As part of a series on budget travel,
our bachelor shows us the best of the city without breaking
the bank.
Would it be possible to get two bags of pretzels?" I ask the flight
attendant on my flight from
Dallas to
Memphis. Like a squirrel in
October, I'm stocking up. Because if and when my $299 kitty for a
bargain-conscious weekend in Memphis runs out, those pretzels might
come in handy. Besides, I'm going to the bustling metropolis on the
banks of the
Mississippi for something money can't buy: to engulf
myself in the legend of Elvis Presley - something my father, who
was the biggest Elvis fan I've ever known, never got the chance to
do.
Growing up in the Raub household, the pecking order went something
like this: Elvis rode shotgun to
God himself. Bob Knight,
ex-Indiana Hoosiers/current Texas Tech basketball coach, was God
himself. Whoever was batting cleanup for the
Chicago Cubs was vying
for a congregation in there somewhere.
I was introduced to Elvis in the late '70s, when my father proudly
brought home a horrendously ugly baby-blue
Ford Leisure Van -
complete with a state-of-the-art eight-track cassette player -
which soon became a sanctum for The King's music. My first thought:
torture. By high school, however, music had become a profound part
of my life, and it didn't take long for me to see the same great
qualities in Elvis that my father had seen. He's credited with
inventing rock-and-roll, for goodness' sake! Like my dad, I owe a
great debt to him. I'm quite sure that debt is more than $299, but
that will have to suffice for now.
There are two very compelling reasons to visit Memphis: to pay
homage to the history of rock-and-roll and the blues, and also to
immerse yourself in an entire genre of
food that should come with a
surgeon general's warning.