A Texas Road Trip

Monday dawned bright and beautiful! The temps were to be in the upper 60's and the huge blue sky was given even more beauty and depth by the high streaky white clouds. A perfect day for a road trip and we had a destination and purpose in mind.

My husband and I met on eHarmony in April of 2005. At the time he had a home in Brownwood, Texas and I had one in Irving. Since his roots in Brownwood were relatively young and tender and MY roots had grown so deep as to be entwined in the bedrock....we decided on making OUR home together here in Irving. Hence we have leased the house in Brownwood to the nicest people! They are a landlord's dream! My husband has had to do little in the way of maintenance other than some A/C-Heater repair (in which case he called a serviceman) and a water heater replacement (that the tenants installed) and a new ROOF which my husband(then 72 years old!) did himself with the help of his son-in-law, Byron! SO on this day we needed to purchase a new microwave to replace the old one which had recently bit the dust.....and deliver it to Brownwood which is EXACTLY 169 miles from our front door to there!

We headed out around 10 am (as we are SO not 'morning people') stopping in
Arlington on Interstate 20 to buy the said appliance. The road stretched out invitingly in front of us! Since we live in North Central Texas, you can drive for hours and hours in every direction except North...and STILL be in Texas! We took a lunch break in Thurber, Texas, to eat at The Smokehouse. They have the BEST Chicken Fried Steaks! From there we headed out I20 to Cisco where we turned off the Interstate and traveled through rural country settings all the way to Brownwood. Louis Dean enjoyed the quiet and the scenery. I, on the other hand, had a 'delicious' one hour nap!!! I LOVE a nap in the backseat of a car on a road trip!

The visit with Marilyn and her warm and loving family was so nice! We had a lot of catching up to do as we had not seen them in 14 months! Marilyn and her daughter, Kristen, made a wonderful dinner! We had Chicken Fettuccine Alfredo, Fresh Garden Salad, Garlic Toast, Iced Tea and Coffee and CHOCOLATE CAKE!! Even better than the food was the good conversation round the dinner table! We talked of books, authors, current events, comedians......it was SO pleasant! Made my heart feel good to see a family that eat dinner together in the kitchen most evenings instead of the slap dash- grab a bite- and eat in front of the TV habit we so easily fall into these days! Marilyn is a creative decorator and has skillfully taken a 'vanilla' HOUSE and turned it into a warm, inviting and unique HOME!

We had to leave right after dinner for the three hour plus drive home. That's the HARD part of a road trip! It is always more fun going than it is coming home! We noticed there was light traffic coming back. Driving the country roads we used our bright lights most of the time as we were the only car around! Usually the interstate is full of the big trucks especially at night but we were surprised when we stopped at the Rest Area to find the only vehicles parked were cars and RV's! Perhaps Monday night is an 'off' night on the road these days! That played to our advantage and we made pretty good time arriving home 12 hours and 15 minutes after we pulled out of the driveway!

Our next road adventure will be to Florida by way of New Orleans! I can't wait!!