THE LAST LIGHT BULB

 Remember that poor old camel who broke his back because of that one last piece of straw ? You know . . . the "Straw that broke the camel's back" . . .   well, with me it is going to be Light Bulbs.  There is going to be just ONE last thing that is going to send me over the edge to either insanity, a cave high on a mountain in Tibet or possibly even death.  I am heading in one of those directions at the speed of light.

OK ,  I'm being just a bit melodramatic but honestly people, I am approaching my limit. (The fact that my "bar" for "limit" is set as low as a dachshund without legs doesn't help matters at all.)

Let's start with a well known fact that I have repeated in my blogs for years and years.  DO NOT CAUSE ME TO LOOSE SLEEP !  If I am woken too early we all know the proverbial "S---" will hit the proverbial fan for sure.  And this morning the shit not only hit the fan but it almost caused The Man to loose his life.

Let's back up a day or four to where all this started.  Saturday was Halloween and I went to my daughters that evening to hand out candy. SUNDAY I spent the entire day down at my Son's house with his three kids. (My grand daughter Grey had to go have a covid test so she can have an MRI done tomorrow. That adventure is for another day after we get some test results.). Anyway . . .  I was tired from the previous night's adventures so getting up at 8 on Sunday morning wasn't not going to be easy. The Man made it twice as difficult by setting his alarm for SEVEN and then leaving his phone in the bedroom when he got up at SIX.  Why did the chicken cross the road?  Who the hell knows which is also the answer to "Why did The Man get up at six?"  The Man, in his once again infinite wisdom, made an appointment to have the tires on his car rotated at 9 AM Sunday morning !!!!  WHO DOES THAT ?????????   I gather that his thought process, (if there actually was one), was that since I would be going out early he might as well do something productive while I was gone.  Being The Man who needs four days, thirty two hours and fifty seven minutes to get ready to do ANYTHING, he set his alarm for seven AM.  But when he woke up and got up at six AM he did not take his phone with him so his alarm woke ME an hour before I needed to get up.  

I was a bit miffed, (that is a mild form of pissed) but I shut off his phone, threw it into the toilet, NO, that's what I WANTED to do but I didn't, I just put it on the bathroom counter and went back to sleep for another hour until The Man woke me with these words . . . "WE have a problem".  

Now mind you, I am SOUND asleep and am woken up by The Man standing in the door way telling me that "WE" have a problem.  At least he knew enough to stand in the doorway because if he was within arms reach I would have had his throat in my hands.  I was half asleep when I asked what "Our" problem was so it took me a while to process the fact that the TV in the living room was not working. ( Like I gave a flying "F").   I dragged my body up out of the bed and staggered into the living room only to note that the TV was ON with a dark screen that had a message saying it was not working.  DUH !!!  I "calmly" explained that HE needed to call the cable company because I did not have the time.  I DID take the time to write down all the information he might need before I gathered myself together to make the 45 minute drive down to see the grand kids.   I AM TIRED !   It was a wonderful day though and I got home by 6:00 so we could have dinner. As soon as dinner was over I called the cable company,(because The Man did NOT call them.) and with in minutes the TV was working fine.  The joke being that the TV in the bedroom was working the entire time so The Man could have watched football all day had he only checked that TV OR made the one call to the cable company !  Dumb Ass !!

Ahhhhhhhh . . .   but it only gets better . Monday and Tuesday were full of doctor appointments for both of us and today I had to get up to go to the dentist at 11:00 AM. I figured an 11:00 dentist appointment would let me sleep a little and get ready to go at a leisurely pace. I did not factor in that yesterday was Election Day and we both sat up until almost 2:00 AM watching the debacle. We went to bed pretty sure our president was going to loose which caused me to have a disturbing nights sleep. That would have been bad enough but when The Man woke me at 5:47 this morning by turning on the bedroom TV I almost killed him.  I grabbed the blankets and pillow and pulled it all up and over my head giving The Man the message of "I AM NOT HAPPY!"  For the next hour I tossed and turned while envisioning the most painful ways I could kill The Man.  His death was going to be slow and painful !

By eight AM I finally gave up and got my butt out of bed, muttering all the while that I got dressed. I promised myself I would give The Man the benefit of declaring temporary insanity but when I stepped into the living room I lost it and told him exactly what I was thinking as I stomped through the room and out the kitchen door onto the lanai where I sat down to write this blog.  

It is now 6:30 in the evening and we are both still alive. I did apologize for my outburst and he apologized for being an idiot.  

