Iowa, finally

Heather: I was just reviewing my last post, full of glee and excitement about the trip. Wow that was a long time ago. I am glad I wasn't aware of what we had in store for us.

We left Macon at about 3pm Thursday, 5 hours later than schedule, not having finished packing the night before. Atlanta traffic was a breeze; it was not nearly as bad as it could have been if we'd hit it only 30 minutes later. After Atlanta, we didn't see much traffic at all. We got to Lexington at 1 am so the first leg of the trip took 9 hours. The cats were perfect gentlemen. They slept almost the whole way. There were no accidents, kittie or otherwise. They used the makeshift litter box like traveling pros.

We got about 8 hours of sleep at my parent's house, my mom cooked lunch for us and my sister's family (my nieces are adorable), we walked around downtown and went out to dinner with everyone, then got back on the road about 10pm. Our spirits were high... for the first 8 hours or so. Man that was a long drive. We made what seems like a lot of pit stops between filling up the tank (8 times I think?), picking up caffienated beverages and depositing the result of the former pit stop. Also, near the end of the trip Xerxes started complaining and thinking that he needed to "go" we kept stopping to let him out. We finally figured out that he was just getting frustrated at being locked in a box and ignored him. Then, he would meow for 20 minutes and sleep for 2 hours, meow for 10, sleep for three, etc.

We arrived in Ames at noon. Our spirits rose. We were finally here! Time from Lexington to Ames: 14hrs. Total time in the truck: 23hrs. When we got here we went to the Budget's drop off location and freed the car from its trailer, parked the truck and the cats at the house (the cats love the basement by the way) and went to dinner at about 4pm, or 3pm here. Something told me that the butter cream sauce was a bad idea for such a tired body. Jamie and I got giggly and started feeling inebriated through fatigue. We came back to the house and spread out a blanket for a nap (by that time it had been 30 hours since we'd slept not counting dozes in the truck). The kitties must have been worried about us because even though they were hungry they didn't bother us until I got up a couple of hours ago to deal with the consequences of eating such a rich meal - my stomach thought that shrimp scampi was an even worse idea than I did.

The cats have begun to feel comfortable enough to romp around the house. Xerxes has found a couple of hidey-holes that he feels comfortable in. Nero is comfortable anywhere, he doesn't care. Jamie has an alarm set for himself for midnight to start some light work. We haven't unpacked the bed yet. The weather is nice and the house is cute in a renovated-in-the-seventies sort of way. Nero looks like he needs some TLC and i need some from him, so I'll be signing off now...