From Kansas, through Missouri, Tennesee to Georgia

After one of the longest days of my life across Kansas we had a short day driving to Springfield, MO.  Bit of a rough morning being really tired from the prior 12 hour driving day.  We were going along smoothly until I talked to my Dad (who lives in Springfield) telling me we were taking the long route and we should cut across to a different road to save an hour.  Well we programmed Nancy (my GPS) and ended up on back roads with lots of dead critters, one lane bridges and endless fields of who knows what.  I'm sure it still took us that hour we were trying to save.  We finally got to Springfield, visited with my parents, had a great dinner at Ocean Zen, and managed to get my mom in bed after half of a martini.

My dad is dying and he knows it.  We said goodbye on Sunday morning probably for the last time.  Needless to say, it was a long emotional day.  Scariest thing ever - we're on a road in Tennessee and it was kind of back road, windey and rural.  I come around a curve to a huge levy bridge.  I am terrified of bridges.  And this one was really high and really narrow and there were semis coming straight toward me.  It was all I could do to keep a little composure and get over those bridges.  We crossed the Mississippi and Ohio rivers.  Erin learned something about Mom she never knew.  I HATE BRIDGES. 

After that incident I enjoyed the scenery.  There a rolling hills, beautiful southern homes and lots of beautiful fields. Erin & I took turns and drove to Murfreesboro, TN and couldn't wait to get out of the car.  Nancy, our GPS, got us safely around Nashville and we needed the help! We were both pretty hammered emotionally, tired and hungry.  We went to a local Italian place run by Sicilians - Sal's Pizza.  It was fantastic! At the end of a crappy, crappy day that place made our day.  The building wasn't special but the food was amazing.

So we get up for another crazy day of driving, this time to Valdosta, GA. I got us through Atlanta which was crazy.  A 20 lane freeway and going 75 is like standing still.  We managed not to get hit, or to hit anyone, and only got honked at once. The architecture in that city is beautiful.  I've only spent time in the lovely airport for layovers, but I would like to investigate that city some day.

Erin had her first experience with fire ants while walking the dogs at a rest stop. There was also a chopped up school bus being worked on that said, No Work, No Tacos, on  the mud flaps....okay....

Lucky for me that Erin was with me.  We changed over and I was out like a light.  I slept for 2.5 hours and we pulled into our luxurious Best Western for the night. Amazing how wonderful any hotel is when you want to stop driving.  The whole way through Kansas I thought "look, there's a perfectly good hotel" and we would drive by. We finally hit the South and some serious heat and humidity.  Our room would only go down to 75 degrees but we were too tired to change rooms. 

We decided to go out to eat and ended up at a Japanese restaurant.  I could have eaten BBQ every night but it's not Erin's favorite.  So the food was decent there, and we drove through a local ice cream place for a sundae.  The next stop was the gas station to fill the generator.  Have I mentioned that we are hauling UHaul with a freezer full of fish from Alaska?  Every night and every morning we start up the generator and run that sucker to keep the fish frozen. Move over Beverly Hillbillies.  Anyway, I'm filling it up and the nozzle slips and I gas down Erin's feet; ant bites and all.  I'm such a great Mom.

We get back to the room and Erin MUST shower after being doused with gasoline. We start watching the Cowboys game and the cable just turns off.  Emory must come and reset our TV so we hide the dogs in the bathroom as pets are allowed but there must be two under 40 pounds or one 50 pound dog.  Sophie's head weighs 50 pounds.  We got past that and finished the game and passed out.

Did I also mention that Sophie started "woofing" during the night at every little noise?????????