Beginning with this entry I plan to cover quite a few topics so I hope you have the patience to bear with me!
Right now I am sitting in a hotel room in Springfield, Missouri waiting for my daughter to finish her final final at Missouri State University so we can head back home. This is her last night in her dorm here because next semester she will be at Lindenwood University, which is right in our home town. I am very excited that she is coming back because the drive down here has gotten very old for everyone. She does it so much that it just seems kind of nuts for her to be so far from home.
We started our journey down here yesterday afternoon, waiting for the morning round of freezing rain to pass. We finally left around 2:00 and hoped to be here by 5:30 or so, driving past endless miles of frozen trees, grass and shrubbery. It was an eerie, yet beautiful sight. Unfortunately, by the time we got to the halfway point, a heavy fog had descended, rain was falling and the temperature was hovering just above freezing. We decided to stop for the night, and pulled into a McDonald’s with wi-fi so we could locate a reasonably priced room in the area. You gotta love technology!
After finding a room, we made a quick run to Wal-Mart because my daughter hadn’t planned on spending the night anywhere but her dorm and she had no clothes, toothbrush or other necessities. Finally, we got comfy at a Waffle House and dove into dinner.
Today we drove through the weirdest stretch of weather I have ever seen. Starting with temps in the sixties and a sunny sky, we got within forty miles of our destination and ran into this huge black wall of a cloud. It looked like the sandstorm scene from The Mummy and totally freaked us out. Within a half mile of entering this cloud, the temperature dropped at least 15 degrees and we were surrounded by gray cottony moisture. The saying here in Missouri is “If you don’t like the weather, wait a bit and it will change.” That was never proven more true to me than it was today!
We spent our day doing some Christmas shopping, eating and jus goofing off. It was a lot of fun getting to hang out with my girl. She is an awesome young lady and I love her to pieces. Tonight I took her and her room mate out to dinner at Lambert’s, famous for its “Throwed Rolls” (www.throwedrolls.com) which was very good. The only bad part is that this place doesn’t take credit/debit cards, and I never carry cash, so that meant a quick run to a local ATM to make a pricey withdrawal! I have to say that it was worth the effort though.
Tomorrow we head back home and I know the journey will be just as much fun on the return trip as it was on the way down, if not more. At least on this trip, there won’t be any studying going on!
So until tomorrow morning, I'm hanging out here in a room of my own, watching what I want to watch, snoring if I want to snore and going to bed whenever the notion strikes me. Heck, I even worked for a few hours! And speaking of working, this hotel is full up with electrical workers who are, I assume, here to repair all the area damage from the ice storms. I wish I had my camera to share a picture of the parking lot! Every space is full of white trucks, some with booms and baskets, some laden with other kinds of equipment. They are everywhere you look, even on the streets around the hotel. It looks like an electrical workers union convention or something! Actually, it reminds me a lot of my Dad who spent 37 years working for our local electic company. I have a soft spot in my heart for the guys here because I know they are going to put in some long hours if they haven't already.
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