The continuation of our journey saw us awake at the relatively late hour of 8:00 a.m. and ready to depart at around 9:00. We left Rawlins, Wyoming amid sunny skies and dispositions, eagerly anticipating a pleasant, if somewhat boring, drive across the plains. By Grand Island, Nebraska, however, dark clouds had gathered, both in the skies and in our souls; the weather had taken a turn for the worse and the rocking of the truck was rather severe at every bump. We still had not figured out the problem at this point. By the time we arrived in eastern Nebraska, however, the skies had cleared and both Dad, the turtles, Leo, and I were feeling better. We intended to spend the night in Council Bluffs, Iowa. There were no rooms available, though, and we were forced to drive to Des Moines, Iowa. We arrived there at about 1:00 a.m. and immediately went to sleep, hopeful that the next day would prove better. We did learn several new items of information. Here are the top five lessons learned on Day Two:
1. My damn father has to have his damn breakfast!
2. Turtles do not enjoy riding in a shaking Penske truck cab . . . at all.
3. When annoyed, turtles crap everywhere . . . a lot!
4. Ball pythons apparently have no problem with cross country moves.
5. Moving trucks must have weight distributed evenly or else they will violently rock back and forth at the slightest bump in the road.
The moving truck count has produced some rather remarkable information as well. Despite my previous claim that the ratio of Penske trucks to non-Penske trucks had to be at least 3 to 1, it is apparent that it is closer to 1 to 1. We saw 53 Penske trucks, 34 U-Haul trucks, and 18 Budget trucks, for a total of 105 moving vans.
Our third day began with Dad and I partially unloading the truck and redistributing the weight more evenly. The results were immediate and amazing. No longer did we rock back and forth violently at high speed. Needless to say, Dad and I were extremely relieved that the prospect of prematurely ending our journey with the truck on its side in the middle of the freeway was over. Other than that, the trip was rather uneventful. There's just only so much one can say about Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio. We did drive by Notre Dame, with Dad fondly waving from the truck. We stopped for the night in Marion, Ohio, and will visit with some relatives tomorrow morning. The critters are still rather irate, but they seem to be doing fine otherwise.
The top five lessons from Day Three are:
1. Turtle crap stinks.
2. Marion, Ohio is in the middle of nowhere.
3. No matter how fast we try to drive, we can only average about fifty miles per hour in our Penske truck.
4. Semi-truck drivers are the self declared kings of the road. They do what they want and no one can stop them. I really want to drive a semi!
5. Trying to locate natural rocks from each state for a collection is really quite difficult when one can only look near the Interstate. Everything there is gravel.
The moving truck count produced results similar to yesterday. Penske had 69 trucks on the road, U-Haul had 50, and Budget had 16. Once again, Penske received more than half of all moving trucks observed. Stay tuned for more exciting news from the Scarborough "Bronx" Expedition.
1 comment:
Now Patrick, don't get upset with your dad about his breakfast. You know breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Just letting your know that someone does read your blog. Love to you both. Be safe and maybe an air freshener will do the job. Love Mom
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