I guess this whole election nonsense has both of us at our wits end.

IT MUST HAVE BEEN THE BRUSSEL SPROUTS

 Yesterday was Halloween.  For the past several years I have gone over to my daughter's house to hand out candy while the family goes out Trick or Treating through their neighborhood.  They live in an awesome gated community that celebrates the holidays in a BIG way.  The decorations are elaborate and the residents are out in full party mode.  Tables are set up in front of houses offering not only candy to the kids but all sorts of food and alcoholic beverages to the adults.  It's a fun place to be even in this year of quarantine and social distancing.  

This year my grand kids were very concerned that I would be exposed to nasty germ ridden children as I sat handing out goodies from the front yard. To avoid any contamination of grandma they decided to devise a way to keep me "socially distanced" from the costumed hoards who show up at their door. The first attempt was to build a ramp out of hot wheel track that would reach from the second floor balcony down to the driveway.  That did not work !  All thirteen feet of it kept falling apart and twisting around. Plan two was to build a ramp out of cardboard taped together and supported by one of dad's ladders.  The Man got wind of all this and decided he could build a chute from PVC pipe until he found out how expensive this pipe is. He then decided he could build a cheaper version of the chute from "drain field pipe" until he could not find anyone in a fifty mile radius that sold this type of pipe. This fact blew his mind because apparently this type of pipe is a dime a dozen in the UP where people actually have "drain fields". Florida being a state built on sand does not EVER create this type of drainage system so therefore no one sells this special type of pipe. At this point the kids went back to the chute plan which actually worked until it began to rain. About twenty minutes before it started to get dark enough to bring out the Trick or Treaters the sky opened and the cardboard chute "melted" into a large pile of instant mush.  Good thing the kids had a back up plan, (one that grand ma suggested days earlier). I sat upstairs on the balcony and when some kids came along I lowered a small bucket filled with candy for the kids to reach into. It was a huge hit with everyone who showed up and it kept me safe from germs. 

What this arrangement did NOT keep me safe from was the plethora of chocolate sitting in a large bowl next to my chair. For what ever reason this year my daughter chose to purchase the GOOD chocolate Halloween candy. The bowl was filled with mini Snickers, Milky Way, Kit Kat bars and my all time favorite, Nestlies Crunch.      OMG !    What was she thinking ???????   I could sit in a room filled with Skittles, Tootsie rolls and Jolly Ranchers and not even consider opening one and putting it into my mouth. But if you put a chocolate bar any where in a three mile radius of me it's all over. 

I arrived at My daughter's house around five o'clock after going to Saturday night mass.  Keri had made a lovely dinner of ribs, mashed potatoes and a delicious mix of Brussel Sprouts and Broccoli.  It sounds crazy but the veggies were REALLY good.  I didn't over do it with dinner but I did enjoy the really tasty meal.  When dinner was over everyone got into their costumes and headed out into the damp night for their two hour walk through the neighborhood leaving me alone with a huge bowl full of candy.  

By nine that night when the family was dragging their bones home laden with pillow cases full of goodies grand ma was ready to throw up.  I was very diligent in handing out the candy to the neighborhood kids but I did just happen to be a bit selective when it came to which candy went into the bucket and which candy went into my mouth.  There was not a single Crunch bar that made it into anyones bag, they ALL went into my mouth.  By the end of the evening there were still quite a few candy bars left so my daughter sent me home with a bag of candy "for The Man". Many of these did not survive the five minute drive from Keri's house to mine. The Man, not knowing any better, was delighted to get the small bag of goodies that I brought home. Little did he realize that the bag was twice the size before it got into my car with me.  

At 3 AM last night my stomach was rolling over and I knew it must have been those damn Brussel Sprouts !  That's the last time I eat those little suckers !

TOO MANY CALENDARS

 I am retired !  People used to ask Husband what he was going to do when he retired and Husband's answer was, "What ever I want".  No one ever asked me that question because they knew better.  It would have sent me into a litany of chores and projects that I had been saving up for years.  Unlike Husband I can ALWAYS find something to do. Husband had no buddies that he hung around with and he had no hobbies to keep himself busy. If it wasn't for Fox News that man would have had nothing to do. 

I have heard the saying that God doesn't take us up to Heaven until we have accomplished all that we were put on this Earth to do. Apparently I will still be alive in the year 3047 because at this rate that is how long it will take me to get everything done. For every one task I finish there are at least twelve others that pop up. (Probably because I make such a mess of things.)  But at least everything is written down on my calendarS. (Capital "S" because I have several. This does not mean I am organized it just means I am anal.)

