Living the Dream with Joyce: November 11-12, 2014

Lazed around for most of the day - got the rv ready to roll - put away stuff, etc In the afternoon, I skyped with Gregory and Anna, which was awesome! Some technical difficulties shortened our time together, though, which kind of sucked. I had to leave to catch the shuttle from the office at 5:00, going to the Ryman Auditorium to watch the Grand Ole Opry. It seemed somehow wrong to be attending a show on Remembrance Day; however, there were lots of tributes to veterans (it being Veterans' Day here) so it seemed better as the evening wore on. The program at the Grand Ole Opry was very well done - a melange of older and younger, newbies and experienced, mainly men . . . hmmm. One group actually sang The Star Spangled Banner, for which the audience stood and sang along - and the last song was, predictably, I'm Proud to be an American - again, the whole audience rose as one and sang lustily! Each act was 15 minutes long - long enough to get a good sampling, but not long enough to get bored - very smart programming! I took some pics with my phone (didn't bring my iPad), so the quality isn't as good. I bought a tshirt, of course . . .
Today (Wednesday), I drove on to Memphis - stopped for gas just outside the city and had a rather unpleasant experience: I prepaid $85 for gas, then picked up food at McDonald's in the same building, then went to pump my gas and it wouldn't pump. I went back to the cashier, who said that her register said that it had been pumped - big confusion - I phoned my credit card company and ascertained that yes, the charge had gone through. In the end, the head honcho was called in - he approved resetting the pump so that I could get my gas, took my phone # and said that he would wait 24 hours to see if the money went through at his end, and if it didn't, he would phone me and do another transaction over the phone. Hmmm - we'll see what happens here . . . Anyway, I booked in at the Graceland RV Park on Elvis Presley Blvd. and went to dinner at Marlowe's - driven there in a pink limo, no less! Marlowe's provides free rides to certain hotels - and the Graceland RV Park. Everything in that restaurant is Elvis - Elvis tabletops, Elvis' costumes behind glass, pictures and signatures and even Elvis movies playing! What a hoot! Good food, too, although definiitely a lot of heart-attack-on-a-stick choices. I had fried green tomatoes, bbq brisket on a bun, mushrooms, and a Blue Hawaii cocktail. Tomorrow I'll walk across the parking lot to Graceland and take a tour or something.