Road trips.

A few posts ago, I mentioned that Haley had moved to Tennessee. She auditioned for the summer musicals at the Tuacahn theater in St George, but instead was "recruited" for a show Mic Thompson was choreographing in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.

Pigeon Forge? Seriously? I called it Pigeon Toe at least the first five times I referred to it.

What we were told about the job was that it was a song and dance variety show and she was being hired as a dancer/back up singer. Her contract would be for one year, they would house her, give her 50% off of meals at the hotel and pay her very well. (And not just in contrast to what she makes at her salon ... pretty much "well" in general for a 23 year old.)

Hmmm ... really?

But call after call came in from the show's producer and from Mic saying how excited they were to have her and how soon could she get the signed contract back?

Well ...? It sounded great! We loaded up her car (and I DO NOT say that lightly - we loaded up her car) and off we went into the wild blue yonder ... or in this case, the wild bluish grey yonder for most of the three days it took us to get there.

Now I really do like road trips in general. You stop at your neighborhood gas station to fill up first - with gas and drinks and road trip food: chips, peanuts, pretzels, candy bars (all sorts of chocolate in various ways/shapes/ and forms), mike and ikes, starburst, etc. etc. (What's not to like about that? It's treats and music for hours on end.)

Haley's ipod was loaded with a favorites playlist ... she told me it was all the songs she knew I would like. I think that meant songs that I would approve of. I asked her how many songs she had on her ipod and she said somewhere around 3,600. But I think we started to repeat sometime during that first day of driving. That's not good. 'Cause did that mean there were only a few hours worth of songs I would approve of?

Our second stop for gas was somewhere in Wyoming. When Haley pulled up to the pumps she circled the islands looking for the one with the least amount of water around the muddy pumps.

I said, "Welcome to rural America, sweetie."

We saw rural America for the next 12 hours that day, and all of the next day, and pretty much all of the day after that.

We saw lots of these: which I really liked.

And lots of these: which Haley really liked.

And here is what we saw the most of along the way (in no particular order):

1. Fireworks Super Stores

2. Big Rig Trucks

3. Subways ($5 footlongs all along the way)

4. Cracker Barrel Restaurants (everywhere)

5. Colleges and Universities (good to know there are higher education opportunities all across the USA)

6. Lots of space

7. Lots of "road kill"

Yes, it was that exciting.

But we really did enjoy each other's company so much. And we enjoyed eating all day long even when we felt completely sick from the sugar overdose (and still ate more because we could - and what else is there to do on a road trip that lasts for several days?)

We especially loved our comfy Hampton Inn beds each night. And we only got lost once, on our way to Route 64. It was tricky. I don't think we were the only ones who ever got lost there:

And we were especially happy when we saw this: