Thursday, November 13, 2008

1st Top 10 - and maybe my last...

Top 10 Things I LOVE About My Drive to Our NEW HOME:

(In no particular order...just how they come out of my head, which means the ones at the end, may be the worst - so yeah, maybe they are in order)


1. As a history major in college and just a freak in general about American history, I LOVE that our major road that we travel is Hwy. 66 - yes, that Hwy. 66 - The Mother Road. The one featured in Disney's CARS movie.

2. We have only 1 stop sign in our 12+ miles. Well, technically there are 2 on our way into town, but 1 is a right turn, so basically its a "Yield". We cruise 60, slow down for a mile in a cute little town and then back to 60. It makes for a fast, easy trip!

3. Dead things on the side of the road. Granted, this is the boys' #1, but you really do see different things dead on the side of the road. The time change has put 2 deer on the side of the road currently, but I dont know how long they will last - there is something eating one of them at night...

4. The Boundary - hands down the best BarBQue - Buffy's husband can cook and dont let the name Buffy fool you - I am not sure I know anyone whose ass she couldnt kick...

5. County Sheriffs - I have never seen them pull someone over with a cattle guard - I like to see it as reverse discrimination. I have only seen cars that dont belong pulled over - Lexus', sports cars, "town people". Its awesome.

6. The wave. Every time I pass a pickup, the hand on the wheel comes up in a little farmer wave. I would also bet that if I was on the side of the road with the hood up, someone would stop pretty quick. The hard part is waiting for someone to pass.

7. Weekends - you see large traveling groups going up and down Hwy. 66. There are the motorcycles....the antique cars....there was the VW weekend and I have even seen a PT Cruiser weekend (that one was a little sad - that is just 1 car that should NEVER have flames).

8. Hay bales in a freshly mowed field. Gorgeous expanses of pasture, neatly trimmed surrounded by woods, hills, rocks. The land really is pretty here. Hills, gorgeous large pink/red rocks, tall oak trees... I always thought Wyoming was supposed to be beautiful (and it is on the edges), but driving through last summer, I was SHOCKED - S-H-O-C-K-E-D - at how desolate it was. I told John something that I still have nightmares about as a Texan, "I couldnt live here - Oklahoma is so much prettier"...I just shivered....

9. Time with my kids in the car. There is a calming affect on the drive. The green, the space, the constant speed of the car, the sky all give my kids a sweet spirit in the car. We talk, we laugh, we sing in our opera voices and I hear all about their day.

10. Red Round Barn...Google it....

3 comments:

Ryan said...

I love weekends. Also the wave is cool. I used to work on a fish farm a few miles outside of a tiny town (under 1k pop) near home. For some reason I can not remember I started to wave to every car that drove by on my way to and from work. Pretty darn quick they all waved to me. It was nice.

Ryan said...

Come to think of it Sheriffs have always treated me pretty good. I distinctly remember one time long ago I got pulled over by one. I was driving about 65 on a 50mph very curvy country road and saw the lights behind me. He started to lecture me about how dangerous this road is with recommended 25mph corners about a mile from where I was, then he looked at my license. After seeing the address of the nearby town and asked if I drove this road often. I said something to the effect of "I go to school and work there so a couple times a day every day for the last two years so yeah". After that he said a token "slow it down a little" and sent me on my way sans ticket.

Another time I was driving home late one night and got pulled over in a suspected DUI stop. I was 19 and it was about 3 am. He asked if I had been drinking and since mentioning the single beer I drank 6 hours before seemed irrelevant and foolish I said no. He also asked about the pump shotgun laying across the passenger seat of my little truck. I said it was not loaded (true) and that he was free to check it if he liked. He had me step out and do a little sobriety test which I did horrible at since I was uuber nervous I messed up the walking and my contacts made the pen light thing impossible. In any case after a few minutes of talking he sent me on my way. The fellow could have made that way more painful by having me crawl out the window at gunpoint and handcuffing me on the side of the road, etc but he didn't. Town cops I am not such a huge fan of but Sheriffs have always treated me square.

Shy Wolf said...

Ah, yes- Route 66, highway of legend. Corvettes. Marty Milner (don't recall the other star). Symbolic line we dared to cross from the 'old' of our parents to the 'new' generation of explorers, questioning youth and adventurers in America.
Not to mention the patrols on that road were good and bad depending on which state you were in.
Thanks for the memories.
Shy