Quick Fire Desert DRAW

MISSION: Nine days to get through four states (Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona) from the Big Easy to Sin City. 1,736.6 miles to cover, NOLA exhilaration/nausea still coursing through our central systems and a desert to cross until we had to be in Las Vegas on the 4th of December. It was action packed and quick moving so fasten your seat-belts and adjust your armrests; we're going hard and fast.

TARGET: The Flamingo Hotel on Las Vegas strip. Forever Fabulous.



SIGHTS TO SEE: Cactus, cowboys and swinging saloon doors.

SOUNDTRACK:
The Animals - House of the Rising Sun
Jace Everett - Bad Things
Chuck Berry - Johnny B. Goode
Hugo - 99 Problems
Ray Charles - Hit the Road Jack
Blues Brothers - Rawhide
Elbow - Grounds for Divorce
Edwynn Collins - A Girl Like You
Donna Summer - Hot Stuff
Elvis Presley - Suspicious Minds
Jerry Lee Lewis - Great Balls of Fire
Florence + the Machine - Girl with One Eye
Prodigy - Smack my Bitch Up
Bloodhound Gang - The Bad Touch
The Eagles - Hotel California
Tupac + Dr Dre - California Love

Eight Ways to Stay Sassy in NOLA

Feeling less fierce? Sass levels dwindling? Fix up, look sharp. Here's how we kept the attitude topped up in the US Capital of Sass; New Orleans, Lousiana (NOLA).

1. LIVE SASSY 
Book a bed at the Best Hostel of All Time, the AAE Bourbon House New Orleans run by a peroxide-haired bombshell and Sass Commodore-in-Chief, Jayson. He is the only hostel manager to date to wake me up and drag me to Walmart in search of turducken with all the trimmings for Thanksgiving dinner.
Whether you're in the mood for sass or not, it could be hurled at you from across the garden or handed to you sweetly on a paper plate, alongside your barbecued franks and potato salad. It all depends on the waxing phases of the moon. 

2. DRINK SASSY

Indulge in some of that pre-loading David Cameron is always banging on about by procuring a two-litre bottle of $10 vodka from Walmart. Amatuer Sass Cadets can begin with starter bottles of Bud Light Lime while the more sophisticated and refined have a tasty bottle of wine to turn to. The vodka vanished alarmingly quickly thanks to the obscene measures being poured by the Gassonimator. Before we knew it we'd been vacuum packed into a convoy of taxi cabs and whirled out to NOLA's drinking-and-mugging hot spot Bourbon Street. Here the streets are rained on by alcohol, cheap carnival beads and STDs. Already meatballing around the pavement, a kind soul threw me a Hand Grenade and three minutes after imbibing it, the cocktail shot through my veins and exploded like an a-bomb right behind my eyes. 

3. FIND AND FRIEND FELLOW SASSERS

solid life motto

This was one of those rare fantastic times when the planets align and the cosmos conspires so that we were in the right hostel with the right people at the right time. Our fellow hostellers were all a bunch of right wrong 'uns, a good mix of Australians (all from Melbourne, weirdly), a scattering of American and the rest, British. There was a news editor from the Beeb goading an erotic dancer from Portland Oregon who looked exactly like K-Stew, the Real Inbetweeners (four English boys studying in Illinois had come down to Naaaawlins for Thanksgiving break and they were the living, breathing Will, Neil, Jay and Simon. They hated that we immediately christened them the Inbetweeners, but not more than they hated being called One Direction), a pair of Scottish LADs interning at a Texan oil firm and two Brummie girls, cool in black with heavy eyeliner and tattooed arms.
The evening was young and ours to claim. 


4. FLASH YOUR SASS ON BOURBON STREET

Rules for Bourbon Sass include: partnering your hand with a drink at all times, smearing yours and others' face with gold glitter and Vaseline, administering sass at a bar to cut through the queue, sassing with aplomb on the dance floor, duckfacing those with inferior levels of sass while sucking on a neon jelly shot in syringes, snapping fingers at raasclat bouncers who, though younger than you, still require checking your ID, dishing out some smartass sass to poets trying to sell haikus and ditties on the pavement, withstanding a Hurricane cocktail, hailing a cab without passing out, throwing up without getting any vom on your only Going Out top. All with nothing less than optimum sass.



