Operation Lily Put, Day 4: The dropoff (everything begins with So)

No images in this post because I promised not to post any of the pictures I took today.  So let's put on our imagination caps and read some attempts at 1000 words per image.  If you select the description of the missing image, and do a google image search on it, sometimes it's funny, sometimes it's not funny, sometimes it's haunting.  Don't bother.  Also, this post is much longer and more meandering than most because of the lack of imagery.  You could just skip it if you'd like.  tldr:  Moved in, it was fine.

Picture of the license plate of a Prius

So today was drop-off day at college.  My daughter the freshman is ready.  I'm ready.  While everyone is a little nervous, we've planned for this day for some time, and packed everything needed.  We've made lists and checked off items.  We figured a list of things to pick up beforehand and lists of items to pick up a few weeks later.  Her Mom is coming down to visit her after the gets settled in.  Long story but I think I explained it earlier - both kids move into their dorms on the same day.  The first child is now a senior in college, and if we had been able we would have just rented a $19.95 truck from Home Depot and hired a hobo to drive it to Iowa.  And been proud for the expense.  In our defense, when we moved the first kid to college for freshman year, once all of the boxes got into the room he essentially told us to go away, and then (as far as we know) didn't unpack anything until the week before he had to move out, at which point he unpacked everything and didn't pack it even when we went to pick him up at the end of the year.  Again, I'm not worried about offending that one because they don't read my blogs and that's possibly the wisest thing they've done.

So back to the license plate.  Since Lily had her own car, and we drove it out together (instead of driving her car and our family car out caravan style, which is fine since we didn't want to put the miles on it - and it would have been so much more boring than what actually happened - although I would have had the chance to drive it *back* home on every little back road between the Atlantic and the Mississippi river over the course of, say, 10-15 days.) I ended up dropping her off at college.  When she was dropped off, I had no way to get back to my brother's place 30 minutes away.  (Which, since it's Baltimore, was about 200 yards away)  (One more aside [lie, there will be more] the dear wife had to drive to Iowa with the first born and their girlfriend, then drive alone back home on a 5 hour drive and she doesn't like driving that far even with someone else in the car to entertain her.  But ended up taking an awesome walk by a river on the way home that was better than my swear-infused walk through a confusing campus.)

Anyhoo, since I had no way of getting back to his place, my brother let me borrow their Prius.  Which was really quite considerate of him.  Especially since he let me drive his car when he was overseas with the Army in the 1990's and I ended up losing half the hubcabs and more, but let's not talk about that.  It was really nice of him.  And I'm much older and wiser now, so it seemed less risky.  Back to the anyhoo, I had never driven a Prius before.  After a brief about how it works (press on, then drive) I followed Lily to the Target near her school.  We needed supplies.

So my review of a Prius is this:  I learned a lot about myself today.  Apparently I have a heavy right foot and floor the accelerator whenever I come off a stop.  I guess I knew that, but today really solidified it.  You know how you're going to take a left turn and you have to wait for traffic to clear, and then you take a nice calm left turn and go on about your business?  It's not that I *didn't* do that, it's just that I often just floor it and wedge myself between two cars going 45 mph in the direction I'm going.  With the Mazda (zoom zoom) wagon and the Mazda truck (groom groom) it's not that bad, and with the new Vespa I can really get flying from a stop.  Not so much with a Prius.  I was driving very carefully but the first thing I noticed is that it doesn't have a ton of pickup.  The dash said I was in "eco mode" which I'm guessing means it drives like an ordinary sane person but I'm not.  So I got used to the very calm, very environmentally friendly manner in which it comes off the line.  I'd like to think I saved the lives of a number of dolphins today.  But I was impressed at it's ability to move on the highway at the same speed as normal vehicles, and the satellite radio was kind of nice to have.  Although it did cut out a few times and I don't know if it was the settings or the fact that only Boomers use satellite radio anymore, but the only stations I could find were 1970's album alternatives.  I don't mind Steely Dan, Christopher Cross, or Cat Stevens, but not so much grooving on Dionne Warwick.  It's a generational thing.

 I took a picture of the license plate when I got to Target so I could find it in the sea of Prii parked there when we were done.  Not sure if that's the proper plural, but it is now.  Oh and who the HELL decided to make a Target where the parking aisles are DEAD ENDS?  I could get the Prius turned around just fine, but the giant SUVs around me were having much more problems dealing.  Ended up finding a spot right by the door.  Win!

Picture of a father and his daughter trying to find twin sheets at a Target (NOT SuperTarget) next to a college on freshman move-in day.

So I met her at the Target.  I purposefully did not wear a red polo today, because I've accidentally worn a red shirt to Target before and we won't talk about the interactions with strangers that that caused.  I did however neglect to realize that a "Salmon" shirt is pretty close to red and the regular employees have been pushing the "red shirt" rule for some years now.  So waiting inside the entrance because the weather outside was crazy hot and humid, I felt very conspicuous and worried that someone would ask me for a cart, or where humidifiers were found.

