Traffic! You haven't seen traffic until you go thru Atlanta, Ga. I will never go thru there again unless kidnapped. They changed all the names of the hwy's to please the woke so I got lost in my own hometown for the first time in my life. People flying by you, coming out of their lanes [head on collision], lots of illegals libs let in that can't drive a go-cart much less an automobile. Pull in for gas and some thug's are staring you down. Not sure which is worst filling up or giving out of gas on side of road. No I'll never drive thru my hometown again.
We always had to go through Atlanta when we went anywhere when I lived in the South. My wife hated driving in Atlanta (HotLanta), so she would drive to the suburbs and intended to get off at the last rest area and I could take over. She almost invariably didn't pay attention until we were passing the last rest area, so she was stuck driving through the city...and for much of the time we had a standard-shift vehicle. Nothing better to develop left leg muscles that driving through Atlanta! I don't think Atlanta was the worst city to drive in however. Washington, D.C. was worse, as were some areas around NYC. Minneapolis probably has the worst drivers (IMO) and Boston can be the craziest. West coast cities are zooey, but generally the drivers there know what they are doing and the traffic generally moves well unless there is an accident or construction. I used to say that East Coast traffic jams just sit there, but on the West Coast, the traffic jams travel at 70+ mph--heaven help folks if anyone slams on the brakes however
I learned how to drive with a straight shift but wouldn't want to drive one now, too multi-tasking for me now. Lots of drag racing in the 60&70s.Tore out lots of rear ends.
When I was a young man, I drove fast and would switch lanes whenever that would allow me to get ahead of someone. It's not that I was in a hurry, usually; driving was just more fun when I turned it into a sport. Of course, I also got a lot of tickets. Now, I still get a little frustrated with people who are driving too slow, but I rarely drive more than four or five miles over the posted speed, except where everyone is. When driving long distances, I usually take a center lane, set the speed control to four miles over the posted speed limit, and stay there. Whenever I try to be kind to someone who is tailgating me by moving to the slow lane, I regret it because I get caught behind people who are either merging or driving below the posted speed limit, and then it can be hard to get back in the center lane. So I ignore the people behind me and let them go around if they want to. If there's only two lanes, I'll take the slow lane, however.
While traveling can be fun, and has to be done sometime, I miss my cats when I'm gone. More than simply missing them, I feel bad thinking of what they are going through while we're gone. Ella starts getting nervous when she sees the suitcases coming out, although I don't think Bubba has made that connection yet. After we left today, I realized I had forgotten my phone, so we went back for it, and I found Ella under the covers in our bed, which is not where she usually goes when we're not there. I think it's a security thing. Oh, someone comes by to give them wet food every day, to hand out treats, and so on, but it's not the same. She says that she sometimes doesn't even see Ella, so she hides from her, apparently. So physically, they have everything they need but I don't think it's easy on them when we're gone.
We didn't get far today. For no reason that I could determine, traffic was barely moving all day. We didn't come across any accidents, construction, or any reason I could see for people not moving, but we only made it as far as Mount Pocono, Pennsylvania. Ordinarily, we would make only one stop for the night on this trip, but we don't want to arrive too late.