5. FESTIVE SASS
Thanksgiving in America is up there with Christmas in terms of ceremony, decoration and excessive carb consumption. With our newly formed NOLA Collective, we decided to trawl through the aisles of Walmart to create a feast of our very own. I was tasked with making a carrot and orange salad, which managed to go awry the minute I picked up the grater. However, Leah saved the day with her Mother Hen routine and spent most of the afternoon in the kitchen, sweating out her dishgushting hangover over trays of crispy roast potatoes and parsnips.


6. BLACK FRIDAY SASS
Back at Walmart, elbows at the ready and the fire for a true bargain burning in our hearts, we braced ourselves and pushed into the fray. There was a netbook for $188 with my name on it. We got there and Darrell the department manager informed us that all twenty six had sold out. What kind of company stocks just twenty six laptops on a day as serious as Black Friday?!
INITIATE SASS.
'Na uh honey. OH NO. Whaaaaaat, you bein' serious?!' Jayson sassed, hip jutting to one side and hair quivering with rage. He assumed the duckface and went off into one, demanding the number for Walmart HQ, then flirting with him before threatening lesser staff members with letters of complaint at this shoddy display of retail incompetency.
I was glad he was on our side, fighting on my behalf for this  injustice. One Walmart worker, inevitably called Shaniqua, had four gold teeth in the front of her mouth and looked as though she could knock my burgeoning sass right out of the state if I tried it. She and Jayson tangoed in a crazy sass war, but then Jayson got distracted by half price duvets and my netbook was lost forever. 



7. CASUAL SASS
I managed to meet up with a super-stylist chum who was in NOLA on fashion business. Unfortunately this was the morning after the night before and I was accessorised with bits of glitter in untamed hair and gloopy eye bogey. I stumbled out of a cab at 10.55a.m, feeling like my internal organs had been blow dried, by a mile-and-a-half long queue outside Cafe Le Monde in the French quarter. Alcohol still seeping out of my skin and sticking to my frock in the warm November sun. I found Buntface and we ran into each other's arms by a street performer in the middle of yowling to Michael Jackson's BAD. Then we went to a record shop and got clawed by the owner's kitten before falling into a pub for burgers and bread and butter pudding. Casual, like.
On the walk home I watched a woman strangling a fish on the banks of the Mississippi and found five hundred rupees in a park. Moral of the story: Sass is as sass does.

christmas tree merboy sass

8. DILUTING SASS DURING CRISIS-TIMES
Once upon a time a douchebag came to Nawlins for his 21st bday. He was the kind of livelong moron who hunts down a party with ferocious hunger and the gleam of embarrassing desperation in his eyes. I BETTER FIND SOME FUN OR FUN'S GONNA BE IN TROUBLE. Birthday Douche drank all day. He drank all afternoon and into the early evening. By 7pm he had completed his transformation into a fully developed douchebag and could barely stand. Still, he drinky, raising the odds of getting punched in the face as the minutes slipped by. Oh, Birthday Douche was in for some ass-whoppery tonight.
New Orleans tradition dictates that birthday boys and girls pin a dollar bill to their top and people give them money to celebrate, so Birthday Douche does this. But Twattiness is a stench sniffed out and avoided by humans and dogs a mile off so no  $$$ for him, yo.  We shed ourselves of him and his insufferable ilk and headed out into the warm Friday night, dancing gleefully in a Bourbon whirl before very nearly setting my hair alight in a candle-lit, firehazard-worthy bar. I later found Birthday Douche, on his knees in the hostel bathroom, full blown crisis raging in the middle of the night.  He had fallen out of the cab in front of the hostel and cracked his jaw on the pavement. Now blood was gushing profusely from his douchey chin. Somebody had rung for an ambulance. Everyone had come out of their dorms to watch his pitful mewling and highly public meltdown. ENTER SASS. He twitched while I talked, trying to dial down the sass and calm him down while still taking the piss as much as I could. 'It's okay you massive vagine, that's not the real Grim Reaper you're seeing', I laughed at his falling-down-drunkeness 'No mate, no. No one's laughing at you. That's from inside your head. Twat'. He looked confused, unsure. HAHAHAHAAHHA. He deserved no mercy. Earlier in the evening he had chest-bumped his friend in the middle of chugging his Modelo beer and screamed  'PARTTTTEEE' into the sweet Lousiana sky. I had simply shared a look with Leah and Goodluck Jonathan, our favourite of the Australians. 'Someone concuss this guy, please' the look had said. He should have been issued a detention slip and been sat facing the corner wearing a Dunce hat instead of allowed out with the grown-ups that evening. 
Birthday Douche caught the word 'ambulance' and bolted like a disabled gazelle into the street, flailing and wailing at the intersection where the bored paramedics were parked. Costs around $7k to call out an ambulance in these parts, if you don't have health insurance. SUCKA. I should have sold popcorn, it was such a great show. After about ten minutes, I tired of watching him run away in pathetic slow motion from the medics (who admirably crawled behind him at 0.3mph rather than running the imbecile over) and clambered into bed, falling asleep in my mascara and strands of Mardi Gras beads.

