Bluebonnets and sunshine make up for a a lot

We made it! 2000 miles, give or take a few and we crossed into Texas five days after we left northern Idaho. The trip felt a little like a Pony Express crossing, since we hit snow in Montana, fog in Wyoming, insane wind gusts in Colorado and New Mexico, and blinding morning sunshine as we crossed west Texas.

But we made it, and Miss Lily never threw up in the car, so we're calling it a success.

We also saw umpteen antelope as we drove down, bringing back fun memories of our family road trips. When our son, Dan would get bored we'd somehow talk him into counting antelope - possibly because there are not many different license plates to count crossing Wyoming or Kansas.

Along the way we listened to The Woman in Cabin 10, on audio books. Not great. Not horrible but not great - I can't say I'd recommend it. I'm hoping there aren't many women on the planet who truly use the F word that often. We should have stuck with Killing Lincoln, but that'll keep for another road trip.

We're now in a hotel near our new home, waiting for closing and the movers to deliver all our junkola. Lily is currently in dog prison, waiting for us to rescue her. I went and visited her yesterday at the prison and she almost jumped into my arms, making pleading squeaky noises that I believe could be translated into 'please take me back with you.' Alas, we didn't. We've got enough to do that eight lbs of fluff just isn't helpful, although I sure do miss her. Life is better with Lily in it.

We went and checked out our new home yesterday, thinking it would be just about ready to go. Not so much. No appliances, trim to be touched up, towel bars to be hung, and a pretty decently long list of stuff to be done. Instead of fretting over any of it, we're going to keep a good attitude, and pray that about 99 gazillion people show up the next two days to work miracles before our Tuesday walk through. I'm hoping someone notices the potty in the front guest bathroom as I have no intention of touching it with a ten foot pole....

Today we spent a good part of the day shopping for furniture and stuff we've been planning on for months and months. It was such fun to finally walk into the stores and order some of it. A lot of fun purchases that we're looking forward to using in our new little home. Bright patio furniture where family and new friends will gather, bar stools just right for our Littles to climb up onto and eat lunch with us, a new table to hold the TV (we're going to be behind several weeks watching Survivor).

My possibly favorite purchase was a new Apple iMac, which counted as my anniversary gift since Cub Sweetheart will only love it 10% as much as I will. It has a huge screen and great resolution which should be great with my less than stellar vision. Somehow 36 years have already gone by since we said "I do". It's gone so much faster than I imagined it would, so I've told God I'd like us to have 30 more. Seriously. After 30 more we might both be old enough to say we've had enough. He'll be 96 and I'll be close to 92, so maybe 35 more.

We're hoping to bring Miss Lily back home with us by the weekend if all goes well. Right now she can walk right under the new fence and go exploring, so that too has to be fixed before she can move in. And a dog door added so she can come and go as she pleases when we're away for the day.

Cub Sweetheart also had a reoccurrence of shingles, just in time for the road trip. Apparently once you come down with them, they can make a reappearance. Not great timing, and doesn't seem fair since he got the vaccine five years ago. Probably feels even more unfair to him than it does to me.

So there's a decent length list of not so greats going on right now. Shingles, nasty potties, lots of stuff still to be done at the house and we close in four days, we're living in a hotel for a week (not sure if that's a plus or a minus), and Lily is in dog jail.

But we're also having tons of sunshine and blue skies; the sides of the roads are covered with blooming bluebonnets and indian paintbrush and buttercups, and as of tonight 99% of the guests have checked out of our hotel, after having been here all weekend for a baseball tournament. Last night the pool and hot tub looked like Shamu was swimming about; tonight it's completely deserted so I'm headed there with my kindle to finish up the evening. Back soon, maybe.