(some fanciful, some accurate, I'm not bothering to distinguish which is which)
February 18, 2006
5:00pm Mama sees us off, calling out things about coats, and making sure we have them. I tell her I have one in my suitcase. I don't tell her it is a little, dinky, spring jacket.
7:00pm We are booking it from the rental place inside the airport to the car pick-up spot. I am wishing I had more than a little, dinky, spring jacket since the 13 degree winds are causing me to think bitter thoughts about New England - something I rarely do.
8:00pm We have said good bye to Melissa, and are on the road! I squeal about how excited I am.
8:01pm I say again how exciting this is.
8:02pm I once more exclaim about my excitement over taking a road trip to GA.
(Let's cut to the chase here, and just admit that I talked about how excited I was a lot, throughout the whole trip. Diane is a very patient soul.)
8:03 pm I confirm directions with Aunt Laura, and it was a jolly good thing, since I was about to take the wrong road.
9:00pm We've found Rt 95 which we'll take for hours and hours. We're home free!
9:01 pm We break into a rendition of "On the Road Again" - this was repeated often over the course of the trip.
9:02pm Diane begins reading "True Courage," the suspense story we've decided upon to wile away the hours.
9:12pm I am hooked on the story.
10:00pm Lindsay calls! She laments the fact that we'd forgotten to pray for Craig during our birthday party for him that afternoon. Diane calls him, we both put them on speakerphone, and we all pray for him!
11:00pm Diane tries to get a little sleep so she can spell me in a couple of hours.
12:00am I am getting a little bit sleepy, but I sing along to the CD I have in and that keeps me going.
12:04am I see the moon at its waning gibbous stage! I am wide awake now, thinking about how happy I am to be a science teacher and how I know so much more about the moon and its phases than I ever thought I'd know.
12:30am The excitement of the waning gibbous (as incredibly exciting as that is) has worn off and I'm feeling really sleepy.
12:45am I pull off for gas, and Diane takes the wheel.
5:45am Andrea wakes up from a remarkably good sleep, ready to spell Diane, who has just driven the entire "graveyard" shift single-handedly. WOW! Let's have a round of applause for that heroic effort.
6:14am Beautiful sunrise! I am starting to feel alive again, and really happy to be behind the wheel. I enjoy driving our little Chevy Cobalt!
9:00am We start looking for breakfast places. We are in the breakfast buffet mode, and call Mrs. Randall to see if she can look on-line for places along our route. Who needs on-star when you've got Mrs. Randall?! (What good is on-star anyway, if it doesn't provide eatery information?)
9:30 Mrs. Randall informed us that we have just passed the last Shoney's for hours. Sigh. We decide on the Cracker Barrel.
10:00am Diane and I "go to church" by listening to Diane's Statler Brothers CD:)
10:00am We enjoy a FABULOUS breakfast at the Cracker Barrel. I hear many southern accents, feel a bit like a foreigner, and am comforted by the glimpse I catch of a Red Sox hat!
11:00am We are back on the road again (breaking into song once more), with only a few more hours to go.
11:01am At the VERY next exit we see a breakfast buffet! We bellow at the irony of it all, but confess that we are really quite full.
1:00 pm We enter Atlanta. I am driving, Diane is reading our very exciting book. I am getting a little nervous at the sight of about 14 solid lanes of traffic!!!
1:10 pm Still a bit nervous, but realizing that the laws about being in your own lane and stuff apply on this super-highway just as much as they did on the mere shmere 6 lane highways of 95.
1:30 pm We're all through Atlanta! Safely!
2:00pm We arrive at Brad and Claire's!
2:01 pm No one answers the door - we decide Claire must still be at church. We call her. No answer. We wonder how long these Southerners spend in church anyway!
2:02 pm Claire calls us back, and apologizes for not answering the phone. She'd been upstairs and the phone had been downstairs. "So you're still at the parsonage?" Diane asks. "No, I'm at my house," Claire replies. "Well SO ARE WE!" Claire is dumbfounded. She comes rushing down and opens the door to see us standing on her doorstep!
2:03 pm We are happy she's so surprised, because surprises are nice, but we're a little mystified as to the reason she's quite this surprised. Then we find out she wasn't expecting us until tomorrow! The source of this confusion is unclear.
2:04 pm We get a tour of her BEAUTIFUL home! I am full of praise. It really is lovely! I am very happy for them.
2:15 pm We zip two minutes down the road to Penny's house to surprise her!
2:17 pm Sure enough, she is dumbfounded to see us:)
2:18 pm The truth comes out! I had called Penny last night to say we'd started at about 8. She didn't get the message until this morning, and thought we'd left at 8am instead of 8 pm! That would be quite the record-setting trip indeed!
2:20 pm We get a tour of Nate and Penny's BEAUTIFUL house!
2:25 pm I'm nearly overcome with euphoria! Ahhhhhhh vacation and GREAT friends. Who could ask for anything more?
7 comments:
Yay- we're so glad you're here!
wow, quite the trip...
sounds like fun! Hope your random "break" this week is relaxing and fun. Don't forget the flea market!
Boohoo, I miss everybody.
But awesome post, Andrea!
so funny to read!!! I love you guys. :-)
Shoney's--one of the best parts of my millions of road-trips to the south. You really should try to catch one on the way back!
I'm glad you and Diane were able to 'spell' each other:)Speaking of which I've never heard that word used that way before...anyway...all I know is..all those hours driving spell-time for a nice long nap- to me!:)
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