip was made with a 1969 VW beetle that got 32 MPG on the highway, we didn't have to worry about what some ####### muscle car was getting. And there were millions of such "economy cars" on the roads even then.
The bottom line is that if you want to compare apples and oranges while forcing everyone to buy oranges, then of course you can rationalize away the fact that like so many other things today, the cutoff point for being able to afford cross-country trips has been pushed farther and farther up the income scale. But what if you don't care about wi-fi or fancy mattresses, but you don't want crackheads in your next room? What if all you need is a clean room and a clean bed?** Where's the affordable alternative today that doesn't mean a youth hostel or some sort of variant of that?
**BTW contrary to your apparent belief, a/c was standard in every motel or hotel we stayed in.
Anyway, my first day there I walked downtown to the Duomo plaza. Stepped into a little shop to get something to drink. What do I hear over the PA system in this store that was almost quite literally resting in the shadow of the Duomo, one of the great architectural achievements in the history of western civilization?
"Fergalicious definition:
Make them boys go loco..."
It was an interesting reminder of the ubiquity of American pop culture around the world.
Ha, when I was in Florence last year (in the shadow of the Duomo as well) I came across the fellas from Jersey Shore filming at an outside cafe.
EDIT: I was there in June, though climbing up that massive hill on the other side of the river (I'm sure this is a well-known place that a more cultured person would know the name of) to get a view of the city probably gave me a clue as to what July feels like.
That rumbling noise you heard was Michelangelo spinning in his grave.
I think that's San Miniato al Monte. Beautiful old (old, old, old, old) church there where I attended Mass for the first time in nearly a decade.
So, like, from the 50s?
So you traveled the country in a brand new car?
As for cheap rooms there are a ton of them. Stay at a Super 8 or Motel 6. For instance if you want to take I-80 across country you can stop at a Super 8 around the Moline/Davenport area of Iowa/Illinois and stay at a room for around 45.00 before taxes and such. I even found an inn for $39 a night next to the Quad City airport. According to the inflation calculator that is something like 7 to 8 dollars in 1969. You can then drive out to Denver and stay in the city or around it for 50 to 60 dollars a night which is around 8 to 9 bucks back in 1969. According to Orbitz there are also several options below $40 as well around Denver in the summer time. If you want cheap there are a ton of options.
So you traveled the country in a brand new car?
Bought at the end of 1968. The brochure said it got 32 on the highway, whether or not it actually did or not. I do know we could always fill the tank from near empty for less than 3 bucks, or less than 19 bucks today, and that we could almost always make it last for at least 300 miles between stops along a highway.
I will grant one definite sub-point of yours, however: In the long run I got what I paid for with that miserable Beetle. Today's cars are a far better deal in almost every respect than they were back then. The $4000 real dollar difference in price between that 69 Beetle ($13,000) and my 2006 Focus ($17,000) doesn't even begin to reflect the complete superiority of the Ford over the VW. Not that you wouldn't know that.
As for cheap rooms there are a ton of them. Stay at a Super 8 or Motel 6. For instance if you want to take I-80 across country you can stop at a Super 8 around the Moline/Davenport area of Iowa/Illinois and stay at a room for around 45.00 before taxes and such. I even found an inn for $39 a night next to the Quad City airport. According to the inflation calculator that is something like 7 to 8 dollars in 1969. You can then drive out to Denver and stay in the city or around it for 50 to 60 dollars a night which is around 8 to 9 bucks back in 1969. According to Orbitz there are also several options below $40 as well around Denver in the summer time. If you want cheap there are a ton of options.
I'm sure that if you want to plan your vacation like a military operation with a view to minimizing your lodging expenses, you might be able to come withing hailing distance of those 1969 prices. But if your idea of a vacation tends a bit more towards spontaneity and a bit less like the Romney family, the operative prices are those for walk-ups that you don't need prior research and negotiating to obtain. We found our motels by simply driving down the road we we going on and looking at the signs, not by going miles out of our way to save a few bucks. The prices we found ranged from $3 to $8 a night, with the average around $5, which is just over $31 today. Even the high range of $8 ($50 today) would be tough to find in most places tonight without a fair amount of prior research and / or bargaining, which is a hassle we didn't need to go through.
All these stories make me wonder how reliable these inflation-adjusted amounts are. (I know nothing about the subject)
I don't love On the Road, but I do like the time capsule view it provides for the American road trip. One of the things that struck me is what a big deal mountain passes were - in shitty cars, on shitty roads, getting over a mountain range wasn't trivial. Now you just blare straight through at 80 mph, and if you're passing through one of the big Western ranges, you are only mildly inconvenienced by the trucks in the right hand lane.
Brendan Ryan didn't seem to think so.
I'm not usually one for conspiracy theories but I wonder if the home plate ump makes that kind of call (and without any help from 1B) in the 4th inning of a 6-5 game.
Thank you.
Wow, who is Philip Humber.
Good ####### question.
The best player involved in the Johan Santana trade!
