I linked to The Slog The Longest 3-Hour Drive In American History in another thread. You know, it’s pretty good. So rather than hijack that thread with comments on it, I’ll share it here. It starts out with an embedded video that sets it up. (The audio is the same commercial they’ve been playing on the radio.) Watch that, then click on the individual map points for more video.
I won’t spoil ‘Crab Apple Flats’.
The Uncle Sam billboard. They pulled their punches on that one. Some of the messages it displays are pretty heinous (to this Liberal).
Now that’s clever advertising! Gotta love the old-sounding narrator, the first-person narrative letters, and the background music that accompanies the little videos. (Though is “My Old Kentucky Home” appropriate geographically?) Anyway, it’s priceless–thanks for sharing.
That is hilarious! Great advertising for sure. I don’t know the Seattle-Portland area at all, but damn if I can’t relate to most of it, having driven the 403-QEW for years, not to mention holiday drives home down the fucking 401. “The Big Repave” is, without a doubt, the same phenomenon affecting the area around Black Creek Drive. And the service stations… dear gods, I can’t believe we ate there as often as we did.
I’ve driven The Slog many times – on my drives from L.A. to Bellingham and back. Now that’s a slog. Nineteen hours or more. Not only is there The Slog, there’s the long, straight, boring run through the middle of California. Worse, to even get from Washington to California (or vice versa) you have to go through Driver’s Purgatory (also known as ‘Oregon’). Anyway, the funny thing about those videos is that even though I’m not a native Washingtonian I know the places they point out in the videos. The Kelso/Longview sign? Yep, it’s a checkpoint. The traffic suddenly slowing or stopping for no apparent reason? Ayup. And I’ve already mentioned the Uncle Sam sign.