She finally showed up and we got on with our shopping.  Due to my memory issues, I used a mnemonic to remember the five things I needed to get today in addition to her list.  Mask, Masher, More Power, Mueller, and Mousse.  Since the only mask I have on this trip is a very colorful "ships in bottles" pattern, I kinda wanted a plain black mask so I could be a little more subtle at the college.  I also was told by all of the females in my family that I needed a steamer for the wrinkled shirts I pull out of my luggage.  That's a "wrinkle Masher".  Since the daughter stole my Power Cell Phone Charger Brick thing, I needed a replacement* as "more power" for my phone, and I also needed some different hair product because the travel sized "cream" product I bought last week was not working for me at all.  The final M, Mueller, is the last name of the friend who lent us an iPass toll transponder, and I needed to remember to get that out of the daughter's car.  I promptly forgot the last two M's and spent most of our visit at Target trying to remember them.  Sometimes I feel like I have dementia, but without the relief of being placed in a memory unit.  Happily I got everything except the mask.  Back in Minneapolis every third aisle is a collection of masks for sale, and Target bags since we charge $.05 for every plastic bag.  Apparently the masking rules aren't as strict in Maryland, so no masks were to be found, and we ended up getting a Dolphin killing amount of plastic bags to contain our purchases.  So much for the Prius eco saving mode.

Also, shopping for Twin sized sheets at a Target directly adjacent to a college on move-in day was not probably the wisest move.  Lily even saw someone she thought she followed on Instagram among the many, many families of college children, concerned mothers and disinterested fathers.  We did end up getting most of what she needed, including silverware, spatula and measuring cups.  Should have thought of trash can, but who's perfect?

Time was going well until she pointed out that we had 15 minutes to check out and get to campus.  My decision to leave my digital watch on Central time was not a wise one.  It all worked out in the end, even if she wanted me to help her to her car with her cart.  I think she was just nervous and wanted me to hang out more.

* It's more than you need to know, but I forgot my phone charger in her car last night, so I got smart and plugged the phone into my laptop via USB for the overnight, thinking I was a genius and it would continue to charge like it said it was charging but it didn't.  So I woke up two hours early to a very strange pattern of vibrations and found out what it's like to have a phone at 0% charge.  Apparently the Prius blows a fuse if you main line USB power to a phone, so I really needed another way to get the phone working.  See the previous note on not having a working phone/data connection for the amount of pain I was in.  But the lack of confidence in the phone meant I didn't sleep much in those last two hours, and ended up with about 4 hours sleep.  Good base for a hard day.

Picture of the daughter at her car

So one of the concerns was that we were bringing her car on campus as well as the Prius, and we were worried the strict guards at the gatehouse would deny me access, and talked about all of the different Uber options, street parking, or leaving the car at the Target and sneaking through the woods to get on campus.  Turns out it wasn't an issue, big shock.  When we met in the parking lot and got ready to go check her in, I took a picture of her getting out of her car and joked that I would be livestreaming the whole event.  She didn't think that was funny.

She did get pretty quiet, and I talked to her about being nervous, and we worked together to allay any fears she had.  I have to say I couldn't blame her.  She was going into a foreign environment, not knowing anyone, being surrounded by other kids and their nervous families who were moving in for the first time, and the student volunteers were really quite extra.  One of them was cheering with pompoms for every car coming on campus.

She got checked in well, but at one point they made it clear parents had to wait awkwardly outside the registration hall.  It was about 900 degrees and the humidity was near 100%, so I hung out with a bunch of other parents working on our sweat patterns and trying to look aloof while not sitting on any of the benches - which were in the sun. 

Picture of a WHOLE BUNCH of boxes in front of a dorm

So after getting checked in, identified and issued a "guest pass" for me (we were supposed to turn it in after we were done, but I kept mine. For the amount of money we were paying I figured earned a souvenir.  And it wasn't numbered or anything, so if someone comes up short on the guess pass count, it can't be traced back to us.)

They made the campus a one way loop (more on that later) and we were to pull up in front of the dorm where a crew of very energetic volunteers would help us unload.  Now, for the first kid's college experience, we got to drive on sidewalks, and when we pulled up a whole Lacrosse or Jai Lai team of students converged on the car, grabbed boxes, and took them up to his room.  In this case we ended up with an awkward Ginger guy with a cardboard box on a set of wheels.  Luckily, my order was to help unload the car and then drive it back to the parking lot and then come back and help carry things.  Second stroke of good luck - you know that whole "one way loop around campus" thing?  Turns out the loop took me into some of the very beautiful and serene forests of this campus, past hammocks and lounging students, past impressive buildings and such, right past a security vehicle and out the back gate.  On city streets, at least 90 degrees off the main gate (again) so I had to drive around and come back on campus.  While that seemed a bit off-putting, it absolutely assisted me in taking enough time for the task that I didn't end up carrying anything up to her third floor room.

When I did find her she led me up to the room but in passing the ginger guy he waved and she waved back.  She had now started her college career and the only person she knows is essentially a Weasley who likely didn't have anything better to do that day.  Could be worse.  Could be a Jai Lai jock.

Picture of an annoyed 18 year old in a dorm room with the same boxes but spread everywhere, while avoiding having the roommate or her mother in the picture

So while I waited I added a couple more layers of sweat to my already fatherly moistness, but once we got inside it was a Very Cool air conditioned dorm.  We got up to her floor, but in the elevator I asked if she'd seen the communal bathroom yet and she said she hadn't.

