January 24, 2013 – 10: 30 PM, Hernando, Mississippi
Choppy and I are officially on the road!
OK, we are sitting in the driveway in this picture. But the house is locked up, and we are in the car, so it counts as being on the road for purposes of this picture and post.
Rather expectedly (because this always happens, and really, I should get rid of the whole modifying ‘rather’ there, as like I said, this always happens), we got a late start; I needed to wait for the mail as I was expecting tickets to an event we have scheduled for this weekend (perhaps I should have thought the timing on that mailing through a little better). Plus, I sort of failed to pack anything last night, so this morning was a bit of a packing frenzy, and even if I hadn’t been waiting on the tickets, we would have gotten a late start.
A little further down the road (‘little’ being the operative word there, as I took this at the end of my block while sitting at a stop sign). Starting the trip off right, with a little Willie Nelson – just as every car trip I can remember has started (even when it was my dad singing the song, rather than the iPod playing it).
Despite only beginning to pack this morning, I did manage to get my shoes down to a totally reasonable number (9 pairs. Not including flip flops, because obviously, unless there are heels on the shoes, they don’t count). I was quite happy about that.
Unfortunately, and despite the awesome job keeping the shoes to a reasonable number, it turns out that the bare minimum amount of stuff I need to go on this trip – which is the amount of stuff I feel that I brought – takes up a lot of room in the car.
By ‘a lot,’ I mean that there is no extra space in the car. I am not exaggerating. If I didn’t have a backup camera on the car, I have no idea how I would back up (well, actually, I do have an idea of how I would back up – I would back up unsafely. And quite likely by an occasional use of the bumper).
Now, in theory, this amount of stuff, though taking up almost all of the car, wouldn’t be a problem. Choppy has her seat on the passenger side, I have my seat on the driver’s side, and the back is full of our bare minimum amount of stuff. And thanks to the backup camera, I can back up pretty easily; I also drove a conversion van in high school, so I am used to having limited sight lines and being rather reliant on my side mirrors.
So, as I said, having no space would be fine, except that in exactly two weeks, my sister is joining us. And unless she wants to sit with Choppy on her lap, the current space situation is not going to work.
And so, I somehow have to figure out how to either (a) fit everything into a smaller space, or (b) cut down on the number of things in the car. As I have no intention of throwing anything out (like I said, this is seriously the bare minimum amount of stuff), I have to go with Option ‘a’ and fit everything into a smaller space.
That, or my sister and Choppy are going to become very close friends.
Miles Traveled: 417
States Visited: 6
Travels with Choppy 