The Joys of Traveling?

Taking a vacation from the daily grind is something everyone looks forward to, right?

Even if it's to porchville, it's nice to be off work.
(For those of you who don't work, you'll just have to imagine what it is like going to a job everyday, putting in time doing your thing so you can bring food home to eat and have a roof over your head. But we all can't sit around eating bon bons and watching Jerry Springer, ok?)

Anyway, I recently got to take a vacation with the hubby to our favorite location, the Outer Banks.

The 'where' is not the topic. The 'how' and the 'whys' are.

How we managed to get there in one piece and Why there aren't more road rage incidents is amazing.
Traveling can be like a nightmare.

**Top ten annoyances on recent 600 mile trip (each way) to and from the eastern-most part of North Carolina.**

1) Rest areas that are closed. I mean, WTF? We pass a sign for a rest area and there is a big yellow sticker on it: "CLOSED!" Soon after that, a sign that says "next rest area 46 miles". They are giving us fair warning that we might have to pee in an empty Mountain Dew bottle if we don't stop, then make it impossible to do so. When we get to the rest area exit it is of course all blocked off with cones and barrels, and it says 'closed until fall 2009". Say what? Not only is it closed all of the summer, when most people are actually traveling but it is closed for a year and a half! What are they doing? Installing space stations? New-age toilets?Whatever. Get out the Mountain Dew bottle.

2) Big rigs driving amazingly fast. No matter what the weather. No matter if there is road construction ahead. No matter if there is a cop lying in wait. No matter if there is a broken down car along the side of the road with a bloodied individual standing there waving a white walmart bag for help. They just don't....freakin'....slow....down. I know they are on some kind of mission or whatever - get to the locale and dump the load, make more money! It's like they are secret agents or something. Can't stop or slow down for anything!

Well let me get out my secret decoder ring and try to make some sense of it. I firmly believe they don't care if they kill someone. Nothing I hate more than seeing one of those monsters in the rear-view mirror and/or right in front of me.

Sidenote: Bad also because when they are in front of you, you can't see the confounded exit signs. Damn!

3) Fruit stands. Don't get me wrong, I like fruit. I really do. Matter of fact we have been known to stop at these said markets many times. However, must they put little signs in succession along the highway two miles prior to the driveways? Apples.............peaches...........watermelons............peanuts............jams..............! This makes people, in particular the elderly, slow down to like, 25 mph to read all the signs and look for the stand. So then everyone is slowing down to 25 mph. How about one damn sign a few hundred yards before the market. Just something plain and simple. FRUIT STAND AHEAD. They'll get your drift, ok?

4) Rubberneckers. People who slow down to a crawl when there is something to see, be it a automobile accident, a police car, a hitchhiker, a dead deer - whatever!

Then there is this massive interruption in the flow of traffic and we have to wait an hour to get past the Busch Gardens exit instead of 5 minutes. Wake up people.

5) People who cross the yellow line inside a tunnel. I don't even know why you aren't allowed to do it, but it annoys me to no end that there has always got to be some jackass in a sporty little red Mitsubishi with the top down who speeds through the tunnel, changing lanes at will. And with his sunglasses on - something else they tell you not to do. If I have to take off my sunglasses, so do you - you middle-aged balding butthead.

6) Kids who stare. Didn't your parents tell you it's not polite to stare? Then why are there so many kids making faces and picking their nose while gawking at us as the folks drive by on the way to Disneyworld or where ever else they are un-deserving enough to go to? I can't tell you how many children passed us and made faces or just plain stared at us like they were in a trance. Maybe they are. Maybe some parents get out the cough syrup before a car trip. Not a bad idea.

7) People who throw things out the window. I didn't really think people still had the nerve to litter anymore, but they do. Mostly it was cigarettes, but there were also candy wrappers, cups, and other (mostly) paper items. It's still against the law as far as I know, and in any state. And it looks like shit along the road. Immediately I dislike someone when I see them doing this. How about you?

8) Roadkill. Now I know for a fact these animals are not lining up to be slaughtered, but I thought there was someone in charge of picking the poor corpses up... like the game warden or something? I am a huge animal-lover, and I get upset even when I see a slain squirrel, let alone a deer or (heaven forbid) a dog or cat.

And on that note, who knew there were so many damn possums on the Outer Banks? (well, maybe there technically aren't that many, as most of them are deader than a doornail on Route 12 in Dare County, NC)

9) Driving in the rain. We drove from Hagerstown, MD to our house (approximately 170 miles) in the pouring rain, alot of which was on the crappy PA Turnpike where not only does the rain lie on the road in hydroplane-inducing puddles, but the fog rolls in like a John Carpenter movie. With the aforementioned big semi-trucks plowing down the road on each side of us I thought for sure I was a goner. Thankfully, I am here to tell the tale.

10) Finally getting home. On one hand, I am kissing the ground that my cat's paws pitter-patter on just to have reached my destination unscathed. But then there is the realization that I am home. Which generally means we have a mound of clothes to wash, phone calls to return, suitcases & beach chairs to return to the attic, bikes to put in the garage, and the worst thing of all - work to return to.
It was nice while it lasted.