Justin G. Roy

760 Miles

( If you have not read Day One to MA post, click here! )

Tonight marks the end of Day 2 on my journey to Massachusetts. For those of you just tuning in, I was offered a position and accepted with Nichols College in Dudley, MA as their [first] Director of Social Media. Among the typical social media activities, I will also be working with staff and faculty in training each department to work together online in spreading the word about the Nichols brand, reaching out to the online world, and ensuring we can all be found online. Additionally, I will begin working with students, teaching them the intricacies of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, online branding, social media and marketing strategies.

Onto the day. Well, I slept in a bit and woke up at about 9am, then again, I went to bed after 2am (yes, there were a lot of updated profiles with new pictures – don’t shake your head, we know you do the same thing – and tweets that had some great advice and articles on social media programs and measurable.

Within 15 minutes, I was laughing. Guess at whom. Dad.

We ordered breakfast, for him was pancakes and sausage links and for me was the continental breakfast (just give me coffee and a bagel). When the pancakes came, they came with whipped butter. Granted we all know and have seen whipped butter, but a certain somebody went into a 3-minute rant about what does whipped butter mean. Then he looks on the package and discovers it is 52% whipped butter and asks me what the other 48% is. Before I could answer, which leads me to believe this was a rhetorical question; he told me that he thinks the 48% is made with truck grease.

First lesson – check the butter on Dad’s plate before he sees it.

Pancake meal went well; Dad was happy because there were a couple of huge pancakes so it passed his professional inspection. With only three bites left to go, Dad stopped because (a man who is skinny and in shape) he was concerned about his weight. Only three more bites…..after slathering it with real butter and maple syrup.

We set out on the road, making our way through the rest of Ohio, right across the top tip of Pennsylvania, and into New York.

Quite a few people commented on my last post (through comments, private messages on Facebook, and tweets on twitter) on the Day One story about the gas level (check it out here if you have not already). Well, in response to these remarks, I decided to see how far I could push this (aka – use my pokin’ stick); my good friend Maura Wall-Hernandez will appreciate this.

I let the gas level get real close to empty; we were at the line right above empty. I swear he lost more hair right in front of me. Sorry, Mom.

Eventually I did get gas, and I found out my father does not close the door to the truck completely when I get out of the truck, just in case I left the keys in the ignition, manually locked mine and his doors (without him seeing), and closed them. At first, you might laugh and wonder (as I did) why pretend to close the door, but I thought it was a classic parental move. It’s not that he does not trust me, or think I have common sense but more so he is looking after me and has the knowledge of how I get when I multi-task (looking at my phone and texting, tweeting, talking, and pumping gas), I can multi-task, just not well.

As I type this, I realize that tomorrow we will be landing in Wilbraham, MA, both my hometown and where my parents continue to live. I will be unloading the truck into their garage, and will eventually take clothes and essentials towards Nichols towards the end of next week, to my best friend Coley’s house (he was so gracious to let me stay there until I find an apartment).

Tomorrow marks the end of the road trip to Massachusetts and begins the last week before being on Campus.

Tomorrow marks the end of the road trip with my father; I feel extremely lucky that I do not need a road trip to feel or get close to him.

Don’t worry, his quotes and sayings will never end, and since I have committed to keeping this blog alive with different happenings in my life, projects I am working on, programs we are writing (social media related – both ROI related and relationship measurable), and other thoughts and tips, I just know you’ll see more!

I’ll leave you with a few final notes:

• My dad can go to bed with the lights on – his eyelids turn the lights off.
• We did not get flip-flops. Nuff said.
• Dad is a “rubber neck” like me. He has to always be looking at everything on the road, side of the road, and in other cars that are passing or being passed.
• We both check the alarm clock multiple times, both the time set and to make sure we turned the alarm on.

(I will write about the drive tomorrow, in the night. Stay tuned!)