6JUNE2012 @ Birmingham, AL - Is this the famous Birmingham bus station?  Is this where authorities with German Shepherd dogs and fire hoses attacked citizens 50 years back?   I was asleep and not able to mull such possibilities.  I awakened to see almost every one in a line for our Atlanta bus.  Of course this put me in the back of the line and of course this meant I would get the last seat ... and who knows the condition/size of the person with whom I would share the several hours into Atlanta?  Oh well, you snooze you lose ... I think I can handle it. 
Ummm ... but what's this?  I am being stopped, told all seats are occupied ... and that the next bus will carry me ... I only need to stay in Birmingham several more hours.  So I tell the driver that my connection in Anderson will possibly not know this, that I can (and will) EMail him the change, but can not know that he will receive the message ... is there no way I can go now?  Well, what a stellar gentleman ... he says I can go now and sit on the floor.  Strange, yet far better than staying in Birmingham, so I accept and in short order am stretched out in the aisle, head encased in the hood of my windbreaker and supported on my backpack.  I'm fine, though several riders direct their outrage toward the driver.  He stands up to them; I give the driver the "thumbs up" sign.  All settles down, I go to sleep and awaken as the bus approaches Douglasville, GA.  Sleeping on the floor of the bus is easily better than some of the camping nights that I have recently experienced ... and besides, I am focussed on destination. 
After some hours in Atlanta we embark northeast, stopping in Norcross, then Gainesville and then Anderson.  Bob Fjeld is there waiting despite the station having moved many miles from where we last saw each other.  Ahh, that Bob, what a capable guy! 
Need I say that mom/dad were surprised to see me?  No tears, just an immense surprise ... it's all good, folks.  They look well and happy.  By the end of the day I had pimento cheesed it, ginger aled it, napped it and ice creamed it ... then went off to bed.   Horizontal is me.