I woke up Wednesday morning in Tallahassee (and, since that’s where I fell asleep, that’s a good thing) to rain.

Lots of rain.

After breakfast, I started out, with the lights on and wipers going, and killing the mpg on the Prius: Wet pavement, headwinds, idiots who think they know how to drive in water – my idea of STRESS!

Mile 141 I-10 westbound (still raining):Notice the rain didn’t slow me down very much (speaking of idiots).

Mile 70 I-10 westbound:Florida is finally coming to an end.

This is where I would have pulled over, set up the tripod, and snapped a picture of myself standing in front of the state line sign. Since it was raining, that plan was canned:If you like, you can imagine me standing in the rain in front of the sign, getting soaked every time a vehicle drove by and sent spray splashing my way.

On I-10, Alabama and Mississippi are only about an hour wide: Still raining here, too.

…and still raining as I cross into Louisiana:Still not stopping to get soaking wet.

Coming into Baton rouge, and crossing over the Mighty Mississippi:That sure is a bright bug. The rain seems to have let up, but there is a fine mist in the air and besides, I’m making really good time now.

Crossing the Basin Bridge – mile after mile of swamp below, still raining up here, and the wipers are working hard again. My timing is such that I managed to avoid getting the wipers in the pictures:

Off I-10, onto I-49:

Mile 70, I-49 northbound, near Alexandria:

Mile 140, I-49 northbound, near Natchitoches:I stopped in this area for gas and grub.

In Shreveport, merging off I-49 and on to I-20 westbound:

Texas!

I-20 westbound, someplace in Texas – I forgot to note the mile marker, dang it!

“Hey, Martha! Didja see that? That idjit took a flash picture in his car driving down the road!”Shortly after this, I talked with Jenn and promised I would call in the next evening on her show.

I arrived in Fort Worth at GG’s house, went to dinner, talked with Doug on his show that night, and then fell asleep.

Miles traveled: about 900

Thank you for stopping by, God bless you all, Wear Red on Fridays, and support Warriors for Innocence!

Now, understand that when I left on this trip, I had every intention of doing the whole tourist thing – stopping at the state lines, important points along the way, and so forth, to the point that I even packed the tripod for our camera so that I could take pictures of myself at the state lines, important points along the way, and so forth.

I didn’t realize how much I would miss my wife and daughter.

Now, I know that a big tough former Marine such as myself should be a big old independent cuss, able to stand on his own two feet, not need anyone’s help for anything, yada yada yada, but I stand before you a changed man.

As I recently told a friend, “…the whole self-sufficiency thing can get in the way sometimes…” – and I have finally had the lesson come home to roost.

So – I shot most of the pictures through the windshield of the rental car. Besides, day two was spent in the rain until I was in Texas. No way I was gonna get out, set up a tripod, take my picture in the rain, take down the tripod, repack it, and then continue on the way. I didn’t have that many changes of clothes.

You’ve already seen the picture of Denver International Airport. The next trip photo is of Tampa, as seen from the causeway driving from Clearwater: This was on Tuesday afternoon, as I headed out.
Mile marker 56 on I-275 nothbound:
Fair warning: you are going to see a lot of these.
Mile 317 on I-75 northbound: I took most of these every hour or seventy miles, whichever came first. I also learned a lot about the camera – like when it’s dark outside, the pictures don’t come out nearly as well. I experimented with the settings a bit, but nothing spectacular happened.
Mile 383 I-75 northbound:

Then I thought, “How goofy do I look driving?”Answered that one, didn’t I?
Once I gunned through Gainesville and hooked west, I felt like I was making some progress: (Mile 281 I-10 westbound)Still, it was getting dark, and time to start thinking about how long I wanted to drive.
Mile 211 I-10 westbound, just outside Tallahassee: You can see what I mean by the pictures not turning out at night. Since it was about 1830, I figured I would just stop for a bite and push on for a while. Then I saw the light had been left on for me, so instead I got a room at the Motel 6. I did grab a bite to eat, but I ate it in my room, watched a little bit of TV, and then sacked out.

Miles traveled: about 250.

Thank you for stopping by, God bless you all, Wear Red on Fridays, and support Warriors for Innocence!

Everyone can relax – I found the notes. They were in the margins of the Sudoku book I use on flights, to take my mind off the fact that we are ignoring the laws of gravity and relying on “flight physics” or whatever to be transported from point A to point B.

