Tuesday, August 16, 2005
The trip home begins. Stop by Vickie’s place for one last goodbye, gas up, and hit the road a little after 9 a.m. The kids had the backseat locked up with the laptop and switched back and forth between DVD’s and games…let’s not forget naps. They got their share of naps. I got my share of the open road and tried to space out the fact that I had a helluva long way to go.
When we hit the lower part of Idaho, dark rain clouds and wind were blowing our way. The rain was phenomenal – as if someone took a giant, never empty bucket and poured it over us. Just out of Salt Lake we hit another rainstorm that almost matched the one in Idaho. I had a tarp over the goods in the bed of the truck and when I removed it to unpack, I brought some rain with me. It was kind of neat, shaking out a few puddles of water that I’d transported from another state. Ok…so I’m weird. Little things flip my switch.
Road kill was everywhere. Deer, raccoon, birds, a porcupine, and a bird that I would swear was an eagle but I didn’t slow down to check it out. Perhaps it was the moon – maybe it was just too damn big and Moon Madness is a disease that hasn’t been catalogued yet. This is a shot of the moon when we stopped for gas about five hours out of Vegas.
Funny but Kayanna said she’d never seen ‘the man in the moon’ until now. She didn’t even know it was there. What the hell are they teaching kids these days. Or am I just old and remember another era when one was entertained without TV and video/computer games? But on another note, no one taught me how to play poker when I was young either. I didn’t start playing until I was 32 or 33…that is a bad beat.
We slid into Vegas just about the time I thought we would…right around 11:30 p.m. My butt had grown to the seat and my hands had merged with the steering wheel. A gallon of Red Bull, lots of lattes and rice crispy treats – let’s hear it for sugar rushes – and 14 hours from Missoula, we were home. Ke-e-e-e-rist! This place never looked better.
My baby truck had taken us over 2,400 miles on this trip, not to mention all the bugs it killed while we were hyper spacing. And speaking of trucks, I hate ASSHOLES that have to walk by your truck and throw a can or junk food bag into the back of it as they go by. When I bought it, I didn’t realize it resembled a $25,000 garbage can. Diptards! I’d like to take my garbage for the week and download it right into their front seat.
Unloading the truck had to wait till mania. Kayanna was fast asleep, Ryan was getting there, and after checking out the place and bringing in a few essentials, I was winding down…the road noise that had been crashing through me a few hours before was now a small buzz. I didn’t even need Sand Woman Land…