In Bethlehem They're Killing Time...riding their Segways

Since I haven’t ritten in a while, and have eliminated silent letters from my style, I was waiting for a defining moment to get the juices flowing again. Would it be smashing my head on a fire valve in Flint, MI and bleeding into my hat? Or being continually harassed by hotel employees regarding use of the complimentary shuttles they all begrudgingly “schedule” for our use? Or getting out the old tennis racket for a couple hours of punishingly refined fun at a raquet club in Kalamazoo? Perhaps waiting 35 minutes for a bagel and peanut butter at a stupid little shop in State College and protesting the shite service (can I say that on the radio?), honorably, by not bussing our own table? Or touring the semi desolate town of Bethlehem where most of the geography is fenced off and abandonded, leaving enough room for a home goods store and Segway dealership. The moment happened today as I was carrying my bags up to the 7th floor (translation: 8th floor) of the Binghamton Regency and was teased by a group of firemen descending who fell silent when I said “I want to be like you when I grow up.”

Also on the way to Binghamton we stopped for lunch at a song-worthy oasis of metal buildings on the highway in Pennsylvania featuring names like “Store,” “Fireworks,” “Country Kitchen” and, appetizingly, “Mahwah Tires.” Paying fantastic homage to the herd mentality, we 45 or so dandies and youths were a mere 30 miles from our final destination, but needed so badly to eat and romp in irony that we delayed our arrival in Binghamton (motto: “are you really here? Wow.”) by over an hour. I saw the most massive section of human fecal matter I could ever dream of sitting in a toilet in the “Store” restroom.