A Visit From the Cap'n

Jeremy Mucha, AKA The Cap'n
Originally uploaded by baldman76

Early in the AM this morning, my dad and I delivered Jeremy Mucha' (AKA Cap'n Hardqore AKA Homeskillet) to the Jackson airport.

Jeremy is one of my oldest friends, and still one of my closest. There's a certain type of conversation that I seem to only have on those occasions when he's around. Good, deep conversations on weighty topics. Perhaps this is due to mutual respect or simply familiarity and comfort in each other's company; it's likely both.

I met Jeremy (along with Billy Middleton) on the first day of second grade at Culkin Elementary. The three of us were fairly inseparable all the way until high school graduation, when we each went our separate ways. But not too separate. Jeremy lived with us for two summers after high school and he was but a road trip away in Atlanta, and Billy went to Hinds with me, so we were still regularly in touch. (Billy was technically my roommate at Hinds for one semester, but he wasn't thee very much.) Even now, I keep in touch with both of them, and even though we're on opposite sides of the country, I manage to see Jeremy at least once a year these days (which is largely due to his efforts, I must admit). That means we have known each other for 23+ years. Katie has always marveled at the idea of having had a friend that long. It's one of the advantages to having been born and raised in the same small town.

So Jeremy came in from San Diego* and spent a good 3 ½ days here in V'burg, visiting the family. It was a nice visit and was great seeing him, but there were several impediments to it being a rockin' visit worthy of someone so hardqore as the Cap'n. First, there's the difficulty of entertaining someone in a house that's not your own in a town in which you no longer live. The “idea well”ran dry pretty quick. And it rained a good portion of the time he was here. Add to that the fact that Dad has had a few rough days, Mom got a terrible cold, my Mamaw Reid is ill with a mystery ailment and panic attacks, and the fact that I caught a bit of a sniffle bug myself (the "Dread Mahocus"), and it was likely a little less of a stellar visit than it could have been.

Luckily, Jeremy is a pretty laid-back dude, one that is content to just chill on the back deck., I had a lot of fun and it was great to see him. We went downtown on the Fourth of July to see a very impressive fireworks display.** Thursday afternoon, we cruised over to Jackson to return his rental car and chilled at Cups coffee shop for a while. We spent a few afternoons in Daniel's coffee shop here in town, and wandered about taking in the sights. After going back to see the New Harmonies Roots Music exhibit, we realized Jeremy had never seen O, Brother, Where Art Thou? so we rectified that situation. And we played Scrabble. Several times. Always great to see him.

* Discovered by the Germans in 1904, they named it San Diego, which of course in German means “a whale's vagina.” Not really.

**It's not the first grand fireworks display here in town, but V'burg hasn't always had a soft spot for the 4th of July.