Think about it.  You've never really been away from family for more than a couple days, and now you're a literal 1,000 miles from home, know absolutely nobody except a budget version of Ron Weasley, and you don't even know what the bathroom you're going to be using for the next 9 months is like.  Much less the showers, the laundry, the cafeteria or even - crap we forgot about this - the classes!  I have so much respect for anyone going off to college now, or ever.  Makes dropping out twice seems fairly easy in comparison, even if I had to go to Marine Corps boot camp to avoid the wrath of my parents finding out.

Picture of the daughter hanging fairy lights while the suitcase with all of her clothes is left unpacked by the bed

So as I said, when we dropped the first kid off it was literally a dropoff.  Right into the void of "college" without any idea how anything was going to play out.  So it was rough.  Ugly sobbing in the car at a state park, but that's another story.  (This might be the only time I don't go off on a tangent, mostly because I can't remember if I already have on previous days.  Considering it your next birthday and Christmas present combined.)  For this one, we're so confident of her ability to deal with the experience, and we know we'll see her again, etc.   So it's less scary and more exciting.  But the best part was that she let me help her unpack!  Her roomie's mom was assembling shelves, and they were going a mile a minute setting things up, so the fact that we just had a wire shoe rack to assemble and a couple of bins of sweaters to unpack made me a little nervous.  But as it turned out we were really a good team, and I helped as much as I could.  It was nice to be able to turn a Target bag into a trash bag and pile all the cardboard boxes up knowing I wasn't going to have to throw anything out or find recycling.  Welcome to the rest of your life dear daughter.

So it was moderately chaotic, but we managed to make her bed, set up her stuff, and she even got to work setting up things like fairy lights, and putting her place settings in a drawer.  Then moving them to another drawer.  And then back to the original drawer.  I was just happy to be there and help.  And be in air conditioned space.  What I sussed about the roomie was that she was a Dungeons and Dragons nerd, wanted to pack 120 books but settled on a dozen five inch thick volumes, and her talk about being into making pancakes wasn't just talk.  Lily has everything you need to make pancakes and serve them to three people.  Her roommate had more than that.  They'll get along just fine!

Eventually Lily hinted that it was time for me to leave and I gave her a good sweaty hug and we talked about her schedule for the next day or so.  She thought she might make lunch with us tomorrow, but as it turns out it's not likely, but maybe tomorrow night.  I'm due to leave on Monday, but as it happens there's a hurricane approaching my sister's place, so I might have to delay that trip due to loss of power and imminent wind death.  We'll see though, as I love me a good weather trauma.  I think it's likely I'll get to see my daughter before I leave though.  My wife is coming in a couple of weeks once Lily gets settled in, and I think she's getting the better end of the deal, although I think COVID will keep her from being able to see the dorm.  But Lily's so much more likely to be chilled out by then.

Update:  No, she won't make lunch tomorrow, but is getting along famously with her roomie, has already made some friends, and is happily exhausted.

Missing:  Picture of me getting an iced Latte at a Starbucks drive through

So as I mentioned, when I dropped the first kid off there was anxiety and sobbing and bitterness and hours spent looking at his location on google maps caressing my phone saying "oh he's in his dorm he's ok I wonder if he remembers my name."  This time I spent a moment lookup up a Starbucks with a drive through and enjoying my drive into Baltimore.  I seriously love my daughter, but have so much more confidence and understanding about what's going on this time.  It was a good Latte, BTW.

So hurricane Henri is heading to my sister's place, and that might make the rest of my trip crazy, but the stress is off on the dropoff, and it's time to just settle in and enjoy hanging out with my siblings and their families.  I drove the Prius back to my brother's place, no issues or incidents.  Do I offer some D cell batteries instead of filling the gas tank?

Missing:  38 pictures of me chasing a toddler for an hour

So Lily was winning the "who can win over the toddler" contest by the time she left, but I was determined to make an impression.  I brought a stuffed Snowy the dog from the Tintin series, and hoped that would win her over.  She eventually warmed to it, counted it and an Elsa doll a number of times, and shoved it into the hen's area of a Little People barn.   But didn't really stop carrying it around.  Which was awesome.  My brother had to go into work saving the world, and his wife was on an all-day video conference, so they asked me if I wouldn't mind watching the toddler for a bit.

So I've helped raise two kids who at various times have been more than a handful.  So how hard could it be entertaining a beautiful and fun little girl?  Well, apparently it's been a few decades since I've chased high metabolism energy around a room for an hour.  Holy crap that was a lot of work!  But I didn't break the baby and by the end of it I could get a fist bump or a high five, but I think a hug may take more than a stuffed dog and all the cheerios she can eat (and feed the real dog.)  But I'm determined to be a fun uncle, so we'll see.  When Mom came back from her video call, she minded the baby like a seasoned veteran, and I wondered how it could be done so easily!  

Missing:  Picture of me drinking late into the night with my brother and his wife only to find out it was 9pm when we called it quits

So we had a great dinner, my brother finally got home from frantic work, and we had a lovely evening.  I got some serious quality time with my sister-in-law, and then some great story telling time with her and my brother.  We played "oh yeah, well here's an even better story" about our times in the military in Korea, and I got to try a sidecar for the first time.  Lemon margarita, pretty much.  Tasty!  His wife called it a day and he and I spent a long time still telling stories and enjoying the nostalgia of a shared experience at different times in our careers.  By the time we'd finished out cocktails, it was time to call it a night.  I thought I was reading my watch wrong, but it turned out it was only 9pm.  Which to my time zone clock was actually only 8.  So I went to my very wonderful guest room, turned on the computer and wrote way too many words about a very short day.  Think I'm going to go back and edit this and fix spelling mistakes?  Guess again.  Write to you tomorrow!

