Delayed in Muskogee…

I’m writing this from the Country Inn & Suites in Muskogee, Oklahoma, where we’re spending a second day and night, an unplanned situation made possible by the nasty winter storms currently sweeping up through eastern Texas and into parts of Oklahoma. And we have found how spoiled we are as residents of Illinois, where the streets and roads are plowed and salted as needed during storms. Not so in this part of the nation! I do not wish this to be a complaint-filled post, so I’ll leave it at that.

Why am I way out here in Oklahoma, you may ask? We started our annual February vacation early yesterday morning, pulling out of our driveway in Aurora, Illinois, right at 7 a.m. Central Time. Our planned ten-hour drive was to this spot in Muskogee, with the intention of continuing our westward drive to the Austin, Texas, area to spend a few days there with my wife’s nephew, who works for the University of Texas. 

We are keeping our fingers crossed that the brunt of the storm comes and goes today and things clear up enough at some point tomorrow so that we can get back on the road. We’re content to stay in today, and the good folks here at the motel are providing a comfortable stay. The hot breakfast was delicious, and there’s plenty of coffee to enjoy throughout the day.

After the weekend, our plan is to continue the next leg of our vacation, driving to Florida. With the current change in our plans now, things are pretty much up in the air, with everything dependent upon the weather situation.

Right now, my wife is working on her genealogy research across the lobby here from where I’m writing this, and we have the whole area to ourselves. One unfortunate thing, however, is that the desk manager came over and changed the TV from The Weather Channel to Judge Judy! Oh, well, I guess we can’t expect our luck to be flawless all the time. And I have my ear buds in, listening to a radio show from Champaign, Illinois, so I don’t really hear what “wisdom” is emanating from the TV!

Now, I think it’s time for another cup of the hot coffee and to get this posted and hope that this weather situation decides to cooperate with us and blow itself out in the next twenty-four hours, so we can get on with this vacation! Plus, it would be more encouraging if they would plow and clean the streets and road. Ugh!

The frozen, waning days of 2017…

 

When last I posted, I had every intention of continuing on a regular course of discipline to bring my Route 66 adventures to a suitable conclusion. Well, that didn’t happen, and there are but a few remaining days of 2017 in which to do so. For better or worse, here goes!

On September 15, the third day on the road, our plan was to make Oklahoma City to spend a couple of days. Thus, we enjoyed a continuous array of roadside remnants and classic old neon signage from days gone by.

Here is a sampling of the day’s sights:

The Giant bottle-OK City

Working oil derrick on OK Capital

Solemn memorial at OK City

Toby Keith’s I Love This Bar

The Round Barn-Acadia, OK

Hicks Truck Stop-Chandler, OK

 

A new “cottage season” and Oklahoma thoughts…

Map of Michigan highlighting Cass County.svg (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Ever since last September, when we closed up the lake cottage and moved back to northern Illinois, this is the week we’ve been looking forward to and thinking about.

Yep, it’s time to do it all over again—open the cottage—and these past few days have been all about shopping lists and gathering up things and loading our front dining room and table with boxes and bags and various other items that will be packed in our Ford Ranger or Chevy Malibu to be hauled up to Michigan early Friday morning to begin another “cottage season.”

With all of this “getting ready” atmosphere firmly ensconced, it seems as though it’s been way too long since I’ve attempted any sort of writing—my blog posts or work on my second novel, The Bet, or the various short stories I have “in the works.”

Writing now, I realize even more so that these next two days are only going to get more crammed with things that need to get done, and so I’ll attempt to finish this and get along to tending to many of them.

Of course, the “best laid scheme” often goes awry, and, sure enough, my plan to arise early today and get the yard mowed has gone by the boards because it’s been raining since the wee hours! Somehow, though, before we pull out of here early Friday morning to head to Michigan, I will have to manage to get it cut. My window of opportunity is quite minuscule—and getting more so as the day rolls along—so I’ll have to see how the weather cooperates (or doesn’t!) later today.

And now, it’s time to get busy. My next post will be from southwest Michigan—if I manage to get things done on this end, that is! When I think about it, though, my complaining about such things seems just a bit selfish and insignificant in the face of what those people in Oklahoma have endured and will have to continue to endure. So scratch my whining from the record, in regards to my inability to mow the lawn, please! Instead, offer some good thoughts and a prayer for those who really have issues sitting in their paths. My lawn will eventually get mowed….CortlandWriter

Ford Ranger XLT (Photo credit: Wikipedia)…