2005-05-09 - 3:51 p.m.
Cat: "Back off sucka!"
Dog: "Damn!"
How can a day that began so beautifully end in such absolute disaster?
I did some house hunting on the way back from Crown (more on that later)
It was such a beautiful day that even spending all day chasing down dead end housing leads couldn�t spoil it. I only found one house for sale in the town we were looking at, and it was already under contract. I found a great place nearby, but it may be out of our reach.
Drove all over the eastern panhandle of Maryland, made a quick pilgrimage to Sugarloaf Mountain where my Dad used to take me as a child.
I took about 100 gorgeous pictures of the small towns, and the houses I was looking at, these were on the same card as the multitude of pictures I took at Crown, (this is a set up for later tragedy) Then started home on I-95
This is the first step on the road to disaster. I-95 was a parking lot until well past DC, but then it cleared up and I sped along toward Richmond. At some point I zipped right past the I-85 exit and continued on I-95, which I should add is a mirror image of I-85 same billboards, truck stops, landmarks ect.
Deep in thought I just let the miles fly by, making good time, to the wrong side of the state. The first sign of trouble was heralded by Eva Gardener, or at least her billboard. I thought to myself, �I don�t remember that billboard, must be new� Then I realized that by my trip odometer, I should be home already, and then there was the cold tingle in the belly that warns of impending misery.
�I don�t remember Rockymount being on the way home.�
Then the true sign of my plight took the form of, well�, a sign.
I-95 in bright blue, white, and red.
I pulled off on the next exit and called Jill. �Hey baby, how far is Wilson from Durham? Two hours!?!,� Oh no reason,� I�ll be home a little late.�
Head on the steering wheel, barely contained urge to throw the phone out the window. Complete surrender to the dread of an extra two hours tacked onto an already long trip,
Complete disappearance of the �just about home� excitement.
An hour and a half later (I might have exceeded the posted speed limit) I drag myself in from the car. But now things are looking up, Jill is happy to see me after a week in Canada, the Cat and the Dogs are getting along, the house is clean (my coming home present to Jill) and there is a freshly imported box of maple and rum chocolates from lovely Canada.
Life is good.
Until I excitedly start downloading the pictures of Crown, the house hunting trip and a couple of weeks of assorted pictures to the computer.
Jill is telling me about her week, and I just hit the wrong button. Such a simple mistake, and such irreversible deletion. It takes a minute to sink in, I check the camera, the folder, and there is that cold tingly feeling again� gone, phffft, nada, like so many bits of digital dust blown away in the wind of incompetence.
At least I still have the chocolates.
Justus