Total words: 3,756 - so only imagine 3.75 images.

Operation Lily Put, Day 3: Pennsylvania, Maryland

We left Pittsburgh early-ish.  Ok, early adjacent.  Fine, but it was before noon!  After a stop at an awesome Starbucks for breakfast foods and an earworm of a Blur song, we headed into the city.

We agonized over the route we would take from Pittsburgh to Maryland, but to be honest there wasn't much debate.  We both wanted to see cool scenery, maybe a covered bridge, and if at any time we felt it was time to hit a superhighway and boogie, they were nearby.  We settled on Highway 30, which was also the Lincoln Highway.  Some day I would love to drive it from New York to San Francisco, but until then I'll have to settle for sections.  The first kid's college is on a stretch of it, both original and the superhighway that bypassed all the small towns it runs through in Iowa.  I just love the romance of a road that goes all the way across the country in a time when doing that drive was not a common occurrence.  When I do the whole thing I want to do it in a Model-T or on an Indian motorcycle.  And I want a mechanic to follow me with parts and knowledge, as I would be helpless repairing either vehicle.  (Let's go all the way off track and mention I've been listen to the audiobook version of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, all 5,433,422-some hours of it.  It's a great read but the author distinguishes between those who know how a vehicle works and can fix it, and the people who just love the idea of riding the vehicle and the moment it stops working they're completely lost.  I am of the latter group.  On our long distance scooter rides I had a friend who had the same model scooter, and if anything went wrong he always knew how to fix it or how badly I was screwed.)

We did get to go through a tunnel (under a neighborhood, Lily pointed out) and get boxed in by some trucks.  It was fun though, and I did notice there were "exit" doors available in case of an emergency.  Where they dumped you out is anybody's guess, as we were deep under a whole bunch of earth. 

Also, the night before I had commented that Pittsburgh must have a strange experience when it comes to drinking and driving.  Sober in the daylight it was difficult enough to navigate - I can't imagine someone who was drunk at night could get more than a few hundred yards before running aground.  The proliferation of DUI lawyer signs says otherwise, but I still thought it interesting.

I had planned for the route to at least give us a vista of downtown Pittsburgh, though I wasn't sure Lily would appreciate it.  When we did come out of the tunnel to this view:

I think Lily audibly gasped.  It was a really great view, and it popped nicely after the tunnel.  We skirted downtown on the highway and got to see some big buildings, river (and riverboats!) and some interesting neighborhoods of Pittsburgh.

I was still in my "got to sell the scenery" mode when we headed out of town on a state highway, stoplights and all.  Of course Lily was up for it - she's a trooper!  She said she would drive on a road like that all the time, as it's interesting and not just a boring set of lanes through trees.  

We saw lots of interesting businesses, and were assured that if we needed a tattoo or any part of a vehicle repaired ("ALL ELECTRICAL THINGS") we were in the right place.  Occasionally we would see a sign that we thought was interesting and call it out.  So many times in a sea of signs we would both be drawn to the same sign, and cheer it together in unison, unplanned.  One of the best was a hairdresser called "Do or Dye" - Lily thought the Dye pun was awesome, but after a moment I pointed out that the "Do" could be short for "Hairdo" and that was even better.  We were both impressed, and somewhere in the world is someone who chuckles every once in a while for having thought that up.

Our next amusement has me a bit conflicted.  A number of years ago the whole family took a roadtrip from flyover country down to New Orleans.  It was an epic roadtrip, and some of us enjoyed the many miles more than others.  But one of the things we took back from the trip was that Eli and I had a running joke about the "Bridge Ices Before Road" signs that were all over the place.  We'll still mention it at some random time and laugh.

So Lily and I picked up the same joke.  We just saw so many of those signs!  Initially we'd point it out, but after a while we'd ask each other "wait, which one ices first" or "is it the road or the bridge that ices first?" and on and on.  So now I have the same inside joke with each kid.  If either of them reads this blog I'll be in trouble.  That reminds me, Lily wants a link to this blog.  Maybe I'll give her "https://www.atlasobscura.com/" and say I'm really prolific at writing about interesting roadside things..

Neither of my kids are troublemakers.  Lily especially so.  In high school she had friends who drink, who smoke, who get high, etc.  The more she saw the less she wanted to be in on it - though not judging her friends, those things aren't for her.  A crucial element is the fact that she goes rock climbing competitively, on a team at our local club, and just for fun.  Because of this she's in phenomenal shape, even if her hands are like sandpaper.  I think it's the fact that any of the above vices would be echo'd back directly to her performance really motivates her not to try them.  That said, she *is* going off to college, so we'll see.  

She does have one minor vice, and that's energy.  She'll drink a Red Bull or sometimes even a 5 Hour Energy when she's on a long drive, or wants to stay up even later than adolescent dusk, which I think it about midnight or 1am.  So she grabbed a blueberry Red Bull out of her bag and tried it for the first time.  Normally she likes the diet because it's less sweet.  I can't remember exactly how she described it but the phrases "and the stem of a tomato" and "like a flavored V-8" were definitely used.  I got a great video of her fake (or not) gagging on it and laughing.  Enjoy this stillframe:

We also, unsurprisingly, saw a lot of "now hiring" signs.  Like, a whole lot of them.  Everywhere.  No matter the job, you can have a shot at it.  So every time we saw a "hiring" sign we called it out.  There was a lot of calling out on this trip.

