Westward Ho! - Day 3

Hello from Mishawaka, Indiana, home of Bethel Christian College and neighbor of Notre Dame and the College Football Hall of Fame. As you can imagine, I can't wait to get to the HoF to find out which quarterback got the most home runs.

Today began inauspiciously with a downpour. The weather cleared by the time we set out, but we drove in and out of storms all day as we traversed western NY, northwestern PA, the width of OH and eastern IN. Luckily traffic was light and the many miles of road construction was paused for the weekend, so I was able to drive for about 7 hours and am now HALFWAY - only 1,000 miles to go!

BTW, what did we do before smart phones? I'm using mine for navigation, finding hotels (through Trip Advisor), booking hotels (through Expedia), checking email, playing music, listening to This American Life episodes, streaming public radio, checking weather and news, calculating trip costs, locating places to eat - and, on that rare occasion, phoning. It is remarkable that, not only can these devices do all this, but they can do most of it simultaneously. We've come a long way from the PDP 11 I started on back in the Iron Age...

Items of note today: A beautiful heron flew right over the car (is it coincidence that my destination is  Blue Heron development?).  EZ pass has worked in all these states, including in IN, where they call it Zoom. Outside Port Clinton, OH, we passed a sign for the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center (RBH was my great, great, great grandmother's uncle - do I have that right, Sal?). OH is very flat, but also very green. IN is more wavy and very green, but the trees now are all deciduous; I miss the evergreens.

Watching the greenery go by I was feeling enormous gratitude for all of you who threw your backs into (and out because of) my departure - thank you! Without the beyond-heroic efforts of Peggy, Nadine, Gabriele, Christine, Cindy and Jean (and many, many others who lent moral support), I would still be in Stratham, curled up in a ball among the pots and pans on my kitchen floor. I hope all of you will take me up on my offer to come visit - I promise not to ask your help unpacking!

My target for tomorrow is Des Moines. If you're hanging around with nothing else to do tomorrow afternoon, give me a call and I'll let you know in which direction the holiday traffic flows here in the middle. Most anticipated thing about tomorrow: new time zone - hooray, I gain an hour!

The Tweets are exhausted tonight, after a long day of bumpy concrete road segments, followed by a carnival ride-like entrance into the hotel. Although I booked thinking this was a pet-friendly hotel, a large sign at the desk announced NO PETS. I begged the college student desk clerk to let us in, promising they wouldn't gnaw the furniture, bark loudly, or pee in the corners. He relented, but said I'd have to confess to sneaking them in if anyone complained.

I had to wheel the bird cage right through the lobby on an unsteerable luggage cart, which so terrified them that they peeped the whole time. Luckily the boss must not be in residence, because we eventually made it to our room without being held to account for either the pet noise or the dented walls left in our wake.

In closing and in honor of Labor Day, I thought I'd mention that I've seen a much higher percentage of American cars out here than I see in New England. A notable exception was a Toyota SUV with the license plate NO MOR GM.

May your holiday be safe, happy and labor-free!