Over the river and through the woods...

I am tired of traveling.

Not to say that we didn't have a great trip. The kids were wonderful, we had a lot of fun, saw a lot of family, and no one ended up in an ER. The baby shower was adorable and pics of the cake (which rocked) are coming as soon as I find/unpack the camera.

But good gravy it was hot! The pool water? Was actually warm. It was also pretty grungy, but I'll save that for another post. We turned up the a/c at home before leaving since no one would be here. When we returned, it was so hot that the best the a/c could do was maintain the higher temperature rather than cool off the house any more. Now, that's hot.

All our flowers? Dead. All our weeds? Doing fabulously.

And I? Am really, really tired of traveling. I have the Mt Everest of laundry waiting to be done, and even though I did a couple loads already, the pile is still huge.

We took an alternate route back from North Carolina without checking to see both lanes of Interstate 40 would be open from Asheville to the Tennessee border. Guess what. They weren't. We saw signs for a detour, but traffic was moving fast enough that we thought we'd be okay. We passed the point of the detour route, then we saw the signs for a possible 30 mile delay.

Umm...a 30 mile delay? Really? 30 miles? Oh no.

I guess we technically lucked out because the delay didn't hit until about 5 miles out. What should have taken us a max of 10 minutes to travel took us over an hour and a half. I'm glad we had enough gas to last through the backup, and I'm glad that the a/c on the van didn't quit from sheer exhaustion and over-use.

When we got tired enough to stop for the night (we didn't head out until 4 pm, and going to the baby shower added about an hour to our drive), we discovered that all the hotel rooms for the cities we were near were totally full. Even the smoking rooms, which we wouldn't have stayed in anyway, but that's what the front desks kept telling us - "Even the smoking rooms are booked".

Alrighty then. We'll just keep going.

This route was also going to take us really close to R's Mom and stepdad. Since his stepdad was retiring this weekend and since we hadn't seen them since 2008, I thought we should call and at least consider going by if it would work out schedule wise. When we hit the road, we figured we'd be in their area really late at night (too late to call), and depending on where we stopped for the night, we'd decide whether or not to call them the next day.

The hotel where we finally got a room? Was about an hour away from R's family. When we got back on the road the next day, we called and asked if we could come by. They said that would be okay, so we stopped by. The kids were delighted to see another set of grandparents and they were beyond thrilled to see Uncle George again.

We visited for a couple of hours, R' sister, her husband, and their kids stopped by and if I was ever in doubt of how much I am not liked in that family? Justin answered that question by refusing to look at, talk to, or acknowledge my existence. Even when introduced to me. Alrighty then. It wasn't exactly a huge surprise. I keep hoping things will change, and they never do.

Moving on....we got back on the road and made it the rest of the way home in about 4 hours. Not bad. We were all tired so I made a quick dinner, R pulled the stuff out of the car, and I realized I've got a crap load of cleaning to do this week. And on that note? I'm going to bed early. The cleaning and the laundry? It will wait for me. I'm quite certain. And since we are all home safely and we had a great time overall? None of the rest of the stuff matters.