Westward, Ho!

In a few days we'll be packing the van with enough clothing, food, and portable baby furniture for a ten-day jaunt to the west.

My band has a gig in Baton Rouge so we'll head that way on Tuesday, then the following Sunday will find us wending our way farther, to Austin (with maybe a pause in Houston).

If you know where we live and are thinking of robbing us - you could only improve the place. Casa de Crazy is a dusty, cluttered mess (no kidding, I took down a twelve-foot cobweb the other night) and all I ask is that you clean up as you pilfer - I do like a tidy thief.

Also, please time your pillaging for when my dear friend K3 is NOT here watering the garden, petting the cats and telling them how marvelous they are, and feeding the beetle strawberries (I'll tell you about the beetle another time). She's a lovely woman and shouldn't have to put up with shenanigans.

The first leg of our journey is a nine-plus hour drive, not including stops. We're breaking it into two days unless Sprout is miraculously content to be in the car seat (I never met a baby who so loathed the car seat - you'd think I was dunking her in an acid bath, the way she reacts to being buckled in). We'll be sleeping in a loft with several other people we don't know - I'm thinking about asking the Voodouns there to sacrifice a chicken or something so she'll sleep through the night - bad enough when she wakes me up...

The drive from Baton Rouge to Austin is close to eight hours. At the end of that drive, I am hoping there will be a shower and indoor lodging of some kind (with air conditioning), and I will finally get to meet the rest of Someone's family, including his son! I will also, perhaps, get to meet a beloved friend whom I've never met in person - we've been e-quaintances since forever, and she lives in Austin, so why not take the opportunity if we can?? Meeting people aside, I have two goals while in Austin - attaining and eating a Round Rock Doughnut, and consuming a beef rib. I have never had either one, and I am told that's a shame.

On Friday the 20'th, we're heading home. We may do the drive in on day, or we may stop and do it in two - that depends once again on how well Sprout tolerates the drive. She's such an active baby, I know being bound up in that seat pains her.

As an aside, I think the people who made car seat laws should have to take my daughter on a cross-country trip. I bet they change the laws...

And please don't natter at me about how car seats save lives. Of course they do, and I am all for them, in moderation. I also think seat belts should still be voluntary - my life is mine, and if I want to risk it by not being belted, that's my choice and the government and society can go whistle (by the way, I always wear my belt on public roads and on most private ones, too). Meanwhile, when the baby is screaming and we're stuck in a three-hour traffic jam in the middle of nowhere, Virginia, and there's nowhere to stop, no exit, no pull-off, nothing, and we're almost out of fuel so I have to turn off the air and open the windows to an eighty-plus-degree day, I will take her out of the seat and hold her in my lap if that's what it takes, and no state trooper who is a parent would ticket me for it. The safety Nazis can kiss my capacious bottom.

So the next few days will be busy - there's laundry to do, a run up to Mum's to pick up some much needed yarn, grocery shopping, van cleaning, and packing. Luckily, the Evil Genius is spending Easter weekend with his father, so I have one less person to feed, clean, and entertain while managing all this trip prep.

Wish us luck on our drive, wouldja??