I woke up early and ready to pack and hit the road, but our typical family fate
had different plans. My wife wanted to go to work for just three hours to finish
a few things... Just three hours... After six hours I was wondering if Gilligan
was lost at sea!
The house was littered with half filled suitcases that
my declared inept ability of packing clothes prohibited me from finishing. With
nothing productive to do but wait... I decided to participate in the great
American pass time: watch TV. Lunch on the road was replaced with grilled hot
dogs and hamburgers after the morning and then the afternoon slipped away. When
Linda finally arrived home at 2pm, I was too exhausted from the stress of
waiting to be of much help packing. OK, stress had nothing to do with it, I am
just generally useless for packing. With all the clothes we are taking it is
nice to know that we are keeping some third world textile sweat shop employed.
We
hit the road at 4pm with a six hour drive ahead of us. We raced down the highway
with daylight burning. And fifteen minutes down the road we realized... We
forgot something. Returning home would add half an hour to an already long and
late trip. But that was no excuse and I complied by turning the van homeward.
The forgotten item? A very important and essential sentimental stone. I don't
get it. Probably because I am a guy. But I could have found a replacement stone
alongside the road and thought of some way to assign sentiment to it.
We
followed familiar roads out of New York and into Pennsylvania, racing the clock
to optimize sunlight. All the while our kids were glued to our Souvenir
Collector's 36-page itinerary that described every twist of the road and what we
would be doing every day of the trip.
Usually while driving I snack on
French Fries and Chocolate Chip cookies. And I always load up on Hush Puppies
and Dunkin Donuts - treats I only get during vacations. Instead I decided to go
heathy this time and created a trail mix of unsweetened dried fruit and nuts. It
was disgusting. But I chocked it down and by doing so, it kept me
alert.
We made great time to Harrisburg PA and pulled off for the night.
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