Who ever came up with the idea of LARGE calendars with LARGE empty boxes for each day was a genius. I remember my mom had a little calendar hanging on the wall in the kitchen when I was a kid and there were tiny little notes of hers written next to each day. (I guess this is where I got my love of calendars) Every year the bank or the insurance man would give out little calendars that were meant to sit on your desk or carry in your purse.  My mom would always stick ours on the wall. 

 It is SO much easier to have a big calendar hanging on my kitchen wall so I can see everything at one glance. 

BUT what if I'm in another room ? What if I'm in "Control Central" sitting at my desk top computer and some one calls to schedule an appointment?  I would have to get up and walk into the kitchen to check the calendar. SO I have a desk top calendar book that one of the missions sends me every year. Of course there IS a calendar on my computer that links with the calendar on my phone while it is also linking to the calendar on my iPad but I NEED a paper calendar sitting at my fingertips where I can write down dates and times. If I have to leave the phone "page" on my phone or computer to go to the calendar "page" there is a VERY good possibility that I am going to loose whomever I am talking to on the phone. Better to be safe and write it down on the desk top calendar. Then once I am off the phone I can go into the kitchen to copy the new appointment on the wall calendar and then, and ONLY THEN, I can put the date and time into my phone.  

What you must understand here is that I have been away for the past five months so ALL my doctor appointments have been put off until my return to Florida. I now have an average of two appointments a week for the next couple of weeks. ALL are health related in some way . . . tests, labs, X-rays and actual visits to doctor offices. (Can you imagine what my schedule would look like if I wasn't healthy?). Add to all that nonsense I DO have a life and DO occasionally visit with friends and family so my calendar gets pretty full. I could possibly keep all my appointments straight but we now have to add in THE MAN and all his doctor appointments. This is where it REALLY gets tricky!

The Man does NOT have a life !  Even when we are in Michigan he does not have a life other than doctor appointments.  Any and all visits with his brothers are impromptu with us dropping in at "camp" or them stopping in for a quick hello.  There are no nights of playing cards with the boys or any other such activities. (Understandably because of his limited breathing he is pretty much tied to the oxygen. He is super self-conscious about being in public with an oxygen tank or concentrator so he just stays home.) In Florida his entire life revolves around trips to the Veterans Hospital. (Thank goodness it is only a few minutes away and not an hour like in Michigan.) And now with this dumb ass pandemic our visits TO the hospital are really limited so we have numerous VIDEO calls coming into the house. 

BIG PROBLEM !

Video calls require a computer or smart phone neither of which The Man owns. Want to guess who DOES own both computer and iPhone ???  (That was a silly question because I know you ALL know exactly who has both.). Now because the video calls must come in on my phone line The Man has given the VA my phone number and in the infinite wisdom of any government run establishment the VA had CHANGED his phone number to mine. This has resulted in me getting ALL of the forty two daily phone calls each and every day reminding The Man of his forty two upcoming appointments. (God forbid they could do this all in ONE call. For what ever reason the VA finds it necessary to make separate calls for every single appointment.)

In order to keep all these appointments straight I have come up with a color coded system of marking our appointments on the calendar with high lighter.  Blue high-light is The Man,  Pink is for me. Pretty simple right ?  But wait . . . .  how do we know which appointments we need to physically GO to and what ones are video calls from home ?  GREEN CIRCLES around the video call dates because green is the color of grass and we have grass at home.  (I really think I have totally lost it ! ). But hold on, we're not done yet, there's more.  What about dates that involve both of us ?  The cleaning lady for example . . .  well, those get high-lighted in YELLOW !!!  (Don't even ask why I chose yellow. Just consider that I HATE cleaning bathrooms so that is why we have a cleaning lady. )

My calendar looks like a Christmas tree !!!!  There are blue and pink and yellow lines all over it with big green circles scattered over the entire page.  It is colorful if nothing else.

Now ask me how many calendars does The Man have . . .   If you guessed ZERO you win a new  2021 calendar and a set of multi-colored highlighters because I know you want to start decorating your calendar just like mine. 

ONE LIGHT BULB AT A TIME

 I am back . . .   maybe.  My brain continues to unravel at various points of each day but I think maybe I am starting to regain some of my Florida calm.  Although you may have noticed I have not written anything in a week because I just didn't want to stir the pot of emotions that is boiling over in my brain.