What I failed to do, during the trip, was keep the camera handy on the plane, so I didn’t get any shots through the windows. Sorry ’bout that.

During the leg from Phoenix to Denver, I had a middle seat so the Sudoku kept my attention. On the leg from Denver to Tampa, however, the view out the window kept pulling me away from the puzzles. I used to live in the Denver area, and I was happy to see it come into view, and very sorry to see it go.

Once in the air towards Tampa, I noticed some of the crop fields that were in circles (radial irrigation, with a fixed point and sprinklers on pipes that travel in a circle to water the crops) were planted in sections; this caused a bit of curiosity in the farmer part of me – were these different crops? Same crop in different stages? I noticed this first over the Colorado/Kansas line, but it continued for some time.

Just before we crossed into Kansas, I happened to glance out and down in time to see a westbound airplane below us. We weren’t at the correct angle to catch the name of the airline, but it was close enough to make out the window shapes. I had just read an article in Popular Science that the navigation rules allowed for separation of just 1000 feet, in place of the older 2000 foot rule.

In case you are wondering how I knew where the flight was, Frontier Airlines has DirecTV available in the seat-back sets. Being the miserly sort I didn’t buy any channels, so my set was stuck on the advertising that rotated with a mapquest view of heading, altitude, and speed. (PHX – DEN 500 – 505 mph @ 30K feet; DEN – TPA 525 – 605 mph @ 37K to 40K feet) They also serve Coke products and Sun Chips, so I was in heaven. (wait – don’t tell my wife I drank Coke on the flight. I’m supposed to be sticking to water)

I forget, living in the arid southwest, that the midwest and southern states are very damp. There are meandering rivers with the attendant ox-bow lakes, silver dollars of ponds and short strips of man-made lakes everywhere you look from above.

As much driving all over the country as I have done, I still marvel at the land; it’s folds and wrinkles, flat land and mountains, the way the water has left it’s signature on the formation of this land mass. Seeing it from the air increases my sense of God in all things – even as I am praying that this hollow tube of aluminum continue to defy the law of gravity.

The mighty Mississippi – a whole lot of water in no particular hurry to join the Gulf of Mexico. Alongside, more ox-bows, and evidence of very old ox-bows, left behind, eventually filling into a marsh, then solid ground, and now being tilled and worked by farmers. A high bank on one side, and a shallow rise on the other of a crescent field in the middle of the checkerboard that is found everywhere farms are staked by fences.

Crossing into Alabama, I catch sight of something new – below us, there are several large fires, almost like entire fields on fire, the long trails of thick white smoke pointing to the east explaining our air speed of over 600 mph – with a tailwind, we are making good time. Again, my curiosity is aroused – what’s burning? Is it fallow field, being cleared of unwanted growth? Random lightening strikes? (that can’t be it – it’s a clear day, with high clouds – actually, the clouds are below us) I spotted these fires even in southwest Georgia and the panhandle of Florida.

The flight crews on Frontier are friendly and seem to enjoy their job. They don’t have the polished banter and patter of Southwest, but they do keep things light and enjoyable.

Next time: A photographic journey of the drive from Tampa to Phoenix. Be warned – I only stop for gas, and this is mostly flat land!

Thank you for stopping by, God bless you all, Wear Red on Fridays, and support Warriors for Innocence!

So much travel, so little time – and I am SO glad I was jotting notes and whatnot as I went along.

Monday, January 14, 2008:
The Flight from Phoenix to Denver was my favorite kind – uneventful. There was turbulence on the climb, and again on the descent. I think I know why they call a paperless voucher and “e-ticket.”

Unfortunately, my cousin in Denver was unable to come out to visit with me at the airport. Prayers and well-wishes for Bev would be welcome and appreciated.

Denver International is a very nice airport – at least concourse A is. I didn’t wander about too much. Without needing to leave to meet my cousin, I wanted to avoid a second security check if possible.

Osama Bin Laden is probably chuckling up a storm over what he has managed to incur on the traveling public. Very clever.

I know that I jotted lots of notes for this trip. I just can’t remember where they are. Really, I had some insightful comments to make, and droll observations.

Huh. I wonder what happened to them.

Anyway – left Tampa Tuesday afternoon, about 1500 hours, and drove for a while. I’m not as young as I used to be, so I ended up roosting in Tallahassee in a Motel 6 at about 1830 hours. Next morning (Wednesday), I was on the road at 0730, in a rain that lasted until I was well into Texas on I-20. Yes, that was over 800 miles of driving in the rain. I honestly can’t think of anything more frustrating, nerve-wracking, and stressful than driving in the rain. With snow and ice, the idiots slide off the road and you don’t have to deal with them. With rain, everyone thinks they can drive in the rain. Never mind that they haven’t changed their wipers in ages, and can’t see more than twenty feet in front of them – they will tell you they are the safest drivers out there.

I arrived at GG’s house Wednesday evening about 1930 hours – a bit later than planned, but still early enough to have a nice dinner with her. After a restful night’s sleep, and a delicious home-cooked breakfast, I was again on the road by 0730. I took a break about the Midland-Odessa area, filled up and ate a quick bite while talking to TMBWitW on the phone. Then I was back and cracking – I hit Phoenix about 2200 hours, and put my head on my own pillow by 2230.

In Tampa, I had rented a mid-size car. They offered me a Toyota Prius for an additional $10.99 a day, and I jumped at the offer. The savings in fuel alone would more than offset the daily charge, I figured – and I was right. Over the 2,340 miles I drove from Monday evening to Thursday night, I averaged 42.8 miles per gallon. Oddly enough, I would get better mileage in the cities, where traffic was stop-and-go, than on the open road, but I figured that was because on the open road I was using the little gas engine more than the electric motor. Once I set the cruise control on the Prius, it would stick that speed up hill and down dale. I took advantage of drafting traffic – the bigger the draft, the further back I would be able to reap the benefit – and posted some odd numbers at times. One time, for about 15 minutes, drafting a big rig that I was v e r r r r y slowly catching up to, I was getting about 75-80 mpg at 80 miles per hour. This was in west Texas, on I-10, where the speed limit is 80.

During the drive back, I chatted here and there with some blogfriends, and promised Jenn that I would call in on Thursday evening and talk with her during her Jenn’s Jungle BlogTalkRadio show. Naturally, come time to call in, I was on the one stretch of Interstate Highway that has no cell service whatsoever – I-10, between El Paso and Tucson. Well, except for a blip near Savoy, that I used to call and leave a message for TMBWitW so she wouldn’t worry about me. I did, however, manage to call in to Political Pistachio Thursday evening, and participated in that chat for a while.

When I find my other notes, I will post more about this trip. I’ll also put up more pictures, although most of the pictures are shot through the windshield at speed and are of random points on the freeways, along with the obligatory stateline crossings.

Thank you for stopping by, God bless you all, Wear Red on Fridays, and support Warriors for Innocence!

I’ve been awake for the last two hours – for whatever reason, I woke up at 0339 and I could not, for the life of me, go back to sleep.

So, I came in to the computer room/office, and started messing around here.

Then, MEG woke up about an hour ago, and she couldn’t go back to sleep. So we sat here together, my little girl and I, and poked around the ‘net a little bit. Read the comics over at Comics.com, stuck our nose into a few of the new entries on the blogroll (Hey, Loon, you OK? I missed you for the time you were gone. Good to see you back, and I hope every thing’s OK!) and then we went outside and got the Sunday paper.

Then, I found out why MEG wasn’t sleeping. Her dinner landed on my socks. Turns out that if she doesn’t thoroughly chew her green beans, they don’t agree with her. At this stage, they don’t agree with me either.

Just to let you know – I will be out of touch while I am on the road. I don’t own a laptop, and the stops are going to be few and far between. Turns out not a lot of you (OK, none of you to the east of me) want to have a visitor. That’s fine by me. I’ll just make better time overall.

Yesterday (Saturday) was spent finishing the entertainment center. Somebody forgot to take pictures as he went along, and right now the project is sitting in the trailer, ready to be delivered and installed. Of course, that’s not going to happen until I get back from my trip, but when it does happen, I will post the final result here.

Update – got a photo of it, inside the trailer:
This doesn’t really do it justice – so don’t look at it. Wait for the install pics.

Two more jobs are lined up for when I get back, too. I’ll be hanging some doors at the ongoing project and a referral customer is looking for a corner china cabinet. That should be a good one. I’m looking forward to that.

It’s getting time to start stirring around, so I’m going to sign off now. I will be lurking some of the blogtalk shows while driving (nothing more American than talking on the phone while driving, right? don’t worry, I’ll be using a hands-free device) so you might here me in the background on Political Pistachio, My Point, and/or Jenn’s Jungle.

Thank you for stopping by, God bless you all, Wear Red on Fridays, and support Warriors for Innocence!