Eventually we cleared the city and suburbs and exurbs and ruralburbs and got to hit some hills and see some vistas.  I took a billion pictures, but none of them really capture the depth, color, beauty and awe of the actual view.  So here's just one:

As you may recall, we wanted to see a real covered bridge, after seeing so many license plates with the image highlighted.  So I did some googling and found one not too far off the Lincoln Highway.  So at the appointed time we turned off the main road and headed into nowhere land.  It was much nicer than the movies would have you think.  We did not see hillbilly's with banjos, nor did we see endless sprawls of decrepit barns and dead vehicles.  Lawns were neatly mowed for the most part, animals looked healthy, corn was abundant, and more often than not people waved at us driving by, without us even starting the social interaction.

Among the interesting back country scenery we came upon a cemetery.  Hello Wikipedia:

The word cemetery (from Greek κοιμητήριον, "sleeping place") implies that the land is specifically designated as a burial ground and originally applied to the Roman catacombs. The term graveyard is often used interchangeably with cemetery, but a graveyard primarily refers to a burial ground within a churchyard.

The first child was fascinated by the local cemetery (every time I type that I get closer to knowing how to spell it) and spent hours walking it and looking at graves while enjoying the nature and quiet found in the middle of the city.  This is how I learned the difference between the two, and to be honest I don't think I'd seen a proper graveyard yet.  So when we came upon a cemetery looking area, with not only an associated church, but a second church across the way, I was thrilled to witness a true graveyard!

No street view, but here is the google satellite image.   

What are those black things?  Mennonite buggies?

  

Sadly, the arched entrance named it as a cemetery:  

I know you're getting used to going off topic, so let me tell you about the coffeetable book I want to create some day - or maybe some work of fiction.

Driving to and from Iowa from Minnesota I get bored of the main highway.  You should know this by now.  So when nobody else is with me and I can have my way with the map, I end up on some tiny lonely backroads.  Many of them have little hamlets along the way, and the vast majority of them have a cemetery.  (Not a graveyard, as previously mentioned.)

Almost every cemetery has a fence around it and a beautiful (or simple, or both) gateway with a name on it.  I think about the job of the travelling salesman back at the turn of the previous century, and how they used to sell all manner of things.  And in these cases, I'm guessing there was someone going from town to town checking the cemetery, and if it didn't have an archway, or the archway wasn't customized, these sales people - and in my story it's just one lonely soul - and sell a gate order to the town fathers.

 In my story the lonely salesman falls in love with some town's mayor's daughter, and after some sort of misadventure ends up settling down and marrying her.  Or I could just be lazy and take pictures of a bunch of them, throw them in a glossy book and sell it at Barnes & Noble in the discount section that has coffee table books.  Can't be any less worthy than "Barns of Rural Pennsylvania" or "Classic Cars and their owner's dogs."  Please don't steal my idea or I'll haunt you like the bitter spirit of one of the people buried in a cemetery whose town father's decided not to get the pretty gate.

After that high minded, romanticized bit about cemeteries and the people who manage them, enjoy this bit of ten year old humor in the name of one of the roads we had to turn on:

After not enough miles of roads through fields and forests like these..

Crossing this beautiful little stream..

We found the Glessner bridge, built in 1881.  We drove over it but the video of that was too big, and I can't be bothered to put it on YouTube.  Just imaging driving through this bridge, but without the family taking a picture of their daughter and dog:

We were both too timid to interrupt, go past them, etc.  I did, however, against the advice of my daughter, go get a picture of their jeep.  The spare tire said "Gone Squatchin'" and it had a fun logo on the side.  This is the jeep I aspire to own one day.  Bonus for having orange highlights.  (We had actually been following them and I was bummed I couldn't get a picture when we turned off for the bridge, but as it turned out they took the long way and we took the quick way, so we did get a private moment with the bridge.)

Back on the Lincoln Highway, we actually passed the Flight 93 National Memorial, but didn't see any signs, so had no idea to check it out.  Next time.

From then on pretty much every corner we turned there was another breathtaking view.  The roads were smooth and empty, and we felt like the only people in the world.  I think it was the best way to see the hills of Pennsylvania.

Some rather intimidating signs here and there either warning you of the dangers of the road, or goading you into taking even more roads through the hills.  Very cool!

Time was wearing on, and by the time the roads got busier and we saw more and more national chain restaurants and stores, we decided to call it a magical day and hit the superhighways for our destination.  Again, great driving habits of the local citizenry meant trucks on the right, passers on the left, and everyone was doing at least 15 over the 70 mph speed limit.  

When we saw the first sign for Baltimore the idea of driving 124 miles seemed like the home stretch, when it's actually a longer distance than that to our family cabin back home.  But after 1100 miles you get cocky about more mileage.

We caught the "Welcome to Maryland" sign, and you're going to have to trust me on that as the below image doesn't really look very clear.  But we got it!