The BIG question of this past week has been, "How can lightbulbs that have not been turned on in over 5 months go bad?"  If we are not using said lightbulbs why are they blowing out at the speed of the pace car at the Indie 500?".  In the past week we have had to replace at least five different bulbs. And of course they are all difficult to reach so it isn't a two second job.  (There is something to be said for the old fashioned table and floor lamps of our generation. These recessed ceiling lights are a bitch to change.)

Moving right along in the petty annoyances I am trying to deal with this week is the "daily" newspaper delivery.   I "restarted" our paper, the left leaning Palm Beach Post, a week ago last Sunday while in the car on the way back down to FL.  I was so proud of myself for being SO proactive !  HA !  In the past NINE (9) days that we have been home we have gotten the paper ONCE !!!!    ONE TIME,    UNO !!!!!!  I now have a lovely morning ritual of waking up, having The Man tell me, "No paper today!", and then me getting to call the Palm Beach Post subscription office.  I have made some very lovely friends over at the newspaper office. Each day I get to talk to someone different and each day they reassure me they will TRY to get us a paper delivered "tomorrow" and each day there once again is NO paper.  We have heard every excuse about as to why we are still not getting our paper and how they are having such issues finding dependable "carriers".  THAT excuse is a bowl of doggie doo doo because our next door neighbor is getting HER paper EVERY SINGLE DAY !!!!!!!    Some where along the line someone has been dropping the ball and we sit in anxious anticipation each day for the possible arrival of a paper. Of course they tell us we can always read the paper "On Line" but it just is NOT the same.  Because we are two old farts we like to sit out on the lanai each morning with a cup of coffee reading our daily paper. The Man gets to tell me about all the idiots who live in our adopted state and I get to do the puzzles. It's a win win if only the paper would get here. 

Next on the list of little annoyances is the daily dose of doctors. With the new pandemic rules many of our doctor visits are virtual. At least that is the way the Veterans Hospital is handling most of their appointments.  So far in the past ten days The Man has had three video calls all of which must be done on my computer or my phone because the dinosaur I live with with still has a flip phone. These calls do NOT go smoothly !  There are at least three "pre calls" to his phone while he tries to give them my phone number or e-mail address.  It actually is quite funny listening to him shouting "M" as in Mary, "S" as in Sam . . .  and so on and yet even then they fail to get it right on the first try. Once the doctor actually connects with us the signal goes out at least ten times so we are talking to no one for most of the call.  Basically it's a disaster.  The Man did have to go into the VA Hospital last week to have lab work done. (Can't do that over the phone.) I dropped him at the door and disappeared while he did his tests.  For some strange reason the VA doesn't get the idea behind valet parking.  Does it make sense to you to drive past the front door of the hospital, drive around the side of the building to have someone park your car for you? The "valet" parking is further away than the regular parking lot. Doesn't make sense to me.  Because The Man really can't walk the distance from the parking to door I have to drive him, drop him off and then return to pick him up.  This "Care Giver" job is exhausting !

But The Man isn't the only one seeing doctors. Because I spent the entire summer in Michigan I missed all my six month checkups.  I made and cancelled several doctor appointments at least three times these past five months so now it is time to actually get my butt in to these necessary visits.  I got to go to my ear doctor AND my dentist today. Both visits are going to cost me a small fortune because I am going to need new hearing aids within the coming year and a cracked tooth is going to need a crown. I see dollar signs flashing in my doctors eyes and tears in my eyes.  

BUT . . . I think I see the tide turning. Tomorrow I am going to sit at our pool with my good friend Theresa.  I am so looking forward to this time of girl talk and female company.  Hopefully it will get me back in a better frame of mind and back to blogging. You know there is ALWAYS something to write about it's just a matter of not wanting to smash the computer when I sit down. 

THE WORST HOMECOMING E V E R

 As I have told you MANY times before . . . .GOD has a sense of humor.  We are put on this earth for nothing more than to amuse the Lord.  Hey . . . He created us so I guess He is entitled to getting a good laugh or ten every so often.  I guess with the way the world is headed these days The Lord needs as much entertainment as possible to off set the stupidity and evil that is on our planet right now. 