DOUUUUUUUUUCHE

p.s - Stay sassy.

Down the River Road Without a Paddle

Earlier this year, ITV broadcast a documentary showing Sir Trevor McDonald (one of my guilty crushes) voyaging up the great Mississippi, absorbing the history of this diverse slice of America. Hillbillies, ghostly plantations, fishermen, funnel boats and Huckleberry Finn, they were all here, somewhere. 

I watched avidly during my 4am lunch break at work, wishing I was with Trev, delighting in the weird and wonderful. The river trail looked particularly enticing.

When planning Operation U S of Heeyyy!, Leah and I were in agreement that the Mississippi would feature prominently. We hoped to pick up a car in Memphis and take it down to New Orleans, stopping at towns along the way. 

Our first port of call was Holly Springs, MS, about an hour south east of Memphis, to the home of an Elvis SuperFan who turned his house into an insane, ridiculous shrine to the King himself. 

Graceland Too was at the bottom of a quiet street, rubbing shoulders with otherwise normal looking residential properties. We spotted it instantly - you'd have to have a severe fungal eye infection not to. From the gate to lion stone statues to the roof and Christmas trees on the lawn, everything was a searing shade of cobalt blue. It was like that scene from Mr Bean when he redecorates his living room by igniting a stick of dynamite attached to an open can of paint. 

 We parked up and walked over to 200 East Gholson Avenue, leaves crunching loudly under our All Stars as we tried to set our cameras to the right instagram filter to capture the madness that lay just metres from us. Unfortunately, SuperFan didn't appear to be home - his driveway, filled with rusting old iconic automobiles that no doubt would have gotten the nod from the King in their heyday, was devoid of a normal everyday vehicle. 

I rapped on the metal door until my knuckles turned bright pink but no cigar. We decided to break for tea and came back in a half hour. There was no way we could leave without trying our hardest to breach the Graceland Too barriers. 

I scouted the perimetre, looking for a point of entry, spotting a glint of light near one of the barricaded up back windows. All of the windows were nailed shut with planks of wood. From the inside. 
Hmm. 

We were either about to enter a world of sweet Elvis drenched madness or on the precipice of a brutal and horrific butchering to death by a manic fan dressed in a white, diamante-festooned jumpsuit. 

Even so, I was still desperate to see the inside. The website claimed the house was open 24/7. So what the hell? 

Was it rude to knock on the window, hinting at someone home? Would SuperFan be irked at two girls hammering on his door or would he be charmed by our Queen's English? 

I clawed at the door one final time, pushing open the letter box and shouting 'PAAAAUL! PAUL. OPEN THE DOOR, PAUL!' on his front step before admitting defeat and shuffling mournfully back to the car.

