Cross Country, Part 1

Yawn. Oh, I am so tired. We're finally starting to catch up on sleep and adjust to German time, but we haven't been getting to bed early enough as we've spent the last few evenings catching up with J's friends/coworkers. So many of them are PCS-ing or beginning pre-deployment training this week, so we really need to see everyone before they leave. Also, J's been working some pretty long hours, so that's a bummer. At least I'll get in some studying though.

First, a little about J's and my trek across the Midwest: our cross country journey got off to a rather inauspicious start, as Friday night--the night before J and I were scheduled to leave DC--we discovered after dinner (and after having finished packing up the truck) that some a-hole driving 50 mph down my residential street had sheared off our driver side mirror and sent it flying across the sidewalk. Given that it's nearly impossible to drive a giant moving truck without side-view mirrors, I was worried that we were SOL and would have to delay our drive...not that we had any extra time, seeing as we had to make it to Denver by Wednesday. It took a long drive to some random neighborhood in Capitol Heights, Maryland and we lost several much needed hours of packing, but J fortunately got the Penske Truck roadside assistance people to replace our mirror that same night and we still were able to start our journey the next morning.

The first leg of the trip was 10 hours through the hills of Virginia and West Virginia and the cornfields of southern Ohio. Beautiful, beautiful country. Plus, the upside of long drives is the uninterrupted hours of listening to music. Day 1 consisted of everything from Sam Cooke and Buddy Holly to Brad Paisley and Johnny Cash and Alison Krauss.

 
We made it to Indianapolis by 7:30pm or so and stopped to visit my cousin DW, who lives in a beautiful old house in a historic downtown neighborhood. The three of us enjoyed a dinner of Korean barbecue at Ma Ma's Korean Restaurant, where I may have eaten my weight in meat. The next morning, DW took us to Café Patachou for a delicious breakfast before J and I struck out for Lincoln, NE. I really wish we could have spent more time in Indianapolis--during my last visit, back in 2007, DW took me to Traders Point Creamery and we drove down to West Baden, which was a lot of fun. Next time.

On the way to Lincoln, J and I drove over the Mississippi River at Hannibal, MO and decided to make a quick stop. We had already driven over numerous rivers but this was *the* mighty Mississippi. Truly impressive.

Also, Mark Twain grew up in Hannibal, and the town was having all sorts of Tom Sawyer celebrations during the 4th of July weekend. Unfortunately, we were on too tight of a schedule to check out the festivities. Next time.

Up next: flooding, Lincoln, and the ranch.