I have been praying fervently to God for the past two months that He just let me stay healthy and safe until I could get back to Florida to see my children and the grand kids. God heard my prayers, (He couldn't possibly have missed them because I was praying EVERY minute of EVERY day for two months straight.)   WE managed to dodge the Covid bullet and we had a very uneventful drive from Michigan to Florida.  It was even a pleasant drive ! The motels we stayed in were clean and very comfortable.  We got to stop in Atlanta to see my oldest son and his beautiful family who out did themselves in providing  a delish impromptu breakfast and a bag lunch when we left after our two hour visit.  God Love Kyle and Bridget !  They are awesome !!!!  And my grand daughter Abby even got up at the butt crack of dawn, (9AM is an unGodly hour for a teenager), so she could visit with us and give her grandma some long awaited hugs.  

When we left Atlanta we drove about six hours to Gainsville, FL where we spent the night at a fancy hotel that Kyle gifted to us. Next morning we were on our way for the last leg of our journey home. All was well with the world . . . or so I thought. 

Just after we pulled in my daughter and her two awesome kids came over to help us unpack the car and get settled in.  It was SOOOOOOOOO fantastic to see them.  I usually see them every other day so the past five months have been torture for me. But there they were with lots and lots of hugs and smiles and chatter. I don't think they stopped talking for the entire time they were here.  Keri helped The Man try to figure out the TV so he could watch a football game at 4:00.  The Man had been anticipating this game the entire drive down so when we realized the TV was not working it was a major crisis. 

The fact that the TV was not working was entirely my doing . . .  Over the summer I had decided that I would cancel my cable subscription. One reason was I would be away for 5 months so why pay all that money for something I would not be using and secondly I, in my infinite wisdom, had decided that I could cut my cable bill in half by getting rid of all the extra channels that I was paying for, just get the basic stations that come with my living in this community and then subscribe to HULU for a much cheaper rate to get all the extras that I was paying triple for from Comcast.  But as is usual for my "infinite wisdom" this all did not work as planned and I will probably end up  paying more. But that is to worry about another day.  For the mean time I was just going with the basic cable provided by my community.  NOT !!

WE arrived home only to find that in THEIR INFINITE WISDOM, which is apparently so much wiser than mine . . .   The Cable Company, very sneakily, encripted the basic channel reception so that it is now necessary to go to the cable company store and get a new TV box that will allow you to watch even the most ordinary stations.  It is FREE, no monthly rental fee, but you have to go to get it.  And where is the nearest cable store in these times of Covid 19 ?  Why it is down in West Palm Beach of course.  BUT it WAS open on Sunday so after fighting with the TV and making several calls to the cable company I got in The Man's car, (That we had just gotten out of after 4 days of driving), and drove to WPB where I got to stand on the sidewalk in the hot sun for twenty minutes until it was my turn to be allowed into the store. 

It only took me about ten minutes IN the store so I was back on the road heading home when I decided I better stop at Publix for milk and bread and some much needed beer.  A hundred dollars in groceries later I was back home and ready to get the TV working,  sitThe Man on to the couch with a beer and I could then put food away.  HA  HA   HA  HA  HA  HA  !!!!!

For the life of me I could NOT get the damn TV set up.  Finally The Man stepped in and tried and basically just screwed things up even worse than I had.  I got hm a beer, handed him my phone with the NFL app and got hm watching the game on my phone while I went to get food taken care of. 

Here's where it gets even better . . .  Being The Man we HAD to bring Halibut down to Florida with us.  His son had just visited us in MI and brought 2 coolers of fish and shrimp that he had caught over this summer. We still had fish from LAST summer but that makes no difference,  We HAD to have more. The Man uses the packages of fish as gifts or barter with the neighbors for when they help him out with various things around the farm.) So with five large packages of fish and four containers of shrimp that were all frozen solid we packed them in our thermal bag that we bought last year for this purpose, added blocks of ice and merrily put it all in the trunk of the car. When we got to GA we opened the cooler to give Kyle some fish and at that time it all was still frozen solid. We added new ice blocks that Kyle had made for us, sealed the bag back up and continued on our way.  

Only one problem . . .   the temperature outside continued to rise so the fish was no longer sitting in a trunk that was 40 degrees. By the time we reached home the outside temperature was 85.  And by the time I opened the cooler ALL the fish and shrimp had defrosted !!!  AND was sitting in three inches of stinky fish water. The cooler stunk, the bags of fish and shrimp stunk and MY KITCHEN stunk because all the water dripped all over the floor.  DISGUSTING !!!!!  By this point, after the whole TV debacle I was ready to throw The Man, the fish and the shrimp OUT !!!!!  I don't think I have cursed this much since I broke the big bottle of Jack Daniels Honey whisky last year.  

