Chicago Move: Cross-country drive, day 2

Oh good goddamn. And I thought Phoenix to Bisbee was too much goddamn driving.

Today, dear reader, we drove through northern New Mexico (quite pretty!), the northwest corner of Texas, the panhandle of Oklahoma (OOOOOOOOklahoma!), and (most of the way) through Kansas. From about Texas all the way through Kansas, there was a whole lot of nothing between towns - the most interesting parts were a beef farm (I was corrected on Facebook by a Midwest native that they're called "feed lots"), some grain fields (prettier and far less smelly), a few pretty horses, and (midway through Kansas) an opossum crossing the road. Although we did most of the Kansas leg at night, I have a feeling we probably didn't miss much.

Google Maps had estimated the day's trip at just over nine hours - although, oddly, Apple Maps estimated it at closer to eleven. We ended up splitting the difference, coming in at about ten hours of driving, counting (very short) breaks. Google Maps probably was pretty close to accurate, as I imagine we probably took an hour's worth of breaks (fifteen minutes in a couple places, twenty or so for lunch, and a quick ten-minute bathroom break). The estimate for tomorrow is eight hours, which will probably become nine or so with breaks, but it's the last big long day of driving - we'll be hanging out at a Holiday Inn Express in Lincoln (three hours outside of Chicago) for a day or two until the current tenant vacates and we can move in. And they have a pool and a hot tub! I'll have to buy a swimsuit, as mine is currently in the depths of the Penske truck, but I strongly suspect a large portion of my time will be spent there.

We seem to have found the optimal sedative dose for each of the cats today - Leo the Aspiring Straitjacket Wearer gets a full dose, while Tripp and Dexter seem to do fine on the half-doses the vet recommended starting with. Additionally, when we grind up the pill and mix it with tuna broth, it seems to go down easier (with Leo and Tripp at least) and hit their system a bit faster, too. All three gave only token resistance going into their carriers, anyway, and were quiet almost the entirety of the trip - enough that we were a bit worried about them a couple of times. (Further evidence my husband is awesome: if he's concerned enough about the cats, he thinks nothing of pulling over to the side of the road - on an interstate! - and double-checking to make sure they're still breathing and okay.)

Today's curveball was a thunderstorm over Kansas. Conditioned to Arizona storms, I had sort of assumed it would be fierce and over quickly. Instead, it went on for a good hundred miles, although we were lucky enough to be mostly on the edge of it rather than in the middle. (Ian got caught in the middle of it with the truck and is consequently staying the night in Pratt, an hour and a half west of here, since he didn't want to push on until 1 AM.) There was some pretty spectacular lightning, though, and it was nice in that it washed all the bugs off the windshield.

Really, for all that the driving's been tedious, we can't complain too much about this trip. The truck both fit in our driveway and was exactly the right size for all the stuff we wanted to bring. We had friends to help us with the packing and loading. The cats have been generally well-behaved and haven't had adverse reactions to the sedatives. Plains states aside, there's been some pretty scenery. We have a good friend we trust driving the truck with all our stuff in it, and helping us with the cats. Nobody's broken down or had a flat. And if our motel room today smells rather strongly of cheap air freshener, well, it's clean and inexpensive and they didn't charge twice the room rate for the cats like the first place I called wanted to.

And now, more sleep! Really looking forward to that hot tub tomorrow night...

Chicago Move: Cross-country drive, day 3

Oh thank god we're almost done with the driving.

Actually, today wasn't bad at all. It definitely felt less stressful than yesterday, despite the fact that the drive was only an hour shorter. Some of that might have been the fact that we weren't losing an hour to time-zone changes - even though it's just a psychological effect, there was a definite impact. Also we got a somewhat earlier start today and therefore weren't driving far into the night like last night. And then there's the "this is the last full day of driving" part to look forward to.

The landscape was much more pleasant. Missouri has lots of farmland, but also lots of trees and rolling hills (and no feedlots that we saw). I was a little nonplussed when I started seeing all the signs for Mark Twain Historic Sites (I didn't think he lived in Missouri, but perhaps I'm wrong?), until we broke through the trees and onto the bridge over the Mississippi River. Holy crow. I mean, I'm from Alaska, I'm no stranger to large bodies of water (or larger-than-life geographical features in general), but...damn. I may have to come back down this way for a long weekend sometime so I can properly appreciate it, rather than just sneaking glances over the side of the bridge.

No major curveballs today, thankfully. We did discover that rural gas stations often don't sell premium gas, but that wasn't a big problem as there were plenty of truck stops that did. At one point Leo's carrier fell off the blanket and tipped slightly sideways, enough to alarm him even through a full dose of sedative, but a bit of repacking (along with propping-up help from my new favorite hoodie) got him righted again and he settled back down. Other than that, things were pretty uneventful, and we got to Lincoln just fine.

Much to my surprise, the cats have been adapting to the various hotel rooms with almost no trouble at all. When we took Dexter and Leo from Juneau to Sierra Vista by plane, they kept us up almost that whole night, yowling and rattling cupboard doors and generally making their displeasure known. I'm not sure if it's the presence of drugs or the lack of issues specific to plane travel (maybe cats really hate pressure changes?), but while they certainly haven't been happy about being stuck in their carriers for hours on end, they've generally settled right in once we let them out. (Tripp is actually snuggling up with Brian and purring like mad right now - it's pretty adorable.) Which isn't to say that I'm not glad they're getting a break, too. They've been such troopers - Bast knows they deserve it.



I'm probably most pleased with this place of the various hotels we've tried. For one thing, it's the only one that has actual conditioner (as opposed to "conditioning shampoo") in the rooms, and for another, the furniture/paint is newest and the bed's probably the most comfortable. Also the front desk girl is super-nice, and (perhaps most importantly) the room doesn't smell like dog pee covered up with cheap air freshener. (I mentioned this to the front desk staff at the last place, and they apologized, but said that they were full up last night and wouldn't have had another room to give us, so I guess it's good that I was too tired to raise a fuss.) But then, my perceptions might also be colored slightly by the fact that WE DON'T HAVE TO DRIVE AT ALL TOMORROW. And then it's all of a three-hour drive to our new place on Monday. Thank God.