How Many 'Bottles of Beer' Does it Take to Get From PA to DC?

I have made the drive from Southeastern PA to Washington DC hundreds and hundreds of times, but this weekend my kids helped me discover something I never knew about a route so familiar I could do it in my sleep.

I spent the weekend with my daughters in Washington, DC visiting old friends from my days covering Capitol Hill as a radio reporter. That was an era long before I had kids.  It is a drive I've done literally many hundreds of times since the 1980's.

This weekend I discovered something new on this drive.

It takes from just south of I-95 on the Baltimore-Washington Parkway to just north of the Ft. McHenry Tunnel to sing all 100 verses of "100 Bottles of Beer on the Wall."

Remarkably, that's also the exact same amount of time it takes to share some really big laughs and make a vacation memory that will now be part of family lore for at least a generation.

Amazingly, this discovery was made without the help of a video screen of any kind, without the radio, without cell phones, without any technology beyond what's under the hood or powering the family car.

The singers were a dad, a 16 and an almost 12-year-old daughter and an audience of one disgruntled almost-14-year-old who "stopped even listening at 60!"

The singing was born of my intense need to engage my mind in something other than the mind-numbing sameness of a straight two lane road at sunset after a long weekend of touring, playing and having exhausting fun.

I announced that "due to me being tired and needing to liven things up in here, we are now going to sing." I did not ask permission and I didn't heed the protests from the back passenger side seat. By '99' there was a trio singing harmony. By '90' there was running commentary from the audience of one and by '85' full vocal silliness had erupted.

Funny, things like this rarely, if ever, happen when noses are buried in iPods or digital video players. Don't get me wrong, those are wonderful devices which can make trips go faster and I do not object to them.  I'm just saying they are one of many things to add to the mix on car trips.

I used to have a minivan that featured lots of space and infrared headsets that allowed passengers to listen to two radio options or watch the video screen in the center of the car. When my kids were younger and we were driving to New England, Ohio, or Williamsburg these were great for them, and for me as a single parent.

Now, thanks to the price of gas, I drive a compact car that could fit in that old minivan and is equiped with seats and a radio. That's ok, they each have handheld devices that deliver millions of options, depending on the apps they've loaded.

My rule of thumb when they were smaller was "no videos on trips of less than an hour." The car is a great place to talk with a captive audience and spend quality family time, if you choose to make it that. That rule provided a structure that promotes communication, much the way our family dinner times do.

When not singing we have played the license plate game, 20 questions, a counting game called 21 which one of the girls learned at camp and taught me. We also (because they the children of a Patch editor) talk about news events and how it relates to their lives. The discussion of drugs and was of particular interest to my high school junior.

The point is that you never know where the conversation will lead when you're in a car with a captive audience. The one thing that is certain: conversations that never happen go nowhere even as the car is driving somewhere.

Am I saying there's no place for screens and headsets in the modern family road trip?  Heck no. They can be a real help. 

I am suggesting that it's good to remember you always have the option of car tunes instead of cartoons.

You might even stumble across a few vacation memories your kids will be telling their children about.