Road Trip!

We've got our compression socks on and the Boogers are blasting on the radio -- Florida, here we come! We've made it out of our home state and there has been no bloodshed among our children, which is no mean feat, as we live 15 minutes from the border.

My 6 year old is already eating gummy bears and playing license plate bingo and chattering on as usual, my teen daughter just awakened from her sulk by spotting a sun dog (pictured), and our exchange student is in the way back of our van listening to her music. She shared with me that her parents back in Barcelona are so excited about this trip not because of our visit to Florida, rather the road trip itself. "What an American experience!" I guess it is... Traveling 14 hours by car from Barcelona would get you to a whole different country, like Germany.

Things we've seen so far:

• A sundog 
• A swamp with a ton of Trump signs (irony, haha)
• 2 small oil pumpjacks
• 2 deer standing on an outer highway road
• geese flying in a perfect V (we cityfolk rarely get to enjoy this site)
• 2 car vending machines
• Middle Tennessee Castle (yep, it's a castle)
• pretty waterfalls on roadside cliffs/exposed rock on hillside
• a handpainted sign announcing gas prices as "$5 Democrats / $1.49 Republicans"
• a collaged and painted sign reading "Making the Taliban Great Again" with Joe Biden's face superimposed on a stereotypical clipart of a Middle Eastern fighter clutching a Kalashnikov

***

It rained and stormed our entire second day of driving, so we saw a lot of gray.  However, our hotel had an automated pancake maker that infrared cooked both sides on the pancake as it was transported down a ramp and flip-flopped onto your waiting plate: this was the coolest thing my son had ever seen (according to him). When asked for a quote, he said, "I liked it because I got to see it get made and I liked how it was like the Pancake Olympics."