KISSMYB

How's that for a license plate? Or "SWEET B" is a good one too. I'll probably go with the latter but I do admit the former brings giggles of mischievous delight.

My story begins at 5 am and ends not before 11pm. I slept nary a wink last night, and then fitfully at best, getting up at 5am merely because I could not stay in bed a minute longer! I even made coffee to whittle away the time, as if I even needed a drop of caffeine. Then Pops picked me up at 6 am and we headed out to good ole' Springfield, Illinois, a whopping 397 miles/6.75 hours away. For about the first ohh....1.5 hours, I chattered non-stop. I think I bounced around several hundred conversations while my father sat there, dazed and confused by this tasmanian she-devil whirling about in a fury of conversation. Then as soon as the fountain of speech burst forth, it stopped. Yes, I crashed. All of the sudden speech become slow and slurred and my head slowly drooped down and I actually fell asleep. Actual time from last word spoken to moment of sleep was probably about the same time it takes to turn a light switch off.

Then my loving father kindly wakes me up and says "Hey, your turn." Nice. So I drove from somewhere outside of Dayton (heck yes, I didn't even make it out of Ohio before going comatose) all the way to Springfield. I would just like to throw out that IL and IN are f-l-a-t. I think this poem/ballad I wrote catches the gist of it all. While Pops slept through this monotony of terra firma, I struck up quite the catchy tune. Ever listen to people who hum along to their ipod, emitting sounds that seem not to correspond whatsoever? Yes, this was me but with lyrics. Laugh away but I am not ashamed. Desperate times call for desperate measures.

Flat farmland everywhere
Not a hill to spare
I hate this flat farmland
Flat farmland everywhere. (repeat as many times as it takes until you are out of the flat farmland)

I know I know, it's platinum stuff. Just remember, strife brings genius (and I totally made that saying up --they should seriously look into using my song and the flat farmland as a new form of water torture)

So we get to Springfield (and I totally got to see Abraham Lincoln's Presidential Library (emit veloceraptor-like screech of joy)) and make our way over to the U-Haul joint- where we find out in short order that our electrical hookup for the auto transport is not the correct one, our receiver won't come out of the hitch in order to put in the receiver with the ball, and the ball is too big. Now is the time where I sing the praises of both Fathers. Heavenly one for orchestrating all of this and earthly one for being my earthly hero. He went out, bought an electrical adapter, wailed on the receiver with a hammer and WD-40 for a good solid 15 minutes, and got the trailer hitch to fit the receiver. He's pretty much amazing. OO, and while he was out performing these great feats, I got to watch the 40th fighter squadron (don't quite me on the squadron part) out performing their own great feats...(acrobatic that is).

We get to the seller's house (who has been ever so gracious in waiting for us) and find out that he's a pretty super guy. With me behind the wheel, he and my father guide (more like get a running start and push with all their might) the car up onto the auto transport. No, they didn't do it for fun, the battery had died, sheesh. We fill out the title information, say our goodbyes and scoot on outta Dodge. Actually though, Springfield has a very "yesteryear" feel about it and for the couple hours we were there, it was quite nice. Thanks to the o-so-sweet staff at the IL DMV (I'm sure there were some sweet staff there, they must just hide far far away from the front), we had all the title information correct and could actually commence "scooting outta Dodge."

7 hours, 397 miles, 1 new battery, and thousands of veloceraptor-like screeches of delight later, we arrive back in Columbus. Entering it just as we had left it, in the dark. I would just like to say this has been 800 miles and 18 hours that I will always remember and treasure for the rest of my life. Thanks Pops! (Did I mention my MGB is the hottest thing on this planet? Scarlet exterior with silver (grey) trim and and a rocking black leather interior. H-o-t. The size is something I'm going to have to get over though, it's about the size of a miata which is something I've never encountered before in driving. I learned to drive a suburban and horse trailer get-up before a 4 door car so I'm looking forward to this new challenge. And some sleep.

night.