On the Road but not moving

I never appreciated how many people travel over Thanksgiving until the last two days. When I drive home from my mother's home in Port Charlotte for Minnesota, my first stop is outside of Atlanta, next is southern Illinois and then home. Three days max.

Yesterday, we never got out of Florida. Tonight we are outside of Nashville. Still not even in southern Illinois. At every major intersection where interstate highways join, there were massive slow downs. I am talking about traffic jams that had no reason to exist except high levels of autos. Traffic jams that lasted hours. Hours of going 13 miles an hour with cars acting like water bugs as they jump around from lane to lane. And it was not just a single junction, EVERY intersection of interstate highways meeting other interstates was the same way. Georgia posted a message on their highway information phone service saying expect high levels of traffic and they were not kidding. They also posted an army of police cars on our route.

Our journey down to Florida was pleasant. Jeanne and I talked, listened to the radio and to CD with music from the 60's and 70's. On the way home, Jeanne got into a book. Not a word from her side of the car, EXCEPT when we needed to stop for oranges and grapefruits. Twice. No singing together. No communication. No help finding the right road. Just her with her nose in her book. By the end of the day, we were talking. I was telling her to get her nose out of the book. I also blamed her for our slow time with all her stops. (I almost blamed her for the traffic but I could not think of a good way of making that argument work). We did listen to the radio, but it was a weak, static filled, station broadcasting the Vikings win over Chicago. So high traffic, dark interstate without streetlights, rain, cars darting into and out of my lane and Jeanne listing to a static filled broadcast. Oh Yeah! I was also hungry.

Well, we are in out hotel room; she is watching the rest of the Vikings game as she reads her book. I want to go get something to eat. She says she is fine and not hungry. Pray we both arrive back in Minnesota still married and both of us a live.