I'd gotten all the bins on the golf cart the night before so I'll be positive and tell you that slogging the remaining suitcases out to the garage in the rain wasn't as bad as it could have been. The cat was about as happy as you can imagine a cat zipped up in a little carrier can be in a lightning storm. She likes to talk. A lot. We got to the ferry landing with enough time to get antsy about standing over water with a metal roof above and say goodbye to friends who love us enough to come out at 8:30 am wearing the most fashionable trashbags as rain gear. It's a sad thing to wave goodbye to friends in trashbags.
At least the rain had mostly cleared when we got to the marina (we like to call it America). You know it's been a bad storm when the Weather Channel van is parked where you've just left. And here's something you should know - even if I am in the market for 5 minutes, when I exit I am unable to remember where I parked my vehicle. It's like a vanishing memory spell is cast in the produce section or something. Anyway, when you've left your vehicle for weeks the effect is intensified. I stumbled around and would have used the little beep thing on the key fob if I'd ever remembered to replace the battery in that. I finally called Kenny and asked him if he remembered where I'd parked it the last time he'd come to visit and voila! there it was, just where I'd left it. If you swap from golf cart to car after a couple of months the overstimulation of radio, seatbelts, AC and stop lights becomes a most irritating experience. What's really cool is if you add a cat, a little sobbing and Spongebob into the mix.
I think my cat's memory is as bad as mine. She's made this trip more than once, but spends the drive alternating between an "I might vomit" expression and a constant meowing. A CONSTANT MEOWING. She usually settles down after about 5 hours, but by then I hear it in my head. Also, I am allergic to cats. Mostly only if I touch one and then touch my face. The simple swipe of a hand across my eye causes an immediate and intense itching and swelling of my entire face as well as a respiratory reaction focused mostly on incessant, heart-stopping, sneezing. So I spent a lot of the drive with a very stressed out cat (did you know they SHED when they get stressed?) with claws buried in my lap as I repeated the mantra, "Don't touch your face, don't touch your face, don't touch your face." Her fur was actually floating through the air all around me. One deep inhalation and it would all be over. I could take some allergy medicine but the drowsiness that causes just turns an 8 hour drive into a 14 hour drive and trust me when I say nobody wants that.
I took a short audio sampling of our drive together. In 23 seconds, kitty meowed 9 times. That's an average of every 2.5 seconds. So that you math people can have a word problem, consider how many meows that is if we are traveling at 80mph for 8 hours. So along with a Spongebob video playing (Olivia says it's impossible to be sad with Spongebob playing) we are also receiving a constant, brain-stabbing narrative by the world's most nervous cat. Who lives in a pineapple under the sea? Meow. And this cat has now figured out how to position herself for a quick exit every time I drive through for food or open the door to get out for gas. I was pretty sure one of us wasn't going make it, but the dog would have been so disappointed if we arrived home without her feline friend so I opted to press on. Did I mention Olivia also had a Slinky? - which is a delightful toy (fun for a girl and a boy) until you here the shink-shink-shinking of it for 8 hours.
Somehow we all made it back to Rome alive, even though some of us are less furry and others of us are now exhausted. Olivia's off to school, I have gotten all the cat hair off of me and will now attempt to unpack and catch up on all that we've missed. Can't wait to hear how you're doing.
HILARious!
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