Friday, June 20, 2008

Riding on out to the west side

Like I mentioned before, this was my first long trip in ages. Even the Princess knows this. When I told her that she, the Bear, and I were going to see my folks….she made the comment, “Really? You’ve NEVER done that drive before.” Yes. She knows that I’m normally a passenger. But this time? I was the only adult on the drive. Me. Only Me.

You all know that the Hubs does all our drives. He is the one who drives my car when we’re out as a family on the weekends. He is the one who drives his car when we’re out on a date. He is OUR driver. I normally just drive the kids to and fro to appointments and activities. Short drives.

But let me say that I LOVE the fact that my vehicle has cruise control. I actually called the Hubs when I reached Interstate 8. I waited until then because there’s normally a bunch of folks on Interstate 10.

Me: It’s me.
Hubs: Hey, what’s up?
Me: How do you turn on the cruise control?
Hubs:You at the speed you basically want to be at?
Me: Yes.
Hubs: Then hit the ON button. See how it feels then use the plus or minus button to get to where you want to be.
Me: Okay.

People? Cruise control just about saved my life! I don’t think I could have handled that six hour drive without cruise control. Seriously. My foot would have fallen off. Having that break for my foot and my leg to be in THAT position? To be able to sit with my legs in a comfy position? It was totally awesome. All I had to think about was keeping the car in my lane – as the 8 is relatively a straight shot into California. I didn’t have to think about keeping my foot steady on the pedal for more than 6 hours.

In the open sections, I kept the cruise control on set at 75 mph. And it was all good. No need to think about being stopped by police cars. Out there in the open, they pretty much concentrate on folks doing more than 5 mph over the speed limit. What did pretty much immediately was figure out how to "Cancel" and "Resume" the cruise control so that I could pass vehicles. I wanted to be able practice what I would do before I had to actually DO it. It was easy. YEAH!

The kids were pretty wonderful on the trip out. Ate their snacks. Drank their water. Played their handheld games. Watched their DVDs. They really were low-maintenance. All I had to do was change out their DVDs. And the DVD in my car? It’s SO easy to change out even when I’m driving. I just kept all the extra DVDs in the front passenger seat. I was able to eject and load a DVD in less than 30 seconds. EASY! Thankfully, my car came with a DVD remote so the Princess was able to start/stop the movies as needed.

Of course, when we stopped for gas around 1pm we also got out to get some lunch AND stretch out. I bought kids meals for both the kids and a sandwich for myself. Wouldn’t you know it? The kids barely ate their meals. ARGH! But they were in pleasant moods so I let it go. Just as long as they both stayed hydrated and happy…that’s all I wanted.

The second half of the drive out was pretty easy. I was a little nervous about having to pass slower vehicles on the two lane highway. Thankfully my car has good pickup speed and I was able to pass cars with no trouble. What I found interesting was how close some folks drove to the car in front of them. There was one grey Accord that followed a little too close to the white van in front of him. Whenever the van moved, the Accord followed. Too close. But that’s my own opinion. The Accord didn’t do any of the leading at all. He was just following. I was able to pass this dynamic duo at one point as the white van didn’t move into the left lane as it approached a slower moving vehicle on the right.

We arrived at my folks’ house around 4:30pm – only 6 ½ hours after we left. I made good time for a first-time driver, eh? We ended up going out to dinner with Lil Sis, Shorty, and my folks. YUM!

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