I sulked for about ten minutes then got on with the business of navigating us to Clarksdale, MS, the original home of the blues and Ground Zero Blues club, owned by none other than gravelly-voiced actor extrordinaire Morgan Freeman. We dropped our stuff off at a motel on the edge of town and parked up, walking cautiously around the windswept empty streets in a mission to find the watering hole of the local townsfolk. There wasn't a soul to be seen. It was eerie. 

Clarksdale had all the usual landmarks of an everyday town - petrol station, local craft store, Greyhound stop, post office. Just no people. The odd car would go by, slowing in amazement to watch these two out-of-towners actually using their lower limbs and WALKING along the pavement. I had a feeling we'd find an unassuming shack somewhere, push the door open and discover a wild and hedonistic party thriving inside. It hid from us for a good half hour, like an expert hide and seeker, until the wind carried over a snatch of music and we raced towards it, desperate for a drink and shelter from the chilly Mississippi night. 

The neon sign in the middle distance of Delta Avenue told us we'd found Ground Zero. And when I pushed opened the heavy wood door, I'd found what I'd hoped to - every man and his dog having a wild old time inside. 

Saturday evening in Clarksdale was held at this one spot. I ordered a Southern Pecan beer at the bar which was scrawled with sharpie messages from previous patrons and clambered into a stool, smiling at the barflys next to me. 

A father from Alabama, on his way back from a music festival with his son, caught my accent and once again, we were off, discussing what I was doing here so far away from home in this quiet corner of Mississippi. He told me to have some catfish - fried in a sandwich and bought from a roadside garage - and to keep my wits about me when we got to Bourbon Street in New Orleans. We failed to spot the Freeman, but it was a superb night all in all. I managed to beat a brother-sister team at a game of billiards and drank enough Pecans to sink a Mississippi steam boat.

The next morning, we headed south to the state capital, Jackson. But before doing so, I indulged in a hearty Sunday meal at Abe's BBQ where the sauce changed every view I'd previously held on barbecue sauce. Instead of a treacle-like suffocatingly sweet sauce, the condiment was watery with a greater spice to sugar ratio. The 'comeback' sauce (because once you try it, you're guaranteed to come back for more) was perfect on its own or thickened with hot sauce and Offish Delish smothered over chicken tenders. It was the best breakfast I've had. No, okay, in the top three at least.

Seltbelt fastened and sat nav programmed, we headed south to the state capital, Jackson. We'd heard from various people from night before that Jackson was a bit sketchy, advised not to go out at night and, 'be careful girls!' so we headed straight to a motel and settled in for the evening, entertaining ourselves with the excellent selection of reality TV on offer. Extreme Couponing USA is my favourite, while Leah is partial to a bit of Teen Mom 2. We both love Jersey Shore with a depth that rivals a toddler's affection for her first Cabbage Patch Doll. 

We left Jackson to be explored the next day and headed out bright and early to the town centre. On the advice of two rotund visitor centre ladies, one of whom failed spectacularly in polite social conduct by reaching out a padded little paw and stroking my hair mid-conversation, we headed to Fondren, a hipster neighbourhood on the edges of the downtown area. 

Here was Brent's Drug Store, the set of a scene from the motion picture The Help starring the lovely Emma Stone. I's interior stays true to the film's era - the civil right heavy 1960s - and still offers thirsty customers fountain sodas, malts, grilled cheese sandwiches and birthday cake ice cream. 

I gorged on a retro burger and fries before taking a quick turn around the block. Dotted with pastel coloured charity shops and craft boutiques, its a cute little slice of town that reminded me of pony-tailed cheerleaders and slick haired, letter jacket wearing quarterbacks of yesteryear. 

We left Jackson and 1965 behind as we continued our drive south, this time heading to the town of Natchez, slap bang on the Ol' Mississippi. It's shameful to say, but until now we still hadn't laid actual eyes on the famous river. Memphis had kept us occupied with her history of musical legends and delicious chicken, and Clarksdale and Jackson veered away from it's banks. But Natchez clung to the river like this charmer suckling at this cow's teet.

After getting the balance between cheap and clean motel room right, we directed our GPS to Under-The-Hill saloon. This is another bar recommended by my America Addict chumbawumba back in the UK. It is run by a professional leprechaun. He wasn't as cheery or as charmed by our English accents as his Southern fellows. This threw me. 