At this point we were both ready to be done driving, and quite excited about the days to come that the speed went up and the time flew by.  Lily did all the driving today and that was fine by me - yesterday burned me out a bit.  1100 miles and we only listened to music in the last hour or two, and that was just the new Lorde album, and her previous two albums.  Not bad for 24ish hours driving across half the country!  It's a testament to the fun we had driving, chatting, and exploring the half of our country from the Mississippi river to the Atlantic Ocean.

We finally got to my brother's house and the girl cousins got to see each other after way too many months.  We had a great dinner (Pizza!) and sat around chatting with my brother, sister-in-law, and niece, though in Lily's case it involved lots of running around after a toddler and playing "peek a boo" to hear her giggle.  Both hers giggling.  A good way to end an amazing journey incident free!

Again, too tired to edit, check for mistakes and spelling.  Tomorrow is a big day!

Operation Lily Put, Day 2: Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania

A slow start to the day, a trip to Casey's to get some breakfast snacks, and we were on the road!  We knew this was going to be a long, boring day.  I was looking for any excuse to take pictures or see something interesting.. anything!

We came upon a truck and I noticed it was a car carrier.  Not so much the kind with the shiny new vehicles on it, but a flatbed with a collection of cubes that used to be cars before they got compacted!  If you look closely, you can see a reflection of me squint you can see a tire sticking out on the right hand side of the image.

I do have to say one of the best things I've seen so far is a many laned highway that restricts trucks to the right hand two lanes.  So nice not to have to wait while two trucks have an "elephant race" lumbering past one another while those of us with only 4 wheels form a long line behind them.  It doesn't solve the problem of the white minivan that camps in the left lane, but the further east we go, the more people keep right and pop out to the left land just to pass.

The day before we'd started seeing these funny beehive shaped buildings.  I think I probably saw these before and just forgot, but we had to look it up.  They're for storing salt and sand for the street crews in the winter.  I think they're a little bosom-y, myself.  Once we got into Ohio we stopped seeing them.

Oh and another thing about Indiana..  The license plates have a covered bridge on them, and it took us a little bit of time to figure that out.  We didn't really have time to find a covered bridge, but I'm betting (hoping) that Pennsylvania has one or two, and we'll have a lot more time on Friday to go tilting windmills and looking for old bridges.  BTW, the bridge in Madison County was burned down due to arson in 2002.  So they rebuilt it.  And then it got burned down again in 2017.  Someone must really hate that movie.  Jill and I saw it in a drive in theater along with Free Willy 2:  The revenge but I don't remember much of it, we were still just dating back then.

And just when we thought Indiana couldn't get any more boring, we get walls on the side of the highway.  So we couldn't even look at the trees and barns on repeat.   Luckily it didn't last very long.  I think it was mostly on the Fort Wayne bypass.

So yeah, we didn't take the direct route that goes straight across easterly, through Cleveland and such.  It had more construction, and I wanted to avoid large cities, and to be honest it didn't sound fun at all.  So I played the "this route is only 10 minutes longer" (but you repeat it six times and now you're an hour slower) game.  When we go to the cabin if Jill is sleeping I can do that and stretch the drive out by another 45 minutes or so, but I get to go through tiny little towns and look at interesting old abandoned buildings.  In those towns.  Times are tough in Wisconsin.

Turns out Lily and I share a common love not just for driving, but for going off the beaten path a bit.  Every time I suggested something different, she was up for it -- and a few times she thought of the best way to not be efficient in our route planning.  So I'm going to find a covered bridge for her if it means looping back into Ohio.

We saw an amusing van that Lily described as having antlers.  I was noticing the arm out the window holding something fabric and flapping it about.  We decided it had to be a baseball hat, likely drying the sweat out.  Good old Gutter Dan and his companion, whatshisname.  When we finally passed Gutter Dan and company, I took a look at the driver.  Turns out Dan's an older gentleman, and wasn't wearing a shirt.  Oh and had the window open.

It's been stupid hot on this trip so far and crazy humid as well.  High 80's or more, and just not comfortable.  And yet we see so many cars on and off the highway driving with the windows open.  I remember doing that in the 70's because Dad was too cheap to get an air conditioner in the orange (did you know it was international strikethrough day today?  Well it is now.) saddle tan 1976 Dodge Aspen.

But don't all cars come with air conditioning now?  I suppose not.  I'm thinking that might be my most bougie statement of the day.  But I can't imagine that makes for much of a comfortable ride, though it's better than no air conditioner and closed windows..

More hours and more Indiana.  They did have some kick ass windmills though.  They seemed much, much larger than the windmills we have back home.  See the corn, too?  So much corn.  Great, you've got corn.

But then Ohio happened -- and we got a picture of the welcome sign!  Want to know what Ohio looked like?  Indiana.  And corn.

We stopped at the rest area mentioned in the above picture.  Standard fare, pretty clean, nice picnic pavilion, and..  so much corn.

  I had a call with my therapist in the late afternoon so I was looking for a town with a park.  Settled on Wooster, Ohio.  It's actually got something like 4 exits, so it's of moderate size.  And Lily knocked it out of the park, so to speak, in finding me a park in which to have my call.  Huge park with an amazing view:  

Not a bad place to get your head shrunk!

and beautiful scenery, except many (like, MANY) of the trees had Lord Of The Rings scale spider web clumps in them.  The size of footballs, sure to be holding billions of scary monsters.

