the long drive back

after spending an incredible time in new smyrna, it was time to head back home.  with much sadness we packed up our suite and headed out.  we were both sad to see it go, but excited to be back home with our little ledger!
friday morning we packed up the last of our stuff, said our goodbyes to the beautiful sandy coast, and were on our way by 9:00am.  i had a blast so far our whole trip, but i must admit, i was really excited for our big road trip back to indiana!  we began our journey north, hitting a few traffic jams along the way, but having a good time.  the worst part of the trip though, was the fact that the truck didn't have a cd player or mp3 player jack.  which means we were stuck listening to the radio or nothing.  usually we just elected for nothing, taking the chance to instead talk and just have fun together!  though i will admit, during those long night hours with diana sleeping, i was really thankful for those podcasts!
we stopped for dinner in atlanta (or as i call it 'hotsie', much to my wife's disgust...) and were still on the fence about where or when we should stop for the night.  we kept on truckin, rolling through tennessee and kentucky.  finally, around 1:00am, diana said the had had enough and wanted to stop for the night.  we pulled off at a couple exits.  at the first one all the hotels were booked, so we continued on.  at the second exit we tried i went in and got us a room, then got back in the truck and told diana to head in to the room and i would park the truck and get all of the stuff we needed and meet her in there.  before i could even get our stuff out of the back of the truck she came walking back out, completely white like she had seen a ghost.  'there is no way we are staying here.  go get our money back!'.  um ok...  i guess she had walked in the room, which smelled like urine, the window was open and wouldn't close (keep in mind it was about 40 degrees out), there were two recliners in the room which looked like they had been found on the side of the road, and the sheets were stained...  needless to say, we got our money back and kept driving!  reinvigorated, i talked her in to just driving through the night instead of trying again for a hotel room.  when all was said and done, we finally arrived back home around 10:00am, bleary eyed, but excited to be back!