I expected genial conversation, followed by hearty laughter and an offer of adoption by last orders. What actually happened was me shouting my head off at the deaf, and incredibly drunk, old fella for a Pecan Beer, an offer of homemade gumbo from a Louisiana visitor (this disappointingly never materialised), playing darts with a girl called Britney and her manfriend Kelly and being bought rounds and shots by the Drunkest Man in Existence, Pat. 

oh Pat. He meant well.

Pat had been stumbling around in our direction for a good hour, mumbling about his miserable 35-year marriage and telling us he was a 'good guy, really, have a drink on me'. Once his invitation had been accepted, he clearly felt so emboldened by our hesitant friendship that he felt comfortable enough to stroke Kelly's muscles - 'Ah'm nat gay man, but you got amazin' arms!' and tangling his grubby fingers in Leah's and my hair. I am, apparently, good-looking for a Mexican. 

Cheers, Patrick.

The next day marked our exploration of Natchez. We high-tailed it to the visitor's centre after perusing the antique shops (antique in America means barely 200 years old. She's still a young pup) which pointed us in the direction of antebelleum houses (much like mama Gump's house, but each cost $15 to visit. Just to have a look around. Jog on) dotted about the town, an old Indian village and a burnt out nightclub. 

The Grand Village of the Natchez Indians turned out to be pretty cool. It was free and also educational - the best type of daytime activity. I learned that Indian males once sacrificed a child from their clan to move up the social order in the hope of one day becoming Chief. A bit severe perhaps, but I feel this tradition could be exported and enforced on council estates and Chicken Cottages throughout England. Boost your CV, sacrifice a chav today! 
Farewell Broken Britain.

All Shook Up like a Hound Dog. Uh Huh Huh.

I'd been looking forward to this day for months. No, years. Actually, since my inception, so approximately nine months before the 12th of December.
Finally, after all the waiting, debating and angst about quitting my job and shlepping around the US, intense internal struggles over which shoes I could be arsed to lug around for three months, getting here and traipsing across the north east of the country, finally >>>

WE WERE AT THE GATES OF GRACELAND

Elvis Aaron Presley's actual living, breathing pile on the edge of Memphis. There were probably a few of his cell particles still knocking about. I was so excited I broke out into star jumps by the ticket desk. Just writing about it now makes me feel a bit weird. So, in order to keep the hysteria at bay, I've decided to portray the wonder, garishness and downright opulence of the King of Rock and Roll in this here pictorial.

Feed your eyeballs.

Platinum ticket purchased sending happiness levels buzzing at full volume. If you go onto the Elvis website, you can get a coupon for $4 off the entry price. More money for souvenirs, such as Mr Potato Head Elvis's:

HOUND DOG ONE

Elvis accumulated such a vast amount of wealth that by the mid 70's, he was able to buy a Convair 880 aircraft, gut it, restyle it and name it after his only child, Lisa Marie. Who's the daddy? The plane has a conference table, bar and king size bed with a gold plated seat belt over the entire thing. No cattle class on this vessel.

THE ORIGINAL PINK LADY
Sitting in the huge chamber that is Elvis's Car Museum is the magnificent piece of poetry that is this pink Cadillac. When I was little, my dad bought a miniature version of this for my grandma, and it now sits on my shelf at home, next to a set of Russian nesting dolls and an alligator head. Elvis bought this for his own mum, Gladys.
Seeing it in real life is something else. It's dainty and feminine, like a sugared almond, but also a beast of machinery that could smack you up if you got on the wrong side of it. I like that Elvis embraced pink - he also had a pink striped golf buggy that he used for tooling around the Hawaiian islands and later, the grounds of Graceland.

