Running Errands

Living in the country not only means fresh air and lots of wide, open space, it means LOTS of hours in the car trekking to Costco (an hour away), the vet (an hour away), the dealership where we get the oil of the 'Burban changed (an hour away), the dry cleaner (an hour away)...you get the idea. We spend a lot of time in the car. Luckily, Grace is a trooper and is usually content in her car seat.

What Grace normally looks like while riding in her car seat

When she does start crying while we are in the car, I turn into a crazy, frantic driver. I was recently returning from an ever-thrilling trip to Wal-Mart (the "good" one is...yes, you guessed it...an hour away) and cruising along the highway where the speed limit is 70 mph. I found myself daydreaming for just a second and when I returned to reality, was forced to quickly slam on the brakes. Some woman driver (yes I said it) was puttering along at 50 mph - IN THE FAST LANE! To make matters worse, she WOULDN'T get over. Grace was having a bad moment in the car - her cries starting to reach frenzy level - and my brain felt like it was about to short circuit. Not sure why Grace's cries compel me to drive faster but they do. The louder her cries, the heavier my lead foot (and we all know that that was a bit on the heavy side to begin with).

I suppose I could have taken the high road...or the right lane...and simply sped around her. Instead, I chose the more "mature" alternative and rode her bumper while laying on the horn for a solid minute. It took her that long to check her mirror and realize that an angry Suburban driver was slightly annoyed that she was occupying the fast lane. Eventually, she got over and I sped by her. For the record, I did restrain myself and kept all offensive hand gestures to myself.