A First Time For Everything

We just got back from our trip to West Virginia for Brian's family reunion. The trip took us about 6. 5 hours each way, give or take. Now, remember, we are the only people on the planet who have 2 kids, neither of whom have ever slept in the car. Seriously. I think I can truly count on one hand the number of times both of the kids have slept in the car, combined. Even when they were infants. I don't know what planet they came from.

When all of my other friends with little ones would come over with the kids, they'd put them in the car seat, throw a blanket over it, and BAM, their kids were asleep. I was astonished. Mine would never do that, even in the car. Some people take their babies on a car ride to settle them? No, not us. In fact, the mere fact that both of the kids were sleeping on the trip home, in the same car, at the same time, was momentous enough to do a complete photojournalistic set on the occasion.

Another funny thing about this trip? We didn't hit one minute of stopped traffic until we were about 2 miles from our exit on the way home. And then, we sat in traffic forever because the toll road was down to one lane. Why? Because there were construction barrels lined up in the left lane, just like there was real construction, except, there was no construction going on at all. Not only that, it looked as if there hadn't been any construction going on there for some time. Go figure. Leave it to the State to make our lives just a little more inconvenient.

The reunion was nice. Brian got to go back and see some of the stuff from his childhood that he hasn't seen for about 15 years. Like Turley's station. A primitive little general store stuck out in the middle of no where. Brian said he used to walk there from his Uncle Jack's place when he was a kid to get popsicles. West Virginia was nice. I have never been there, so it was neat to see it. We went to the little sliver that is stuck between Ohio and Pennsylvania (extreme north West Virginia, I suppose). Every time I leave the Midwest, I wonder what the hell anyone would want to live here for. There are so many truly beautiful states in this union, and none, or very few, of them are in the Midwest. Oh well, I guess that's why we retire. If I lived somewhere cool now, I wouldn't have anything to look forward to, right? When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. If you don't like lemonade, play the Lotto.