GRACELAND MANSION
Across the street from the restaurants and exhibitions on the man and his life sits the Graceland Mansion itself. From the armies of shuttle buses we thought the house would be an arduous trek away, the sketchy path prone to bear attacks and prowling packs of Elvis fanatics. It was in fact, just across the four lane road which go-getting pedestrians could easily walk across thanks to a efficient zebra crossing. Still, keen to fit in and intergrate, we hopped aboard the shuttle and slid the cheap headphones attached to the personal audio guide onto our ears. Through the front door on the right was the Presley living room, decked out with festive decorations so we could imagine the yuletide extravaganza that would have taken place here every December before 16th July 1977.
Out of respect to Elvis and the Presley family, visitors are denied access to the upper rooms of the mansion, where Elvis's private quarters would have been. That's a shame - I'd have liked to see his bedroom for interior design tips to deck out my own house, when I get it together enough to get one.

This was my favourite room in the house. It's Elvis's billiards room and the walls and ceiling are completely covered  in what looked like antique oriental fabrics, pleated towards the centre of the ceiling.


LEAVING THE BUILDING
It was the weirdest thing, but throughout the tour, Leah and I had been gawping at pictures of the young Elvis, slowly crushing hard on this dead guy who was gone long before either of us were a gleam in our respective fathers' eyes. Yet when we found ourselves in front of Elvis Presley's grave, we both clung to each other looking folorn and sniffling slightly, feeling this loss for a talent we never knew for ourselves firsthand.

 What a wardrobe. What a legend. What a man.

(what a cheeseball I am)

The Sweet Memphis Hello

One of the things about travelling is believing in the ultimate good of people and that they will not screw you over. Obviously there are times when some skanky girl might try to steal your £6 battered Primark gladiator sandals that are patterned with the faint splatter of vomit (slore) or attempt to roofie you in a Cape Town dive bar, but most people are alright. Throughout our time in the States so far, we've experienced unparalleled hospitality whenever things got tough and we needed it the most.

A kind grandfather rescued us from the roaring highways of Toledo, a legion of MegaBus drivers have cheerily hoisted our backpacks onto our shoulders waving farewell as we tripped along yet another set of unfamiliar pavements. One Knoxville hostel manager readily winched us to safety from the seedy, spunk-stained sheets of a motel hurriedly booked the night before.
But so far nothing has compared to the sweet, syrupy hello of Memphis, Tennessee.

We arrived at dawn at the curbs of the North End Bus Terminal, rubbing sleep from our eyes and trying hard to discourage the two dogs riding with us on the MegaBus from marking their territory on my cherished Primark wheelie-bag. A security guard bloomed out of the darkness, letting us know in that we could wait inside the warm station. Once he'd discovered our status as backpacking job-chucker-inners, he couldn't do enough, pointing out the downtown trolley stop and batting the tramps away whenever they got too brave. He had sons about our age, so perhaps we reminded him of them. People seem to feel a sense of responsibility when encountering female travellers. It's nice, like finding an uncle in every city.

His kindness was not a quirk either. Everywhere we went, Memphites were displaying that famous southern hospitality and were genuinely thrilled that we'd stopped by, leaving us with that contented, looked-after feeling you get when your gran makes you a packed lunch to take to work at the age of 25.

A shuttle driver for Marriott Hotel, who gave us a lift back from the airport when we were stranded one evening, told us that the hospitality stems from a time when fields and farmland separated you from your neighbour by ten miles or more. So even if all you wanted was a cup of milk because your own cow was on the fritz, you'd go over to Neighbour Ned's and make a day of it. People would visit their relatives in neighbouring towns and stick around for a fortnight or longer, yet never outstay their welcome.

The New England states are a lot like home, with cobbled streets and European architecture, but it also comes with a bit of attitude. None of that down south, no siree. They all want to have a chat and you can see the excitement rippling across their faces when they hear the British accent.

Example. Leah and I were on our way back from Graceland on a packed public bus. We stuck out straight away by being female and non-black. The homeless (but friendly and hygenic) guy we were talking to at the stop stealthily told all and sundry that we were from England. We didn't clock on because the fast southern twang is virtually indecipherable to a Londoner's ears. As soon as the cat was out of the bag, that was it. Absolut chaos.

