Road trip. And road debris. Came on a truck tread coiled up in bridge shadow, and had a split second to decide not to try to avoid it—could have wrapped around a tire and taken a fender out. But then I think “OMG! Prius!” because we are low. Wham! We shot it between the wheels, accurately, but brushed it, and I think we may have lost a clip holding the under bumper shielding and got an almost imperceptible ding in the bumper. I am going to take it in to the dealer this week and have it looked at, maybe fixed if we broke anything. But it was tracking perfectly and not leaking anything. We stopped at a service station to have a look and asked them to advise the highway patrol there was a hazard about 2 miles back.
I-90 was a zoo this week, really heavy traffic, lot of trucks, lot of RVs, and tires were failing. Near Ellensburg WA, we saw 7 patrol cars, including the sheriff, and 5-6 car stops—one patrol car had stopped 2 (probably driving together) and interspersed with all of it — 2 lunatics intent on driving 90 (speed limit is 70.) I think one of those was one of the stopped cars.
Tired, really tired. It was a ‘family needs us’ kind of trip, we hadda go, but are glad to be home, ding in the bumper and all.
Glad family needs have been (at least temporarily) met and you are back home where you can relax. How did you handle the issue of now four cats while away… or was it not that long a trip and copious crunchies and water left out could do the trick?
It was a copious crunchies and water event. Thank goodness. We have friends who helped us out on the last, longer trip. But we are VERY tired and very glad to be home in once piece. The 2 of Lynn’s kitties are still not able to be handled, but are slowly getting better. We’re working on it. Now I just have to go wash the pond filter.
Why do you drive these lot distances, so much ? Are flights not a better way, to go ?
There’s 2 of us, #1. Expensive. And while I used to take great pleasure in flying, it’s now become such a nightmare on the ground that I’d rather drive 3000 miles than fly the same distance. And have generally done so. I like to see the country. I like to arrive not mad.
For me, when I fly it’s like it takes a couple days “for my aura to catch up with me”. I don’t feel like I’m really grounded there. Don’t know how to describe it. (And TSA, shudder…)
I don’t pay half a thousand dollars to be treated like a criminal. I absolutely detest what flying has become, and the more so because I used to love it so much.
I am of an age when we dressed up to fly.
I’m now disabled enough to walk with difficulty and the TSA and gate agents are so nice now. And I’m difficult: I travel with a film camera and film and I don’t like it to go through the x ray machine no matter what they say.
But they’re so nice now and no, it isn’t worth it.
Fair enough. I was under the impression that flying was so inexpensive in the US, it made no sense to do otherwise. Have you ever been hauled over by the border patrol, to account for yourselves and your movements, as the alternative to the pre-crime treatment, of the TSA?
I’ve been detained in our own customs, because my traveling companion decided to save room in her suitcase and dumped all her prescription meds into one ziploc. OTOH, customs in Glasgow searched our bags, then very neatly put everything back. With a smile. US is going to leave them a mess for you to put back.
We shared a hotel with the TSA recruitment, and after they were being oh-so security-conscious and hush-hush, they had to ask help from an sf convention to take apart their so-secret computers that nobody unauthorized should touch, because they didn’t have the know-how to pull the plugs out of the sockets and pack up. I kid thee not. Apparently the people who set up the computers for them couldn’t be found and their hold on the area had expired hours ago, with our convention and the hotel extremely miffed. Their area in the hotel had to be cordoned off for biohazard, they were so sloppy with their tests. No, I am not a fan of the TSA.
Oh dear. I passed along your story to DH about the TSA having to call on the supergeeks at the con to break down their computers, and there was much snickering. Sadly, we are compelled to fly if we want to get almost anywhere, but given the option, once we get there we have discovered a love of the road trip. Last vacation, some of our best memories came from the week we spent driving around Wyoming and Montana. Sometime in the next couple of years, we will probably be taking time to visit the East Coast, combining trains with cars to get around once we get there.
The time and ancillary fees and hassles issues make driving preferable for a greater distance than you might think.
I have to drive 1/2 hour to the local airport–probably 1 hour with parking and walking–and 1 hour to Los Angeles/LAX. And I must get there two hours early for TSA groping, and spend some indefinite amount of time packing for TSA and confirming the rules last I flew are still in effect.
Then at the destination, even assuming carry-on only, I have to hassle with getting a rental car or taxi or Uber, except in the few destinations in the US with adequate transit. Then I have to get to my real destination, which is not the airport.
So, 3 hours preflight, two or three in flight, including tarmac time, and another hour postflight. In those 6 or 7 hours, I can travel at least 300 miles at a much lower cost, considering parking fees, Uber, etc., and have my own car in wherever I’m going–cars getting so complex now, it’s not an inconsiderable advantage.
(I was on a business trip in the Island of Rhode. Sudden blinding downpour. I reflexively hit the wiper stalk…and shifted into ultra-low; the over-rev interlock that’s supposed to prevent that? Beats me. Naturally, I flipped the stalk back up…and shifted into reverse; the interlock that’s supposed to prevent that? Also out to lunch. Fortunately, the road was slick enough no damage was apparently done, but it gave me a new perspective on what rental cars go through.)
I’ve been considering changing cars. Bad news, the Prius V is apparently history. 🙁 Good news, the Kia Niro is top rated by Consumer Reports, and is a plug-in hybrid with enough range for my usual errands whilst still having a 500+ mile highway range, which is very convenient in the W. US.