I spent the next three hours wiping up the floor, cleaning out the fridge, (that was a bonus because I had not expected to be away all summer so had left eggs and other food in the fridge).  I had to throw all that out! I did have a great time tossing a dozen and a half eggs, one by one across the room into the sink. It gave me a great sense of relief to THROW something !!  I did make a mess but at that point I was beyond all reason and just needed to KILL something.  Next I got to cook a mess of fish and shrimp so I could then freeze it and do some laundry to get rid of some of the fish smell off the towels that I used to wipe up the puddles of fish water on the kitchen floor.  It was a lovely way to spend our first day home.  I was in bed and asleep at eight but then up at one to spend four hours going through mail and trying to convince myself today would be better. 

Today it is raining.  

At least it didn't rain while we were unpacking the car yesterday.  I took advantage of a break in the rain today to go out to my car that has been sitting locked up for five months.  It started right up and sounds great. 

Too bad the entire inside of the car . . .  seats, steering wheel, floor, doors and ceiling are covered in a thick coat of green mold.  

I'm SO glad to be home !

REDNECK RUBBERNECK

 Today we left Ohio and drove through Kentucky and Tennessee to get to a motel just outside of Atlanta, GA.  

I am about to be politically incorrect so you can hit the delete button now if you choose to but a trip through these two (3) states was interesting to say the least.  The one great thing about driving down route 75 all the way from Michigan is that except for the two hours from The Man's house to the bridge that links the UP to Mainland Michigan we are driving on a major highway with speed limits of seventy five miles an hour. 

In the words of The Man we are chewing up the highway and spitting it out.  This morning we left the motel at 8:AM and  drove about four hundred and forty miles and it seemed like nothing.  We got to our destination just outside of Atlanta at three o'clock this afternoon and are now chillaxing in our room watching our president on TV.   Life is good.

The drive today was pretty easy with the exception of traffic in Chattanooga, Tennessee.  We drove through Cincinnati, OH at "rush hour" this morning and had no traffic to speak of but when we got to Chattanooga, Tennessee the road was filled with cars and traffic was at a dead stop. We sat in traffic crawling our way forward at about five miles an hour surrounded by pick-up-trucks and mini vans. It was one o'clock in the afternoon. Where did all these people come from ?  Where were they going ?

As we crawled along I noticed that the pick-up-truck next to us had a sticker on his cab window that said "REDNECK" .  My thought was, "Why would you want to advertise that?".  But I guess in this part of the country it is a badge of honor rather than something you might want to keep quiet.  Although I really don't think a true Redneck needs to advertise, it's usually pretty obvious. The gun rack in the back of the cab of the pick-up is usually a dead give-away. 

So we continued to crawl along until we finally got to the reason for the hold up.  A tow truck on the side of the road assisting a broken down car.  No huge accident.  No car fire. No blood and guts. Not even a police car !   Just a tow truck . . .  and traffic was blocked up for miles.  

Can you imagine what would happen if there was something interesting to look at ?  

ON THE ROAD AGAIN

 Don't expect to hear from me for a couple of days . . . unless something outrageous happens. 

We left Michigan today and are driving down to Florida.  We should be there by Sunday and I can not   wait !  I think The Man is just as excited as I am because he really wants to be warm and that forecast of snow for this weekend really lit a fire under him to get out of town.   

Hopefully all will go smoothly.  Today we drove over five hundred miles to get ourselves into Ohio for the night.  A stay at a nice motel and dinner from Taco Bell drive through has us now sitting on the bed ready to crash early so we can get moving again in the morning.  I actually was up before 7:00 AM this morning and we were on the road by 8:00 in time to see a spectacular sunrise.  I have not seen a sunrise in years . . . possibly decades. It was beautiful and a wonderful way to start the day.  The fact that it started to rain about an hour into the drive didn't dampen our spirits nor slow us down.  The Man was in jet plane mode so we made great time driving until just before five o'clock tonight.  

It is getting slightly warmer outside.  This morning it was 37 degrees in Michigan so we didn't hesitate to jump in the car and get moving.  We have managed to get some fifty degree weather here in Ohio but that's not nearly warm enough so we will continue our journey tomorrow with plans to stop just north of Atlanta, GA so we can stop on Saturday morning to visit my oldest child and his family who I have not seen in AGES !!!  That is almost as exciting as the thought of warm weather.