'WHAT?? Grrrl, you from INGLAN'?!' A drunkard stared in wonder at you've-left-the-Gasson. 'You the first English person I ever met! Sheeeiit. England? You a celebrity in my life!' He shook his head, 'WOW... England'. It looked like the proudest day of his life. The whole bus was agog. Leah blushed Irishly. Once the firing shots of conversation had been fired, there was no going back. Everyone wanted to tell us their stories about the time they went to the UK and discuss the finer points of Skyfall, everyone wanted to know where we were going and what we had seen in Memphis. And when they got to their stop, they came over to say goodbye and shake our hands and lament over how much they wished they could take us out to dinner, if only we were only staying one more night.
It was completely nuts.

This bus episode, again, was not an anomaly. We caught quite a few of them and every last one felt like joining a private members club. Compared to London where all commuters are experts at avoiding eye contact and masters of passive aggressive mumbling, Memphites board the bus with a 'hey, how y'all doin' today?' And they want to know. They might not know anyone on the bus or be addressing any particular person. They greet and joke with other passengers because it's normal, polite, genial. It only seems to be London where friendly conversation is treated with the kind of suspicion usually reserved for bearded men loitering around playground gates. 
 

Another time, we were sitting in a bar off Main St named Bar Dog, stacking up cheap happy hour drinks while telling a barman about our travels. He looked impressed with our 'insider knowledge' (visiting Clarksdale, eating at Gus' World Famous Chicken) and poured us two measures of Jameson whiskey - on the house. Because he said, he knew what it was like travelling on a budget. Sweet.

What's the likelihood of that happening in the UK? Even if happen to have an 'exotic' accent. About as likely as half past NEVER.

I felt as though Memphis had seen us coming up the driveway, thrown open the front door and tackled us to the ground in a fury of love, fried chicken and 'Heyaaawl!!'. It had adopted us, loved and entertained us and set us steady on the trek down the Old South towards New Orleans and beyond.

Rubbery Chicken and Musical Madness at Sun Studios

Memphis. Three-nights of insane good time fun.
Let me break it down for ya now: 

 

Beale St and Wednesday night's Earnest Warblers.
After a light afternoon snooze and a trip to the airport to confirm we'd be able to hire a set of wheels on the 17th, we headed to the bright lights and hot blues clubs of Beale Street. It's three blocks crammed full of clubs, tat shops, general oddities and bars such as B.B King's, Hard Rock, a voodoo alley and Superior Karaoke. On the hunt for happy hour deals, we meandered along looking into shadowy windows and laughing at the absurdity of one menu selling deep fried strawberries.
Yeah. I know.
I convinced Leah to have a drink at Superior Karaoke. It was loaded with X Factor wannabes yowling their best country n western, heavily obese black women their voices smoother than a tumbler of bourbon and a Lady Thang (imagine an obese Kate Hudson blended with a generous heap of Miss Piggy) who I couldn't work out if Leah loved or loathed. She watched Thang with this intense fire, mesmerised by the furious whipping of her curly blonde hair, laughing at an unimaginably hilarious anecdote. Her false lashes dipped into her pint glass, tinging the amber liquid with streaks of black mascara as she looked seductively across the bar at the MTV camera that surely must've been concealed somewhere in the venue. Why else this show, Lady Thang? She was ridiculous, a star spangled cartoon who clearly thought she was all that and a bag of chips and I loved her.
Between her, the grinding of Leah's teeth, the blinding display of musical talent and $6 glasses of Big Ass Beer, it was the best Wednesday night I've had this side of August.

 

 

 

The next morning, on the advice of the biggest Yankophile I know, we headed towards the waterside to find the hallowed ground that is Gus's World Famous Chicken restaurant. Tucked between industrial looking shop fronts, it doesn't look like much. But the reviews on Yell told a different story. 'I WANNA MARRY GUS'S CHICKEN AND HAVE IT'S NUGGETS!!', one hysterical customer had declared. Another proclaimed it was the best chicken he'd ever had, but please, no one tell his mama, it'd break her heart. GQ Magazine had selected it as one of the top three restaurants to fly across the country for. It had a lot to live up to. We pushed through the glass door and stood in line, gawking at the fried turkey promotions for Thanksgiving, special prices for Ugly Pecan Pie and talking to Kook, a friendly bottle blonde who promised me that we were on the way to Fried Chicken Heaven. She wasn't wrong.