The rest of the park had wildflowers, and nice benches, and these amazing paths that smelled like ValleyFaire when it opened in the 1970's.  Can't recommend it enough.  Although I can't remember the name of the park, because it's in Wooster Ohio and you're never going to go there on purpose.

But something amazing happened when we got to Wooster.  Elevation changes!  Curves in roads!  Interesting things outside the car windows!  It changed everything.  Yes, we were tired, but this felt like we were getting somewhere.  I had to remind myself a number of times that we were still only in Ohio, but it felt much, much less like being in the Midwest and another place like home but with different graphics. 

Yet another side note:   Lily is so awesome at being the right amount of curious!  We would see something like a billboard with a "your ad here" message on it, and we'd both thought to wonder how much that would be.  So a full sized billboard is called a "bulletin" and it's 2-3k for four weeks.  A smaller one is called something else but I forgot, go google it.  But they're like $900 for four weeks.  No matter who was driving, the other one of us was always ready to do a quick search and learn the answer to our curiosities.  But not too much -- just enough to satisfy.

We also started to see Amish folk in great numbers.  Like there was an invisible line they weren't allowed to live west of - as evidenced by the fact that when I'm in Minnesota and Iowa, I might see one or two, but never too many in a single trip.  This was like a convention!  Horse poop on the side of all the roads, people in a wide variety of buggies, and even Amish people walking horseless on the side of the road.  I expect we'll see more in Pennsylvania, traversing covered bridges we hope.  But I've never ever seen one on a horse.  Do they not do that?  For Rumspringa do kids ride ponies at the fair?

We did continue to see beautiful skies and majestic clouds.  And hills!  So many hills!

At some point (again, I could look it up but don't want to.  Go figure our route and look at a map and suss out what I'm talking about - the name ended with " dam") we came upon a man-made lake, with huge towering hills around, and occasionally the road would jet across a section splitting the lakes apart.  I was reminded of the TV series Ozark.  You should watch it, but it's really dark so don't if you don't like that.  And by dark I mean scary, but also filmed so dark you have to watch it under a blanket in order to be able to see anything.  I kept thinking about all of the towns and homes and cemeteries and things like that who were flooded out to make the lake.  I felt bad for the poor "second nation" folks who were driven from their homeland - that they got by driving the first nation folks out.  It's still pretty eerie.

We could see deer in the hills, either in fields or edges of trees, but way high up in the hills.  It was very cool, but also fun to see them not just on the side of the road, dead or alive.

I had noticed this the night before when researching the route - but we were going to go through West Virginia!  (mountain momma, take me home) and that was going to bump our state count for the day up to four!  We were in WV for literally 5 minutes before popping into..

Pennsylvania!  And we got all three new states' signage recorded for posterity!

After a beautiful sunset that lasted for hours, it got dark and we found our way into Pittsburgh.  How the HELL did they live there before google maps?  It's up and down and sideways and crazy all over the place.  Even with the map, the instructions, and a line literally showing me where to go there were a bunch of times that I had to slow down just to see where the road might be.  Oh and I'm going to start a collection for more streetlights in Pittsburgh and the surrounding areas.  They have some, but none of them are anywhere near the curves, many of which are 90 and more degree turns.

So a good friend made a suggestion for hotels in Pittsburgh, and we were super jazzed about it.  But I didn't want to make a reservation last night, because I didn't know for sure that we would make it to Pittsburgh, and the reservations were non refundable.  So of course when we did the "Lily, make us a reservation 30 minutes before we walk in the door" trick that's worked so well for us the one time we've used it, they were sold out.  But she found a Crown something that was inexpensive, really kinda nice, and in a big box store and parking lot factory, so less fear someone would break into her car and steal all her stuff.  Not that they would want any of it.  No offense to her, but college kids who haven't even colleged yet don't have anything of value.  Except cash and checks from cards - and when we got done eating, she went to work and cranked out a ton of personalized thank you notes.  Better late than never.

When we checked into the hotel the clerk noted my surname deficiency, but also loved my Discover card - it's an image of an old cassette.  The clerk in Valpo commented on it as well.  We asked the Pittsclerk what the food options in the area were and he listed all of the boring chain restaurants you can find anywhere.  We ended up deciding to have someone deliver some Arby's, but that was complicated so we just drive to the drive-through window and brought some back to the hotel.  It was gone within minutes.  When we were in Baltimore checking out colleges last year we had no option for food except delivery, so we had Subway meatball sandwiches delivered.  It was the most expensive Subway order of my life, but at 2 in the morning they were so good!

Tomorrow is a shorter driving day, and we intend to make it a much longer drive than it needs to be.  Covered bridges, actual mountains, Amish, etc.  Can't wait -- but can't keep my eyes open anymore.  It's a good kind of tired.  Not even going to go back and fix the typos.

Operation Lily Put, Day 1: Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana

After a morning of alternating calm and furious packing, we were finally ready to go.  In true Minnesota goodbye style, we said all of our goodbyes the night before, then this morning in the living room, then again on the porch, and finally on the front lawn with some pictures.  It was a tone of excitement rather than just weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Photos were taken, goodbyes said again, and apparently I was in the way of a proper picture.  How was I to know?

When we finally got on the road, we were chatty and thrilled to be beginning the trip.  I managed to get an artistic black and white selfie on I-94 just after we got on that highway.  We would end our day on the same road, so many hours later.

