The road trip of the Midnight Society

It’s Friday evening.  And at a nondescript Capital District gas station, a man parks his car, checks his wallet for his credit cards, and exits the car to fill the vehicle with gasoline.

And inside the car…

A conversation takes place.

	Dibs! Dibs!  I call front seat dibs!!
	Get out of the cupholder, Nimslo.  Chuck needs to put his drinks there, and you’re not helping matters.
	Aw, no fair!  I don’t want to sit in the back seat!  Come on, why do I gotta sit in the back seat?
	It isn’t so bad, Nimslo.  Just do as you’re told.  Everybody’s going to get a chance to have fun on this trip.  That includes you.
	Well, I don’t want to sit between the Chief and Kodak Red.  They’re going to fight all the way down the road and all the way back.
	Don’t be silly.  They won’t fight.  Right?
	Nothing for me to fight about.  Considering I’m the best American camera Chuck’s ever owned…
	Aw, geez, do we gotta hear that again?  One lousy picture you took five years ago, it wins awards and you think you’re the greatest thing ever.
	Like you ever took a great picture in your life.  Thanks to me, Chuck has The AGFA Bridge Over Ansco Lake.
	And thanks to me, he has Vivaldi’s Pond.  And I came from a real city in New York.  Rochester is the crown jewel of Upstate.
	It’s not as good as my hometown of Binghamton.
	Ugh.  Southern Tier construction.
	Listen, Crapchester, who won the Calder Cup a few years ago?
	Listen, Stinkhamton, who wins the Calder Cup every year?
	Knock it off, the two of you, or you can take your fight to the trunk.  And if you go in the trunk, don’t expect to come out for the rest of the trip.
	He started it!
	You started it!
	Nyet, nyet, you two must fight all the time, is not good for my travels.  I must stay balanced.  No more fighting.
	Fantastic.  Now we’re going to get lectured by little Moscow.
	I am from Ukraine.  Do not insult the crown jewel of former Soviet Union.
	Right.  Crown jewel.  When was the last time you took a picture that Chuck ever entered in competition?
	You have a mighty big mouth for camera that’s older than Bolsheviks.
	Come on, guys, we don’t need to fight throughout this trip.  Chuck’s going to use all of us on this trip.  Or he wouldn’t have brought all of us.
	Dibs, dibs, I still call dibs.  And if I call dibs, then I get to choose what’s on the radio for the road trip.
	You’ll listen to whatever’s on the radio and you’ll like it.
	I’ll listen to it – but I don’t have to like it.  I mean, does he have to listen to NPR on this trip?
	What’s wrong with NPR?  Don’t you want to listen to something smart?
	It’s the same three shows he listens to every Saturday on road trips – Car Talk, Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me and then A Prairie Home Companion.
	There’s nothing wrong with A Prairie Home Companion.
	And how often do you listen to A Prairie Home Companion?
	Stop griping.  Maybe this trip Chuck will put the good tunes on the radio.
	Well, it wouldn’t hurt to play some vintage New Wave.
	I dig it when he plays the old radio dramas.  They take up a lot of travel time.
	I’m glad he got a car with a satellite radio.  Wouldn’t mind some ESPN for a few hours.
	Must listen to world news.  Chuck needs to know about happenings in his home world.
	Home world?  What are you talking about, Raskolnikov?
	I heard some of Chuck’s family came over on the boat from Latvia.
	No, I distinctly heard someone say that his grandmother’s family were descended from German immigrants.
	That’s his father’s side.  His mother’s side has Native American in it.  Not enough to get free admission into a casino, but still…
	Doesn’t matter.  Chuck’s a proud New Yorker.  That’s why he uses New York cameras for his shooting.
	Ahem.  He appreciates fine German construction.  That’s why I’ve been Chuck’s primary 35mm shooter.
	Hello?  Listen, all you Johnnie-come-latelies, Chuck’s been using Nikon equipment for nearly twenty years.  Step back and show pride.
	If that is so, then why am I the only Soviet camera he still uses?  He appreciates fine Soviet machinery.
	My money’s with Leica Green.  The minute Chuck got his hands on my German construction, he fell in love with my medium format skills.
	Well, I’ve got one advantage over the six of you.
	What’s that, four-eyes?
	You know where I was made?  Atlanta, Georgia.  Home of the Godfather of Soul, James Brown.  Yow!
	James Brown was from Augusta.  Not Atlanta.
	Atlanta, Augusta, Savannah, doesn’t matter.  We’re still driving through there.  So for me, it’s old home week.
	All right, let’s stop our bickering.  Can we all agree that we’ll take great pictures on this trip and make Chuck happy?
	Agreed.
	Me too.
	Da.
	Okay, everybody – oh crap, Chuck’s coming back.  Everybody shush.  Nix.  Nix.
	I still call dibs…

The man gets back in the car, inserts his keys into the ignition, and sets the car radio for road trip driving music.

And at the last minute, he switches the radio to NPR to catch the first few minutes of A Prairie Home Companion.