DANG BOY.

I ordered a plate of dark chicken which came towards my salivating face with chips, coleslaw and the best barbeque baked beans I've ever had. I'm not really into BBQ. I find the sauce can be sickly and sweet just does not go with meat in my cookbook. But these beans. Yes.
They came second to the chicken. Arriving searingly hot from the frier, the chicken landed on the plastic red-checked table, the excess grease dripping on a slice of inexplicably placed white bread.
The succulent flesh, encased in tracing-paper-thin batter hinted at a twist of pepper and peeled easily from the main piece, gently releasing ribbons of steam and fragrant poulty aromas towards my twitching nostrils.
It was deliriously good, certainly some of the best chicken I've eaten. No meat sweats, a huge calorie debt but absolutely no regrets.

 

We also did a tour to Sun Studios. Obviously. I'd have to slap myself with a rubber chicken if I'd gone all the way to Memphis and failed to visit this womb of legendary talent.
A heavily sideburned man theatrically led us through the studio's history, playing scratchy original versions of Elvis's first song and Johnny Cash's recordings.
Then - and this was by far the best part - we entered the recording room where all these makers of history sang, sweated and breathed. It was AMAZING. The ceiling was rippled like a giant McCoy's crisp to help with acoustics and there were three spots marked on the ground with black crosses that showed where the King of Rock and Roll once really, truly, madly stood belting out the kind of hits that made millions of people mess their pants with excitement. Leah and I stared transfixed at the ground then shuffled towards the spot in silence.
I felt a tiny pea of jubilation seeping into my own gusset.

Super cool.
 

 

 

Supermarket's Weep (with joy)

One of the many things I love about America is her supermarkets. The sheer choice, the absolutely bonkers products and the inventions that sadly never made it to the UK's shores never fails to leave my eyes agog and my mind submerged in wonder. I'm sure the produce on offer in New England varies to that of the South, Mid-West and West Coast.

Here are just a few of the items I found in the north east's aisles:

The original saucy minx, Mrs Butterworth. Don't be fooled by her prim stance; Joy Butterworth loves doing the twist and simply relishes in gushing out her warm, sweet syrup all over the hottest piece of bacon and sausage that lands in front of her. Slag.

Doggy Pick 'n' Mix! Treat Street for your puggly mutt.

Excellent start, but this needs to be pushed further. Where are the LOTR Cheerios? Light-sabre-shaped turnips, leeks and carrots? A Game of Thrones turkey crown? A lettuce head modified to resemble a DeLorean time machine? Pull your finger out food developers, and save geeks the world over from the terror of rickets.

SNAZZMATAZZ! I never know whether it's duct tape or duck tape but I know I want animal print heavy duty tape in my life. It's the simple things. 

This is a rifle, there are many like it but this one could be yours. Who wouldn't want a pink gun called Daisy?Someone who doesn't take pride, that's who. Put it in your trolley, fool. 

Just in case you forget the basic rules of living.

NO.

I can't help but think Frieda would have been better placed to sell depilatory cream with all that lush face foliage going on.

Alright BABEZ, fancy a nyt out 2nyt? Juz uz girlz, bcoz who needz a man tho init? OMG LOLOLOL. Get ur bodycon out n ur heelz on cuz we r gna HIT THE TAAAAAN. xoxoxoxoxoxoxox l8rzzz

A scene as old as time.

WHY DON'T THEY SELL THESE IN ENGLAND? So many times I've had to make do with salted popcorn while our American cousins gorge wantonly on Buffalo Wing and Ranch flavoured popcorn across the Atlantic. This injustice must end.

Give your kid a Handi Snack and see if they develop a taste for Mr Salty. 

It's not a party unless you've got cheese in a can.

Seriously, what was the thought behind naming these sweet and salty snacks? They look like they should come with an R rating and a packet of K-Y.

The WINNER: Discounted ammo with every pack of beef jerky. God bless America.