And you were still able to maintain control of your vehicle at that speed? I call balderdash!
And, in the other news..... that last swing looked..... not a swing? Oh dear. Now THAT's going to be the story.
Motel 6's and Super 8's are all over the place and especially by the highways. Plus everyone has a smartphone nowadays so you even get the added advantage of searching for a nearby cheap motel while you drive.
The brochure said it got 32 on the highway, whether or not it actually did or not.
The 1969 Beetle brochures claim 27 mpg. Checkout TheSamba.com for a trip down memory lane. 1969 VW Beetle had a 10.6 gallon fuel tank. VW claims you get 27 mpg with half payload at 3/4 top speed on level roads with standard transmission. 25 mpg with optional transmission. Figure with fuel lines and such 300 or so is around 27 mpg. Top speed was 78 mph so 3/4 of that is 58.5 mph.
I made a point to go to this game, his first MLB start. Boy, did THAT go well.
What's a chickenhawk again? The person that demanded we kill Bin Laden, one of the most dangerous jobs in the world, even ripped on Bush for not getting the job done....but never bothered to sacrifice civilian life or train to hunt and kill Bin Laden, instead demanded others carry out this task. Yea, that's pretty much every American.
The term chickenhawk is pointless drivel.
I was with a group of women I was hoping would not see me as a boor.
Missed this, I hiked the Wall with three gorgeous women from Poland I met in a hostel in Beijing. It was indeed a Great Wall.
Man, I really did miss the travel thread. I agree that people in Asia, even when trying to cut me in train lines, were about 10000 times more friendly than those in Europe. And Vietnam so far counts as my favorite country I've ever visited. I would, and may, go there to retire.
Did you mark your territory?
It's still happening! You hold the thread's destiny in your hands.
Of course "everyone" doesn't have a smartphone. With about 100,000,000 of them in the US, and a big percentage of them owned by teenagers, it's likely that not even a majority of adults own one.
And those Super 8's and Motel 6's are likely to be well over the adjusted 1969 prices if you have to rely on walk-up, which is still what people without a smartphone would have to do unless they're willing to plan their trip well in advance. You keep trying to force your own model of travel on everyone, which isn't always possible for many people.
The 1969 Beetle brochures claim 27 mpg. Checkout TheSamba.com for a trip down memory lane. 1969 VW Beetle had a 10.6 gallon fuel tank. VW claims you get 27 mpg with half payload at 3/4 top speed on level roads with standard transmission. 25 mpg with optional transmission. Figure with fuel lines and such 300 or so is around 27 mpg. Top speed was 78 mph so 3/4 of that is 58.5 mph.
I'll give you the 27 mpg, since I've never had anything but a stickshift. Our MPH varied from 30 going up steep inclines to 70-75 on Montana interstates with no speed limit. You can work out the math, but with the inflation-adjusted price of gas so far below today's, whatever the average mpg is today over 27 doesn't make up for the difference.
Since we've been down this road before, I'll just state the obvious: If you tried to drive two people today cross-country, stopping in roadside motels without advance planning or smartphones, eating your meals in restaurants, and driving (say) a Civic or a Corolla, you'd never be able to do it on $100 a day if you were averaging (as we did) about 350 miles a day. If you could afford a smartphone, and were willing to adjust your schedule to find the cheapest available place to stay, you could probably come a lot closer to doing it. But how much a month is all that connectivity costing you, and how much more would your trip cost if you didn't have it?
And yet that is what you are trying to do as well. You can get cheap rooms. Yes nowadays some things are different. Does that mean you can't drive until 10 at night and just pull in at the first Bates Motel you find? Probably but that doesn't mean it isn't rather easy to find cheap rooms with very short notice.
With about 100,000,000 of them in the US, and a big percentage of them owned by teenagers, it's likely that not even a majority of adults own one.
How old were you in 1969?
85% of Americans have a cell and as of right now and over half of those owners have a smartphone. Even without smartphone ability a cell phone allows one to use a phone on the road. Which I'm sure you are aware helps greatly in making reservationes. 90% of 20 year olds use a smartphone. By the end of 2012 the amount of smartphone owners will be much much higher. Almost all cellphones being sold right now are smartphones.
Can we enjoy a 30 day trip across America for two people on $100 a day? Well, if we put a huge amount of conditions on it like you seem to want to do then probably not. But I'll add one caveat. It's a helluva lot safer to do it nowadays then doing it back then. You can sit there and quibble about the cost of a smartphone or what have you but then you also have to factor in the increased amount of risks people were exposed to back then.
I don't think Andy's entirely right about the costs, but what sorts of dangers are you envisioning? Racial?
I did a two-week version of this a couple years ago when I moved from New Hampshire to the Bay Area. Total expenses were MAYBE a thousand bucks. Probably a good deal less.
The secret is that we live in the 21st century so we're connected to a massive number of people outside our local community. Which meant we had friends and family to crash with pretty much everywhere we went. That's what you can't duplicate in 1969.
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