For the past two years I have spent part of the winter in Florida.  I found a pet friendly rental in Madeira Beach and drove down with my Golden Retriever Honey and a friend to help me drive.  Last year went without a hitch, except said friend forgot her drivers license.  This year not so much, and it seemed that last week in Florida is when it all started. 

The Sunday before we were to head back to Michigan, I experienced what I thought might be severe gas, or a heart attack (pick one)….After two hours of waiting for it to go away, I relented and went to the ER.  They first had to make sure it wasn’t my heart (EKG, Blood work, and oh,  a Nitro pill under my tongue just for good measure.  (Thanks for the giant headache)  Well as you might have guessed, yup, my Gall Bladder.  Emergency Surgery on Monday, released Tuesday afternoon, left for Michigan Wednesday morning. 

In hindsight that was asking a lot of my body not to mention my mind.  We made it to Atlanta that night and found a pet-friendly place to stay.  Score one for us.  I won’t get into the “add a quart of oil immediately” light that came on just as we were going by the airport in ATL.  Rough night trying to sleep, hurt to lay down, or move or get up.  But I made it and was ready to roll out of Atlanta about 10:30am.

It was a beautiful morning when we left, but there was rain in the forecast.  We figured we would be home around 10:30 that night.  Just on the other side of Chattanooga it started to rain and when I say rain, I mean cats and dogs, pitchforks and hammer handles.  I mentioned to Kathy that we had the same exact weather in the same exact place last year on our way home.  She concurred. 

We continued through the mountains and it continued to pour to the point you couldn’t see, but were afraid to stop, fearing  we’d get hit, so we kept going hoping it would let up.  Well it finally let up just short of Nashville. ( I’m telling this story for a reason.)  The pavement was very wet, cars were stopping and going stopping and going.  A recipe for disaster.  Bingo!  That’s right, rear ended…and guess what?  It was raining again.  I get out of the car (ouch) go back and look at my car, no real damage, talked with  the young lady, who’s Dad was her insurance agent, traded information and called my agent. 

Much to my dismay, because it happened out of state she wanted a Police report.  Really?  Was she kidding?  Nope.  Called them, sat in car for an hour + police came, out of the car (ouch) had to move my car to another location where we weren’t tying up traffic, they gave her a ticket and me my police report and we lost almost two hours.

And we are back on the road, and it is still raining.  But we are out of Tennessee, “whew”.  As we go through Kentucky it is still raining and the traffic is quite heavy.  Did I mention it was still raining?   

Driving along with the rest of the traffic, I was on the outside lane and came up over a knoll and guess what?  Yup, cop in the median.  I looked down at my speed and the cruise was set on 78mph so I backed it down to 76 and remained calm.  I checked my rear view mirror and the lights were on and he was on the road.  “What are the odds, Kath?”  I asked.  Well apparently pretty damn good, cuz before I knew it I was pulled over and I gave him my license and registration and he told me he clocked me going 94 mph..Kathy and I had to pick our chins up off the floor.  I said he had to be mistaken, this car has never gone that fast, it wouldn’t know what to do at that speed.  Then he told me he doesn’t just pull people over for no reason and by the way was this my car?  I told him it was and didn’t he notice that the license and registration match? 

I really wanted to argue that I wasn’t going that fast, and by the way didn’t he notice that my last speeding ticket was when I was 21?  46 years prior, evidently he didn’t.  So he took what seemed like an eternity to write me up and return to the car.  I knew I couldn’t argue, I wouldn’t look good in an orange jumpsuit and I wasn’t going to fight it because I sure as hell wasn’t going back down to that God-forsaken state again. 

I was officially defeated.  It was a perfect trifecta, emergency surgery, rear ended, and speeding ticket for 24 over.  If that isn’t a message from God himself, I don’t know what is.  We made it home about 1:00 am, I am still licking my wounds and as God is my witness, I will never drive from Michigan to Florida and back again, EVER.

.