My Mission

It's hard to believe it's only been two days since I stopped working. It feels like weeks! If I close my eyes, I could almost tell myself I took off for the 4th of July holiday. But that's denial. I'm pretty sure there's a part of me that thinks I'll just go back eventually. I just drown that bitch with alcohol! Then she's quiet.

I'm kidding. Sort of. Please don't do an intervention. Unless you bring cake.

Anyway, today's mission was to get to my friend Katie's house in 40 minutes. According to Smoke, it can be done. Sadly, in this part of Northern Virginia, to have a friend who lives less than a hour away from you is a miracle. As the cost of living in the Metro DC area goes up, the further west we all travel. Just not in covered wagons. In cars. Or pick-up's.

This morning I woke up happy to know I'll be seeing my friend Katie. Or Katherine when she's feeling British. We used to work together. In fact, we were work BFF's until she decided to be selfish and stay home with her children. She's about to have her third one so as you can tell, she doesn't care about ME at all! Ha. I'm totally kidding. She's a great mother and I love to spend time with her and her children. 

I drive to the reno home and set the GPS to Katie's address. I reset my car's trip timer. I'm set. Before I leave, I text her. I'm on the way! The road I take is long and curvy. I pass houses so redneck I can practically hear the bango's in the background. Then I pass mansions so fancy, I can almost see Kanye and Kim with North, South, and East running around.

Then there are the vineyards. There are so many you can practically spit out wine and hit another one. You never have to be sober living out in this country! (Seriously, please don't do an intervention. Unless you bring gummy bears). Mixed in amongst these vineyards are churches. Lots of them. Virginia is for lovers of wine and God. Amen.

I'm doing good time until I get behind the tractor. Now I have a great respect for farmers and their machinary. After all, I live in their country, not the other way around. But dude, I'm on the clock! I patiently follow the tractor while chanting, "Please pull over. I'm never going to make it in 40 minutes. How will I know how long it takes? I swear, your tractor really is sexy. But I need to goooooooo..." Finally, he finds a place to pull over and I'm back on my way.

 I finally get off the windy road and hit the highway. The speed limit is 70 so I'm good to go. Man, I love Virginia. Even if they do punish you for having hybrid cars, they give you wine and let you drive 70. Amen.

I get to Katie's house in 45 minutes. If you factor in the fact I got behind a tractor and hit some construction traffic (I forgot that the squirrels do road construction during the day), I think that's damn good time!

We hang out eating chicken nuggets and tator tots and laughing at her son, who is watching Dino Dan and playing with his cars. She keeps asking me if I want to go anywhere and I say I'm fine. This is actually the kind of day I haven't had in awhile. Just a day to hang out and just chill.

Of course on the way back to the reno house, I take a couple wrong turns and end up totally lost for a moment (I swear I was driving straight up some crazy mountain until I had the sense to finally turn around) but if I didn't get lost using GPS, I wouldn't be me!

It was a good day. I helped Smoke a little in the house and I'm tired again. But tomorrow I have no plans, which bothers me a little. I will have to start making that list I've been putting off. You know... The one where I decide what I want to do with the rest of my life. Yeah, that list.

Or I can come up with another mission. Like drinking all the wine in Northern Virginia. Now that's a plan!