I'm back from vacation, unfortunately

The trip back caused me some angst, I have to admit. As usual, a large snowstorm hit the day I was scheduled to leave.

In order to get ahead of the bad weather, I worried about what to do until several hours after my planned departure time. Eventually I decided it would have been a good idea to have left several hours earlier. Especially since road closures forced me to go 150 miles out of my way to get to I-5.

Fortunately, it only took me nine hours to drive that 150 miles and start making positive progress. The mountain pass I took required snow chains, so I had to buy some. Then a nice (and reasonably non-serial-killer-like) man in a cowboy hat put them on for me.

I called my mother at about noon, and then told her I should get off the phone since there was a chain checkpoint four miles ahead. I joked that it should only take me an hour to get there at the rate traffic was inching along.

Two hours later, and thinking the situation considerably less funny – especially in light of the 800 miles I had left to go – I finally arrived at the chain checkpoint. I knew I was there because quite suddenly, all four lanes of traffic became one and a gentleman in an orange vest waved me through.

I called my mother again, ecstatic. “I’m going 45 miles an hour!” I exclaimed. “Really? Be careful going that fast on those chains,” mother exhorted. “Don’t worry, I’m down to 35 now … 25 … 15 …. and, I’m stopped.” Oh good. Traffic on the other side of the checkpoint had sped up not at all.

Finally I made it to I-5, where it was smooth sailing until about 10 p.m., when I had to put my chains back on to go over the mountain pass. I got them halfway on before realizing they couldn’t be latched properly because they were backward. I took them off, flipped them over, and started over. It took me at least 20 minutes to get them on. Fortunately there were several truckers in the vicinity, also putting chains on, who helpfully ignored me. At least it wasn’t freezing cold and raining … oh wait. Yes it was.

Earlier I had called my mother and gushed about how easy the new cable chains are to install. I felt it important to correct myself (despite being a journalist, I still have a small aversion to misinformation) so I called her back.

“I just wanted you to know that when I said the chains were easy to put on, I meant they are easy to watch a man in a cowboy hat put on,” I informed her.

About 3 a.m., when the Red Bull was no longer enough to jolt me into semi-consciousness, I pulled over and checked into a hotel, whose greasy night clerk told me the cheapest room was $60 and proceeded to charge me $70 for it. I slept until 6 and got back on the road, but not before ordering the largest coffee I could find and asking them to put an extra shot of espresso in it.

“That’s five shots,” the coffee girl warned me.

“Oh that’s it? Well, it’ll have to do.”

Finally, 25 hours after I’d started, I reached my destination. All things considered it wasn’t that bad a trip. Anyway it wasn’t as bad as when the wheel fell off our humvee in the middle of Kuwait. There was also that trip back from Korea on a litter with an IV in my neck.

So anyway, I’m back.