I left Solvang at 8 p.m. last night, made it into (10 p.m.) and through L.A., and got to just short of Palm Springs - about 200 miles - before I gave out. Pulled over into a rest stop and crawled into the teardrop intending to be there for my usual 30 minute nap and woke up an hour later. From there another 120 miles or so before I took a nap of about 40 minutes. I got into the west valley at 5 a.m. totally whooped and feel that way still at 7:30 p.m. I think I'll be in bed early, even by my standards.
Besides the easier drive through L.A. at that hour the traffic across I-10 is a whole lot easier in the middle of the night. I counted, and saw one car over a 100-mile stretch. Everything else was a semi. I pulled into one rest stop and couldn't find a place to park, even on the out-ramp. When I washed down the teardrop this afternoon the right side had an oily/sooty layer from going by those trucks.
When I backed the Falcon out of the garage it didn't want to move. I expected it to be difficult to start after sitting for almost three weeks, but once running it didn't respond to the gear shift lever. Yep; a BIG puddle of tranny fluid on the garage floor. I added almost a full quart (I think capacity is three quarts) and got it up to the mark. Old cars, like old men, should be driven.
We hit 115 today. Now, at 7:30, it's 105, and our overnight low will be somewhere in the mid-80's. Nobody moves to Phoenix for this.
Make your kids eat broccoli.
Mom and/or dad dished up our plates with some of everything she had fixed. The expectation was that unless a sudden bout of appendicitis hit we would clean our plates. With four kids to feed there was never a question of who liked what; we all had different preferences and foods we did NOT like. No matter, you ate it. All of it.
To this day I almost never fail to eat everything Pam puts on my plate even if I passed satiation 10 bites ago, and even if it's something less than tasty. (It happens.) That's ingrained in my psyche down near where the voice lives that tells me to fold in thirds and then hang up my bath towel. To not do either one would seriously mess up the cosmos.
Nike epitomized branding with their slogan, "Just do it." At our house it was, "Just eat it." Doesn't matter how full you are or how close to gagging it makes you feel, eat it.
No, it didn't give me scary food issues, but it did teach me to do the hard stuff. If it's right, do it. OK, I learned that from a much broader scope than just the dinner table but I certainly got it there, in bunches. The expectation is that I will do what's right whether it goes down easily or not.
I don't think it's overly hyperbolic to say some of our societal problems come from adults who, when kids, didn't have to eat their broccoli, or peas, or....
"It's too hard."
"I just can't."
"I'm not wired that way."
Thanks, mom & dad, for making me clean my plate. I got all my vitamins and a healthy dose of character, too.
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