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This weekend had the making of another awesome, random trip weekend. Don’t get me wrong, it did end up being a great weekend, but with much more driving than I had originally anticipated.

On Thursday night, I went out to play darts with Evan. While playing, he mentioned that, since he buys so many concert tickets, he was given the opportunity to buy as many as 12 tickets to Friday night’s Black Crowes concert in Gilford New Hampshire for free. The only cost was the $5.95 service fee.

Knowing that I had nothing to do on Friday night, and that I had to pick Kristina up at the airport in Manchester, NH on Saturday morning, inspiration struck. Why not go to the concert on Friday night, stay at his parents house in York Maine after the show, and get Kristina in the morning? It was a perfect plan. I’d save some time getting Kristina from the airport, and we’d get to see a free concert. How could that go wrong?

Driving to the concert wasn’t too bad on Friday night. Sure, there was traffic, but all in all, not a problem. We got to the venue 15 minutes before the Black Crowes went on. The concert was excellent.

After the show, we started driving to his place in York. It was supposed to be an hour and a half away. I got onto 93, which would eventually hook up with 95. Well, after about an hour and a half of driving, we realized we were in Lincoln New Hampshire.

Nearly out of gas, I started looking around for a gas station, but everything was closed. We stopped at an EconoLodge, where the man at the front desk could not help us. He told us that if he used the computer to give us directions, he would get fired. Finally, we got back on the highway and eventually found gas. When we went inside, Evan asked “How do we get to 95?” The answer was priceless: “Oh boy.”

The guy inside the gas station showed us a map. Have a look yourself:

A. Gilford New Hampshire: Where we started after the concert
B. Lincoln New Hampshire: Where we were getting gas
C. York Maine: Our final destination

We got directions and headed on our way. At 3:45, I was having a tough time staying awake. I pulled over and had evan drive for a while. I immediately nodded off. I woke up at 4:45 and realized we were in Hampton Beach. It was so foggy that we couldn’t see anything at all.

At 5:30 am we pulled into Evan’s driveway.

At 8:50 am, I awoke to a phone call from Kristina: “I’m here. Where are you?”

She was already at the airport, and I hadn’t left Maine yet. An hour later I was there and got her. We didn’t do much on Saturday, and on Sunday morning at 9 am, we headed back to Maine for Andrea’s wedding shower. This time, I had no problem finding York.

Kristina went to the shower, and I went with Evan and his friend Mike to a nearby field where I did something I’ve never done: shot shotguns at targets. It was a lot of fun, and since I’ve never held a gun before, it was pretty exciting. About an hour into it, we heard sirens. We looked up, and there was a cop with his lights on and another cruiser pulling up behind it. We started walking towards them, and Evan and Mike were both holding shotguns. I said “Guys, should we really be walking up to cops with guns in our hands?” They acted like it was no big deal, so I followed. Mike raised his hand and said “Hi John. How’s it going?”

Mike knew the cop, so everything was fine. Apparently one of the neighbors called the cops on us, though we weren’t doing anything remotely illegal. The cops made sure we were shooting shotguns, and then apologized for bothering us.

600 Miles of driving
$120 in gas
One run in with cops for firing weapons

Now that’s a weekend.