Travel Woes

Adam, Jacob, and I left Michigan on Tuesday afternoon to drive to Colorado. The traffic jams we encountered on the road were simply hideous, including a stretch in Illinois where it took us 55 long minutes to crawl five miles on I-80. We eventually stopped in York, Nebraska to find a place to stay for the night and were disappointed that every hotel at the exit was booked. We ended up at a dingy-looking Super 8 that had vacancy, and were pleasantly surprised that our room was actually quite nice. On Wednesday morning when we set out for the rest of our drive, we were dismayed to discover that the battery was dead in Adam's Jeep. After no one in the hotel lobby would agree to jump start the vehicle, I called AAA and used my road service for the very first time. The battery was so far gone that I had to keep my foot on the accelerator to keep the motor from dying. I drove two-footed - left foot on the brake and right foot revving the engine - out of the Super 8 lot and across a major highway to a Walmart where, fortunately, the mechanics were able to replace the battery in about 10 minutes. Whew. We arrived at Adam's apartment six hours later.

Jacob and I stayed in Colorado until Friday, when we were scheduled to fly to Houston. We carefully monitored Tropical Storm Don, which was due to hit the Texas coast Friday evening. Sure enough, we arrived at Denver's airport and found all the flights to Houston delayed. Luckily, the storm ended up striking far south of Houston and we arrived there only an hour late. Naturally, it is as hot as blazes here in the Lone Star state, but we are having a fun time running from the air-conditioned house to the air-conditioned car to the air-conditioned stores. And we're doing lots of swimming to keep cool in the 100 degree heat. We still have an exceptional drought going down here, so a bit of rain would be welcome. But, please, no hurricanes for our poor, unprepared house.