Day 12 – July 14, 2002
A sunny morning and a wonderful breakfast with Jack and Kara at Kazansky’s start the last day of the mix tape road trip on the right note.
Mix #62 Signals From Distant (Space) Ships
Maker: Jeremy Date: 2002 Begun: 12:20pm Ended: 1:53pm Miles Covered: 79
The park is not crowded at all and they blast Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly and Ray Charles music throughout the place over extremely tinny loudspeakers. The wooden coaster in the outfield, the Skyliner, cost us $1.50 to ride and there was only one other person on it. This time, Jeremy decides to remove his glasses and actually enjoy the ride. We also rode the world’s oldest working coaster, Leap the Dips, which was built in 1902. You can just imagine women with petticoats and men in handlebar moustaches riding it and being scared out their minds at the 8 foot drops. An amazing, hidden treasure.
Mix #63 The Haves and the Have-Nots: The Haves
Maker: Dan Date: 1/02 Begun: 3:23pm Ended: 4:41pm Miles Covered: 70
Leaving Altoona, PA – Ahhh, coming into the final stretch. Only three mixes left to go and more than enough time to finish them all. No need to hurry because we are certain to make it to Albany airport by the time Allison arrives to pick us up at 7pm. Time to just enjoy the beautiful Western Pennsylvania scenery like the mountain of dead appliances that we passed a ways back and the A-Z Video State College. Ooh, there’s a pretty bad looking accident but thankfully the wait isn’t very long and we’re back on our way home.
Mix #64 The Haves and the Have-Nots: The Have-Nots
Maker: Dan Date: 1/02 Begun: 4:44pm Ended: 6:05pm Miles Covered: 21
Loganton, PA – Okay, we’ve hit more traffic. Nothing to get panicked about yet. Wait, why is that cop car on the shoulder driving against traffic? And now an Advanced Life Support truck. Eegah! This is worse than it looks. Let’s listen to the music to take our mind off the backup. Hey, this Ted Leo song is enhanced nicely by the semi-truck stopped next to us on the highway. Oh wow, that man in front of us is eating just like a praying mantis. Creepy. Oh God!! We’re still not moving! Why are we being tortured?
Mix #65 I Thought You Were Gone For Good
Maker: Jeremy Date: 6/02 Begun: 10:53pm Ended: 12:10pm Miles Covered: 92
108 miles from Albany - Well the traffic seemingly lasted forever, completely fucking us up. Jeremy tried to use the cell phone of a neighboring car during the stand still but couldn’t get a signal out in the middle of the Pennsylvania woods (that’s good!) so he wasn’t able to reschedule a pickup time with Allison who most likely was already sitting at the airport waiting for the Mix Tape Two. Unable to reach her and frazzled by the traffic jam, Jeremy was unable to start the last mix tape, waiting until he got in touch with Allison before he was ready to get back to the music. They listened to other people’s mixes, including a brilliant mix by Shawn, and occasionally drove in silence, sick with anger and dread.
After finally speaking to Allison and explaining the horrific delay, they were ready to finish up the trip with the last mix, the second one Jeremy made specifically for the trip and the one he planned to play as the final mix of the journey. His 28th mix for Dan, it includes, in chronological order, a song by an artist who appeared on only one tape, so song 1 was by an artist who had a song on tape 1 and was never heard from again and so on. Some, like Jesse Fuller, were welcomed back with open arms while others, like Ida, had been happily forgotten.
We arrived at the airport around 12:45 am, listening to an audio mix tape review made by Josh years ago. It was quiet and dead in the parking lot but eventually the palpable tension lifted and we happily made our way home. 65 mixes in 12 days. 6855 miles total. The only question now was when to take the next trip and where that one will go because even after all the traffic and bad night’s sleep and days of 10 hour drives, we were still not sick of mix tapes. Maybe next time, we’ll even find the time to stop at Denny’s.
