The Trip that Began Them All.......Honor Choir Tour- Nashville, TN - March 1994

This trip is important for two reasons. For one, it was the first of EIGHT consecutive school/church trips in which me and 5-jay bunked in the same room. Also, it was the one and only appearance by two great guys Gary Graves, and Jonathan McCullough, who shared our room on this trip. The funny thing is how much I loved Nashville on this trip and wanted to come back one day- who would guess I would live so close one day? Anyway, me, 5-jay, and our good buddies Alec, Chip and Cooper were all in the First Pres. Honor Choir (but didn't go on this trip because of a soccer tournament leaving me and jay to our hellraising devices- HILARIOUS sidenote here- I remember that Trey Walker, who will be mentioned in a second, also skipped out on a church choir tour to go one of the many sixth grade "dances" for birthday parties that year for the 6th graders- I don't remember who's party it was, but I remember Trey being so determined to be cool he wanted to go, he also asked me for the 300th time right before he told me this if I had AOL- yeah cool guy- end of HILARIOUS sidenote), however, according to our other good buddy Tripp Streety, "no one was cool at First Pres". I'd have to agree. Besides singing at a huge church in suburban Nashville, three things really stood out about our fun trip to Opryland (R.I.P.). That was the fact that me and 5-Jay like two idiots, stood above the splash ride and got drenched- real smart. Also, while we were eating lunch, our other good buddy Jay Roberson (who will be featured at length in the "The News Hour" post) did a great lip-synched rendition of "R.E.S.P.E.C.T" while it was playing over the loudspeaker. I also remember that during that wait in line for our food, a stupid redneck girl asked me and Jay if we went to school seven days a week because it was a church school, in one of the first time I ever cussed in public, I said "hell no". Also, I remember laughing at Jordan Walker when he lost his wallet on the Grizzly River Rampage- if you know Jordan you'd understand. However, the one thing I remember more than anything else was the fact that me and Trey Gay Walker, asked his dad, Mr. Carson Walker if we could go ride this cool brand new indoor roller coaster called "Chaos" and come right back. We did, but that ride with Trey scarred me for life. I was having a good time laughing and all, but Trey spent the entire ride going "radical awesome man". I just wish jay could have been there to hear it. Anyway, being the terds that we are, me and jay made complete asses of ourselves the entire trip like only two hormones raging sixth graders can do. Also, it was great because it was on this trip that me and 5-jay took our male bonding to another level because instead of Gary and Jonathan, who were scared to sleep together, me and Jay snuggled up like to young kids in love, just because our fatasses wanted the bed. While me and Jay had not yet perfected our idiot-like acting, many other choir tour traditions were born on this trip. 1- me and jay obviously rooming together, terrorizing our roommates, and being idiots on the bus just by farting. 2- me (and not 5-jay) flirting with girls that I knew hated me. I was a pro at this in elementary school (eventhough some say I still am), but it's all good because we're all facebook friends now (big shoutout to Emelie Elkin and the former Molly Matthews). 3- Me and Jay ordering pizza and leaving it out for the housekeeping staff to clean up. This tradition was taken to another level very soon, and it will be revealed later. 4- me and jay, while concentrating on the main part of the trip (which, in this case, was to sing) making our own agenda to personally be the biggest asses possible just because it's funny. This trip also featured a very competitive game of hand wiffleball, almost one to rival the one played on "Jay and Pigott's last school shibang....the First Pres SwanSong in ATL". However, after a week off school (which is really cool to a 12 year old), we returned for our last 7 weeks at First Pres. While our school career together came to an abrupt end, it would be over six years before me and jay went on another trip where we weren't rooming together at least part of the time. So, this is the journey where the two horsemen rode for the first time, and might be the most important escapade of all.