Road trip, yes or no?

[bean]

Well, as of right now I'm unemployed. I have some money in the bank (a couple of thousand) leftover from the insurance payout on my old car. I opted to get a Nissan instead of another Honda, the Nissans are a bit cheaper, and frankly, the Altima is a HELL of a lot more fun to drive, and gets far better mileage than my Accord.. even though the Altima has a slightly larger engine and just a hair more power.

I'm giving some thought to putting most of my stuff in storage, leaving my pets with my parents.. pack up my laptop, some basic tools, my phone (both for using as a phone and as a modem with the laptop), and all 3 of my cameras... and just driving and seeing where I wind up. My phone has 2 GPS apps on it, Sprint Navigation and Google Navigation (Beta). Both work well, though the Sprint version is a little more polished.

My car gets awesome mileage, the a/c works great, has a nice new CD player with aux in for my mp3 player (though it BADLY needs new speakers), and overall it's in pretty good shape.

I have friends all over the US that I can crash with, worst case, the back seat of my car isn't horrible, it's big enough for me to lay down in (won't stretch out, but I can at least lay down).

More than anything, I'm considering exploring Arkansas and Louisiana, along with Texas. The Ozarks are absolutely beautiful (I'll just have to peel off the rainbow stickers lol).

I'm going to guess most will say no, but being unemployed, at the end of a lease, and having some cash in the bank for gas/food seems like the perfect time to do this kind of thing.

Am I as crazy as I think I am?

[AccountingDrone]

Yes and no =)

Do you have the possibility of employment to come back to? Would you consider taking jobs of opportunity if one pops up while you are traveling? See, I sort of did what you are wanting to one summer. I had just finished a sort of bad relationship, I had just finished college, and was in the great position of working for a company that I had a long employment history with so I could quit but realistically get my job back pretty much at will. I had a 74 mustang, $5k in the bank and itchy feet. I ended up sight seeing my way down the east coast to North Carolina, and ended up working for a summer cleaning rooms in a hotel in Myrtle Beach in exchange for a room for 3 months. Not that it was a spectacular job, but it had no responsibilty for management at all and my brain was fried from going to school and working running machine shops for the past 4 years and I just wanted to flake out. Best decision for a season of wandering I ever did. I cleaned rooms, hung out with a bunch of nice people and learned to surf fish.

I say a reserved go for it.

[AdminAssistant]

More than anything, I'm considering exploring Arkansas and Louisiana, along with Texas. The Ozarks are absolutely beautiful (I'll just have to peel off the rainbow stickers lol).

No, you won't. Eureka Springs (in the middle of the Ozarks) is one of the most gay friendly communities in Arkansas.

I won't give you advice as to whether or not you should go. However, if you do go to Arkansas, don't forget the Delta. Just as beautiful as the Ozarks, IMO. Little Rock is fine, but a bit overrated. If you really want to see the Ozarks, I recommend the aforementioned Eureka Springs, Mountain Home (there's a lake), and Hardy (antiques and such). Anyway, I'm from AR so if you do go, lemme know.

[r2cagle]

Go.. take a break, renew your spirit.

If you've got the means to support yourself for a little while, then take this as a vacation. Time will come soon enough that you have to buckle down and get busy working again.

[JLG]

If you can afford to do it then I say go for it.

You will see many different things and probably meet some cool people along the way.

I would love to hear your adventures a long the way

[bean]

No, you won't. Eureka Springs (in the middle of the Ozarks) is one of the most gay friendly communities in Arkansas.

Funny story there.

My mom always wanted to visit Eureka Springs. So we took a trip out there a couple of years ago. Apparently Eureka Springs has 4 gay pride weekends per year, and we happened to stumble into one of them.

I commented "wow they have a lot of rainbow stickers and flags out here!" excitedly, and she said "There's no way these people know what rainbow stickers mean, this is the Ozarks!" I had her follow me into one store, struck up a conversation with a VERY gay person (the owner of the shop) and asked about all the flags and said I was from Dallas. He laughed, handed me a copy of the Dallas Voice (the local gay newspaper for DFW) and pointed out the full page ads for Eureka Springs. I bought a couple of bracelets and mom left with her jaw on the ground. The shop owner informed me that at least 50% of the population was openly gay - then when we were walking around "downtown" my mom pointed out several guys openly checking me out as they drove by. Even mom's Avalon could do at least 40 around the curves, but she flips her lid on curvy roads and goes white knuckled. If i'm driving on such roads she starts screaming. She's very, very .... paranoid.

I would LOVE to return to Eureka Springs - especially the twisty 2 lane roads that you have to take to get there. Mom was doing 10-15 on them with people lined up 10 cars deep laying on their horns, I would have been doing at least 40-50 and enjoying my poor man's sport sedan (probably could take them around 80 in my old Integra, but it was automatic, my Altima is manual). Pretty long drive though (about 5 1/2 hours from here).

Hotels are horribly expensive there though.

Absolutely *AMAZING* part of the country, the only time I've ever seen trees like that was in Ruidoso New Mexico.

Oh yeah, mom's T-Mobile phone was roaming on AT&T as soon as we left Oklahoma.. at 50c/minute and unspeakable text rates. I had full internet and full Sprint service until we REALLY got up into the mountains, then I roamed onto Verizon a few miles outside of Eureka Springs and lost internet. Free nationwide roaming on my plan. I was actually sitting on AIM and MSN from my phone for most of the drive (had a Palm Treo 650 back then).

I've been to Little Rock once, for a rave of all things, but made a side trip to visit my grandmother's grave (she died a year before I was born). Arkansas is absolutely beautiful.

For the others.... no job lined up, no nothing lined up aside from a storage room and family taking care of pets. I picked up the license plates for my Altima yesterday and asked the seller what work had been done before they sold it, they said they normally just clean and flip, but this particular car had a fried clutch when they got it, so it has a new clutch kit and new rear main seal, so it may need tires in 6 months or so, but should be good to drive for awhile.

Frankly, I'm really, really tempted to take off down to Austin... the night time weather is mild now, and I have various friends I can stay with for a day or two at a time. If I manage to land a job there that would just be AWESOME, I love that city so much. Lots of friends, lots of family, and lots to do there. Dallas isn't bad at all, it's a different world than what I grew up in (El Paso TX), but I'm kind of sick of the whole 6 million people crammed into one metro area bit.

Also no rainbow stickers, no stickers at all on the car, just a license plate frame from the dealer I bought the car from.... it's a bland looking car and I want to keep it that way. Less chance of getting pulled over! My cars used to always be COVERED in political stickers, but these days it's easier to just keep it looking like a grandma car, right down to the shitty $20 autozone hubcaps. Might do some work under the hood, of course. It's a late 90s silver Nissan, it really blends in almost as much as my last car, a 2001 grandpa gold Honda Accord. I will say unamerican.com has the BEST stickers though, a few might find their way onto the Nissan.

[Amina516]

Bean, i say go for it!

Id do it if I could.

Ill live vicariously through you.