FLORENCE, KY—Feeling his eyelids grow heavier as he continued along a pitch-black stretch of I-75 South, Republican presidential candidate Lindsey Graham struggled to stay awake while driving his completely empty campaign bus overnight to his next event, sources confirmed Wednesday.
Graham, who left Davenport, IA at 9 p.m. Tuesday in hopes of reaching South Carolina by morning, reportedly first began to grow drowsy roughly two hours into the 850-mile journey as he passed through the cornfields of eastern Illinois. Since that time, a combination of the gentle hum of the engine and the lack of anyone to talk to had reportedly lulled the senator to the brink of sleep several times as he sat alone in the passengerless 45-foot-long bus.
“Gosh, maybe I should pull over at the next rest area and take a quick nap,” an exhausted Graham said to himself while resting his head against the driver’s side window and loosely gripping the steering wheel with one hand as he neared the halfway mark of his solo overnight journey. “But I really gotta keep going if I’m going to get to the Spartanburg American Legion in time for the meet-and-greet breakfast.”
Reports indicate that at one point, Graham occupied his time by practicing his responses for the Republican debate in September, reportedly mimicking the expected rebuttals of each of the other candidates as well.
“I guess I can just pick up a big coffee or something to perk me up,” he added, stifling a loud yawn that reverberated throughout the silent vehicle. “Might be nice to get some snacks too.”
After twice being jolted from a bleary-eyed stupor when the campaign bus veered over the highway’s rumble strips—causing Graham to jerk the wheel wildly to get the bus back into its lane—the senator seemed momentarily reenergized, asserting to no one in particular that he was “making great time…great time!”
Following the senator’s lone pit stop thus far at around midnight, when he pulled into a Roy Rogers restaurant to order chicken fingers and french fries for dinner, Graham somewhat proudly pointed out that he had since resisted the urge to stop and use the restroom.
“This is great, because with a bus full of people, I’d have to wait for everyone to get their order and finish up eating before we could get moving again,” said Graham while consuming his food from a paper bag wedged between his legs. “But since it’s only me, I can just eat while I drive.”
Saying that good music was all the company he needed, Graham explained that he had been able to keep himself awake by drumming his fingers along to the tunes of the classic rock station he discovered just outside Indianapolis. The senator added that after losing the station’s signal when he drove beyond the channel’s broadcast range, he remained alert by playing a game in which he attempted to name a state’s capital when he saw a license plate from that state, noting that he had already seen plates from 14 different states and two from Canada.
Reports indicate that at one point, Graham occupied his time by practicing his responses for the Republican debate in September, reportedly mimicking the expected rebuttals of each of the other candidates as well.
“I’ve made the drive from Iowa to South Carolina a bunch of times by myself—it’s really not that bad,” said the senator, whose bus contained only a small suitcase with the senator’s toiletries and a couple changes of clothes, as well as a few unopened boxes of “Graham 2016” bumper stickers. “By now, I know a lot of the stretches where the cops are usually looking to catch people for speeding. You definitely need to watch out once you get near Asheville.”
“I bet a lot of the other candidates don’t know that,” he added.
Rolling the window down in the hopes that cool air would stave off sleepiness, Graham said that the miles started to fly by when he began to mentally compose his Republican National Convention speech.
“It’s actually kind of nice being on the open road at night by myself,” said Graham while tearing off another bite of his Slim Jim before tossing the wrapper onto the passenger seat alongside several others. “It’s really peaceful, and I can just relax and be totally alone with my thoughts. Not everybody knows how to enjoy being by themselves.”
“Idaho!” added Graham suddenly, pointing at a passing car’s license plate following a long stretch of silence.