vacation log - Murphy's laws of travel

I am a firm believer in Murphy's law - especially when it comes to traveling. :) You all know what I am talking about. If you pass up an exit because you are sure there will be 10 more "Charlie's Chicken" in the next 20 miles or if you didn't see one but you're sure there will be one just up the road, than you will either 1.) go 30 miles without seeing ANY more restaurants at all or 2.) see every other chain of restaurant except for the one that you're looking for. We had that happen to us with getting gas last night. We were so happy to see gas for under $4/gal. when we got into northern Florida and southern Georgia yesterday evening. We drove along until we were pretty much on empty. We went cruising off an exit in Georgia all excited over the thought that we would only have to spend one month's worth of pay to fill up with gas instead of two month's worth. You can imagine our despair and disgust when we discovered that all of the gas on that exit was $4.17/gallon. We were afraid that if we just kept going we there wouldn't be a drop of gas anywhere for the next 45 miles (because we've done that kind of thing before in search of cheaper gas). Kevin put in as little gas as possible and we headed on our way again. I do not think I am exaggerating at all when I say we had been on the road for only 10 minutes when we started seeing signs for gas for $3.78/gallon. We were able to fill the van all the way up at a cheaper price though. Then there was the motel. We decided it would be smart to get just to the western edge of Columbia, SC before we stopped for the night. Then we would only have about 4 hours left of our trip. We used our handy-dandy internet to look for a suitable motel. Kevin went in to check in. When he came back out he said, "You are going to think this is a joke but the girl in there said that she doesn't think there are any rooms available in the motels on this exit because there are a bunch of Jehovah's Witnesses." Apparently there was a JW conference in Columbia and there were a bunch of them in town. I told Kevin that was probably what it was like in Dayton, OH in April during IHC. I figure everyone in Columbia pulls their blinds and puts out "We are on vacation" signs so that they don't get knocks on their doors by people out evangelizing. Anyway, we were just like, "What are the odds?" Of course, once we got back on the interstate, not only were there no exits with motels but there were hardly exits or civilization period. I was dutifully searching for hotels online each time we saw a sign that said there was a town coming up. Finally we saw an exit for Newberry, SC that had some motels. There was "Ethel's Economy Inn", "Bob's bargain hotel" (or something about like that) and a Days Inn. We pulled into the Days Inn. Now, we were not feeling uppity or picky by this point (1:00 in the morning). We just wanted a bed and some sleep. However, when we pulled through and saw inside to the lobby and saw the people hanging out outside of the rooms, we both thought that it was scary enough that we just pulled through and kept going. About 3 more miles in from the interstate there was a Quality Inn. It looked um...well at least less scary. After Kevin checked in and we were pulling around to the back of the building, I tried to console us by saying, "I noticed most of the cars look pretty decent like family vehicles or old people's cars". (We still took anything of value into the motel room in case any of those "nice, old people" wanted to steal some electronic devices) :). The room was actually not bad at all. Kaelyn was quite distressed and crying loudly for several different reasons - mostly because it was almost 2:00 in the morning and we had been on the road for hours. She was saying, "go home". Well, needless to say, we didn't exactly sneak in quietly to the motel room. About 6 something this morning the phone rang. I very groggily asked Kevin if he had asked for a wake-up call. He said, "No and certainly not at this time in the morning." The phone rang again so Kevin answered it but all he heard was static. He called the front desk but it wasn't them. My [half-awake, disoriented] theory was that someone was ticked about Kaelyn crying at 2:00 in the morning so they decided to call our room number just to be malicious. Kevin (I don't know where he gets his logical ideas) figured someone was trying to call someone else and just got room numbers mixed up. We still don't know but I did look over my shoulder this morning to see if there was anyone glaring at us when we walked out of the room (there was no one around at all). In the daylight, we realized the surroundings weren't really bad or scary at all. Well, since I first started typing this blog we have had another adventure that put us off the road into a garage worried about the transmission but I am mentally and emotionally exhausted for now so more about that later when it's actually a little funnier - maybe. At least I'm going to keep you all on the edge of your seats waiting for my next blog to find out what obstacle will beset us next. "Look it's Big Ben kids!" (That's for you Rach! and that's the way we feel about now)




The motel (Kevin just hollered out the
window and told the cleaning people
that were watching us take the pictures
that his wife never gets to stay in fancy
motels like this and so she JUST HAD
to get a picture.) Just kiddin' - but not
about the cleaning people being out.