One of my promises for the travelogue was to take a picture of every "welcome to" state sign.  The first I got crossing over the St. Croix river into Wisconsin.  It's a bit blurry, but it's so much better than the pictures for Illinois and Indiana, because I didn't get those.  

Interesting aside:  The story I told the kids when they were little, when they were bigger, and endlessly repeated even these days whether they like it or not.  It's the story of the Welcome to Wisconsin signs.  You know how they're always made out of that wood?  It's because back in the days before states, Wisconsin was ruled by a king.  He was a cranky king and didn't like people from other lands, so he build a giant wall around Wisconsin.  When it finally became a state, they did away with the king and the wall as well.  They took parts of the wall and built welcoming signs with them.  So when you see those signs, you're seeing a reminder of the past.  (I didn't really mean for it to be a political yarn, but I can see the similarities now..)  When I told the story to the kids so many times going to the cabin, I could stretch that shaggy dog story out for 20 minutes, easily.

We've seen enough of western Wisconsin to want to take pictures, or even to mention it.  

A stop in Tomah to get some Subway handed to us at the car - the Subway minion chastised us for using the wrong side of the parking lot for our pickup, and we promised next time we were there we would do it the right way.  (Spoiler:  We'll never be there again.)

When we got to the Wisconsin Dells, it got interesting again.  We hadn't actually been into the main tourist zone of the Dells before, so made a quick trip to check it out.  Took about a block of t-shirt shops and Ripley's Believe It Or Not! locations before Lily tagged out.  I took the wheel and we headed on back roads to our next destination.  But before and during the Dells we kept seeing signs for "Ghost Boat" and every time we saw one Lily would announce it excitedly.  Turns out it's only at night, being a ghost boat and all, so we couldn't take that tour.  There's money and time saved right there.

We had been told of a ferry that was fun to cross the river on - and it was free!  So we made for Merrimac (past Baraboo and the actual Circus Museum!  There is a cemetery there and I guessed there was more than one clown buried there..) and got in line.  A short wait later we were on the ferry and crossing the river.  We had to work pretty hard to not cross the river on an actual bridge getting there - I think it's existence is now a novelty.  Gift shops and ice cream stands available on both sides of the river. 

So strange to be behind the wheel of a car, not steering or accelerating, yet moving.  But it was a really cool side trip, and if we're ever back that way again we may try it again.  Or not, because...

The moment we got to the other side, our cell phone data dropped off.  So some amount of time was spent happily wandering the back roads of Sauk county trying to find either a major highway or a cell signal.  Eventually Lily's phone caught a signal and we were back on track.  I found the experience of not being connected to the world of data quite unsettling.  How on Earth did we live without a 24x7 connection to cat memes?

A long day of driving the same superhighway, glancing off Milwaukee and then bypassing Chicago, we were surprised by both the Welcome to Illinois *and* the Welcome to Indiana signs.  Didn't even see the Illinois sign.  And we crossed into Indiana so seemingly quickly I really didn't understand where on the planet I was anymore.   I thought we were still west of Chicagoland, but apparently bypassing it is so boring you miss everything leading up to signs for Gary Indiana.

We did actually stop once at the first Oasis we came across, for comfort stations and some caffeine at a Dunkin' Donuts that was out of donuts.  Lily slept through the mess that was Milwaukee highways, and she really didn't miss anything.  Except that damn white minivan that kept changing into the wrong lane, slowing down and speeding up randomly, and just in general causing me emotional distress.

By the time we rolled into Valparaiso Indiana, or Valpo as the locals call it, the sun was setting and the clouds were enormous and beautiful.  I've always been in love with the ocean, and the sheer magnitude of it inspires and excites me.  Coming back to the Midwest I miss that feeling, but once in a while I see clouds that make me feel like I'm looking at an Ocean.  The clouds of Indiana did not disappoint.  I think it's the flatness and size of the sky, but for an hour or more before sunset we were treated to some amazing giant white puffy cloud collections.   The picture doesn't do it justice.

I was tired and tired of being in a car, so we checked into the hotel, chilled for an hour or so, and headed off to a late dinner.  Lily had a friend from her summer job that went to school in Valpo and had some suggestions for food.  Stacks was the best reviewed restaurant around, and did not disappoint.  It's a library themed joint, and had not only an amazing menu of food, but a beer list that would take years to get through.  (Funny - we were sat in the bar side of the restaurant initially, until Lily got carded for getting a Diet Coke.  The waitress was seriously freaked out when she found out they'd sat a minor in the bar area.  So she moved us to another table about 30 feet away.  Crime solved.)

There was even an interesting tidbit about the bar woodwork, captured on the menu below.  No, I'm not going to transcribe it because I'm too tired and you're lucky to get as much as you did.   Lily got amazing looking pasta and I got a burger with meat the size of a small steak - pink.  So good!  We left fat and happy with leftover boxes that I'm sure we'll forget in the mini fridge in the hotel.  

Tomorrow is Valpo to Pittsburgh, roughly the same number of miles as today, but no big cities to bypass and the promise of both boring endless flatlands, as well as our first foray into some mountain-like scenery.  Lily's very excited about driving in the Appalachians and the enthusiasm is contagious.  She has been up for every side trip and distraction so far, and makes for a fun, pleasant and interesting tour companion.