The Adventures of Bobby Sock and Friends, Part 7

Or Ketchup chips! My kingdom for some ketchup chips!

One thing you must realize about them Canadians: they’ve got strange tastes. For example, while we Americans like ketchup on our fries and salt-n-vinegar chips, they eat their fries with vinegar¹ and like ketchup-flavored chips. I think they do this to be spiteful.

Anyway, Pepperkat has a friend who is a ketchup-o-holic. She puts ketchup on everything. In fact, if we just give her a bottle of ketchup to drink, she’ll clean our kitchen for us.² So, when we saw that they sold ketchup chips in Canada, we decided to bring her back a bag. We didn’t want them pre-crunched, so we chose to wait until just before crossing the border on our way back to buy some.

Bad plan.

I’m one of those annoying people who hates to go the same way twice. If I go someplace using Route A, I must use Route B to come back. If I go to the store to get milk, I have to go the long fricking way around to get home.³ So, rather than go back the way we came, I had the bright idea to take the direct route through western New Brunswick and eastern Maine via Rte 6…

There. Is. Nothing. There.

Dude. Seriously. Other than the historic McAdam Railway Station, there was nothing. Not even a fricking convenience store. So, we returned to the States dejected and chipless.

Now a brief word about security…

Remember when I said that the Canadians just let us in with a wave and a smile? Not so the Americans! On the one hand, I’m glad they’re being all watchful and stuff, but guys: lighten up! Enjoy your low-paying government job in the middle of nowhere! Seriously, I thought I was going to cause an incident by being too damned cheerful.

BORDER GUARD: Sir, turn off your car and open your trunk.
ME: Certainly!
GUARD: What kind of a crack is that, sir?
ME: Um… nothing… I mean… yes, sir.
GUARD: Are you trying to hide something?
ME: Who? Me? No! What would I be hiding?
GUARD: *to his cohort* Check the trunk for contraband. He’s hiding something.
ME: Seriously, we’re just back from vacation…
GUARD: In Canada? Now I know you’re lying. Step out of the car, sir.
ME: But…
GUARD: Now, sir.
ME: *getting out of the car* But we really didn’t even buy anything in Canada!
GUARD 2: I found a donut…
GUARD: Didn’t buy anything, eh?
ME: It’s not mine! I swear!

Sadly, after a few more hours of negotiations, we were forced to hand over the family of Canadians hiding in the spare tire well. (They were just trying to make it to the Land of Opportunity, you bastards!) And with a stern rebuke, they let us go.⁴

We hit Brewer around noon and headed out to meet up with the surviving member of Clan Norton in Maine–my brother, Jeff. An enjoyable afternoon of catching up, followed by a really good (and cheap) Chinese dinner ensued.

WARNING: Gratuitous pictures of cute niece and nephew coming up!

And there was much more Bobby fun.

So, we had made it back to the good ole U.S.A. in one piece. We were ketchup-chipless and without Levesque and his family (and the strip search wasn’t nearly as fun as they say in the brochures), but we had a great adventure. If there’s ever a place that I could call home besides the United States, it would definitely be Canada. Or Australia. The U.K. might be nice, if it weren’t for all the Welsh people. I might try New Zealand, too. Yeah! That’d be cool! Think about it! Hanging around where they made the Lord of the Rings movie. That would so rock! But Canada is definitely in the Top 20 for sure.

[TO BE CONTINUED]…⁶

¹Or french fries, gravy, and cheese curds (i.e., poutine)

²Not true. She cleans the kitchen because she’s a weirdo who likes to clean other people’s houses. Not that there’s anything wrong with that…

³I don’t make fun of your crazy hang-ups (much). Don’t snicker at mine.

⁴None of that actually happened. The U.S. Border Patrol are very nice people.⁵

⁵Bastards.

⁶I always feel like putting BUM-BUM-BUMMMMMMM after that.

The Adventures of Bobby Sock and Friends, Part 8