Chapter Two

Well by the time this is getting read my website www.Aitkenphotography.com.au would have been up and running for awhile. Now I won’t spend Chapter Two trying to advertise www.Aitkenphotography.com.au . Sure there may be a little name dropping of www.Aitkenphotography.com.au , but come on , that’s fair… I won’t do much. I’m purely opening my blog with a quiet mention of www.Aitkenphotography.com.au , maybe that’s enough. Do you think? Ok maybe one more, www.Aitkenphotography.com.au. So lets get on with what’s been happening in the world of www.Aitkenphotography.com.au , sorry last time I promise.
During the month of March I ventured over to the land of Liquid Cheese and deep fried everything (that may sound bad, but try out a Bloomin Onion when you’re in Kentucky, it’s awesome!) . I travelled to Louisville, Kentucky for the Mid-America Truck Show and the PKY Truck Beauty Championship. That’s a long-winded title for ‘Bloody Big Truck Show’. Like the two part name it is actually a two part show. The Mid-America Truck Show (or MATS for short) is very much a trade show. It should be sponsored by Asics though because with nearly a million square feet of trade displays my shoes got a hammering.
The second part of the show, The PKY Truck Beauty Championship was what I was really over there for. This was a truck show like I’ve never seen before. The Americans take their ‘Beauty Championships’ seriously. Guys were pulling in several days before the show and teams of cleaners and polishers were hooking in like there was deep fried beer at stake for the winner (Seriously it’s a thing, pop into Texas and see. While you’re there check out the Fried Salsa and Fried Bubble-gum) anyway I digress. The standard that these trucks are at is incredible. It took meticulous to a whole new level. There were owners standing inside their bonnets polishing the bonnet mounts. There where guys underneath the rear diffs cleaning off every last drop of dirt ( for my website folks that know nothing of trucks, it’s the big bits at the back of the truck that do all the work and nobody ever sees) guys if I cleaned my house or even just the office to that kind of standard my wife would be all over me!!! No not in that way, she would assume I’d done something seriously wrong and was guilt cleaning. That’s how she knows when I’ve been to Digital Camera Warehouse, the house is spotless.
The judging took up most of the opening Thursday although official competition starts on the Wednesday night with the light show. This year the organisers decided to ramp up the challenge for all the truckies by ensuring that mother nature dropped off 8 inches of snow on Wednesday morning. ( For my Queensland based readers, snow is kind of like a mix of an unflavoured McDonalds frozen coke and confetti, that you can ball up and through at people (Which you can also do with McDonalds frozen coke, but it will get you thrown out of the playground)) .Watching the conga line of truckies going to Home Depot to purchase every rag , brush and broom in Louisville was impressive. The owners, drivers and all their families, both willing and reluctant, jumped straight into cleaning off every spot of snow and water. By the time the Light competition was kicking of you couldn’t tell the place had been home to unemployed snowboarders and polar beers mere hours before. Well aside from the huge piles of snow banked up at the sides of each truck. For the amount of alcohol flowing there was a obvious lack of yellow snow though. I was impressed.
Actually, I was impressed by a lot on this trip. I was also less than impressed by a few things. Shall I start a list? (Of course I should, it’s a Blog, I’m supposed to bitch and whinge aren’t i)
No 1. I was not impressed by Qantas’s movie selection or their speaker connections on their seats. Nothing worse than moving in your seat and losing sound in one side… am I right?
No 2. Oh wait, that’s about it……….
No 3. Got one, I was not impressed by the size of the Americans pizza! First night there I decided to order in a pizza as it was late and I was tired. Chose a nice-looking flavour, picked the middle size they had and sat and waited. When I opened the door to the lovely pizza lady, she was carrying what looked like a large cardboard dinner table. Medium is not medium… medium is ‘holy crap that’s big enough to put a sail on and float home on’. So, word to the wise… order the small pizza.
Seriously I’m thinking that’s all I can complain about. Some people may be daunted by the travel time to get there, Sydney to Dallas is 15.5hrs, while Dallas to Sydney is just on 17hrs flying…… but in the end it’s worth it. The flight was with Qantas, who I must say had a great crew on both flight. It’s a long job for them to so they do well to tolerate some of the Muppets that they serve. I also learnt the return leg is never full(something to do with them preferring to put in enough fuel to get home so they can’t take a full quota of passengers, very good thinking really) So I was able to grab an entire row to myself. That allowed a good 5 or 6 hours sleep.
So I managed to get eight days of jaw droppingly wicked trucks, extremely awesome hospitality, some new and devilishly unhealthy cuisine and a bucket load of cool photos. With one minor fatility, I’ve lost my Dictaphone and I think it may be in my rental car. That will make writing some stories a bit more difficult but I’ll just have to reinterview.
Ok I’d better go, I’ve got a lot more waffling to do on chapter three so I’d better get chapter two up.

Ps for those wondering, yes I will be heading back to the states next year, trying out a different show.
Pss for those wondering if I checked with wifey before I wrote the first Ps , no…. but I’m trying the positive affirmation approach
Psss check out Mays Owner Driver for a better rundown on the PKY Truck Beauty Championship
Pssss how many of these Ps’s can I do before I should have just added another paragraph?