Logorrhea apologia.
This is why I drive 400 miles to visit my brother or my sister – it’s easier than dealing with getting to the airport and getting a car at their end, which I’d have to return at the airport coming home. With all that (and getting to the airport without driving is difficult), it’s going to be close to the same amount of times as just simply driving in the first place. And I can stop more easily when driving. (It’s a seven or eight hour drive, depending on how many times I stop. I know all of the rest areas on the route, and have a usual place to refuel both me and the car.)
The last time I flew anywhere was to Kansas City for 2016 WorldCon. Since then we’ve driven to Maine, Chicago, and Indiana from Maryland. Airfare may be comparatively cheap, but that impacts safety. The hassles with security are a real pain, and when you get where you’re going you have to rent a car, which for a week in Texas can cost as much as airfare. Since we’re retired I’m of the opinion we should take our time and drive even though it’s statistically safer to fly. I’ll be through with every 3 week cancer treatment on Nov. 5th, and after that I’d like to take off on a road trip to see my husband’s mother and his oldest son, which will be a loop through east Texas and Florida (and a better time to visit those places with less heat and humidity).
I did not appreciate it when my grandmother, at 99, was publicly searched before a plane ride between states. I know the historic arguments of why that’s done. But it was unnecessary and only served to show me and others that the search was to show just how vigilant and secure they thought that was, when to me, it showed a lack of judgment and a lot of mistrust ana paranoia for no reasonable cause. I didn’t care that they searched me too. I put up with them searching her because I had to. But I was offended personally and as a citizen. It was for show, a sham. There was a time when I would not have been so outspoken, but the more I see lately, the more I think that we as citizens need to speak up at times in favor of our democratic rights, because we are too much at risk of having them eroded away from within, by people who care too much for themselves, and not for the public good, for our country or others.
This is one planet. We all must learn to live together, or most assuredly, we all will not be able to live separately. — That’s a paraphrase of Ben Franklin’s statement during the American Revolution, but it holds globally.
I am tired of all the divisiveness and prejudice we keep seeing, both internally and in other national governments across the world. That kind of hate and fear-mongering is wrong and not healthy or helpful in our world today. Not within one country and not between countries.
People matter beyond little differences, even beyond major differences, and more than some arbitrary borders. When will people learn to see that, instead of demonizing the other guys? It’s so unnecessary. I wish we would hurry up and outgrow it.
That’s why a lot of us refer to that stuff as “security theater” – it’s there to make people think they’re safer, but it doesn’t do anything to actually make it safer. (In fact, I’ve heard of enough incidents with TSA that I’d say you’re less safe with them on the job.)
And then there was the time I took my then 17 yr old niece on a trip. Like any teen who hadn’t flown before, she had this humongus suitcase stuffed so full that it had to be sat upon to be closed and it exploded when opened. We got held up and inspected at every checkpoint because the powers-that-be were sure they scanned a pair of lethal terrorist scissors concealed in the suitcase. This wasn’t even in the US; Canadian authorities can be just as foolish. I should have told her that if she travels to Cuba with me, we aren’t likely to go any place fancy enough to warrant eylash-curlers.
Glad y’all are home safe and sound and getting a chance to rest.
I had a fun question regarding kabiu and another regarding whether there was a word for a great yearning for a favorite food, not the salad word, whatever it is, and not man’chi, but some word that expresses when we get a craving for a favorite dish. The other was a question about whether such things as Spam (or some Spam-like atevi or Mosphei’ product) would be kabiu, or something like pineapple or coconut, which are somewhat year-round, I think, in their native environments. It generated a little fun speculation and varying opinions, toward the end of the previous blog post. I thought it might give you a good laugh, besides that I was curious.
A good weekend so far here, nice hot sunny weather, very typical. Almost but not quite met neighbors. (bunny stop.)
I’m doing laundry and a rewatch of Stranger Things season 2, and want to read some besides.
Aso, I ordered and received (yay) a crock pot to try out next week, after a grocery run.
Gosh, I’m surprised the two new cats are not fully ensconced by now and with Sei and Shu. Best Wishes for the four of them. My two are being their usual wacky selves, very good (mostly).
I just saw a video with a blue-point Siamese kitten with the biggest ears to face I have ever seen. Dunno if he/she will grow into those, or always have ears that big. Way bigger than the usual proportion. There must be some unusual kitty genetics going on there. Also very nice markings, almost white body, the Siamese points were very limited at that age, just the feet and half the tail, the ears and only the end or tip of the nose and mouth, the muzzle. Not sure if he or she will grow out the points to the usual Siamese pattern, or if the dark blue-grey and paler silver-white are masking it for now or lifelong. Huge ears and all, the kitten ws very nice looking. The kind o thing cat lovers would appreciate. unusual enough to look exotic or alien for inspiration.
The huge-eared kitty is probably an Oriental Shorthair – and the adults have ears that are just as big in proportion.
Earth fruits are interesting: you get the ones like peaches where the tree blooms in spring and the fruit is ripe in summer or fall, the ones like loquats where it blooms in fall and the fruits ripen in spring, and the citrus fruits where the tree blooms in spring (mostly) and the fruit is ripe the next winter or spring (and requires some winter chill for best results).
Skippyjon Jones kitteh!
People always wonder what you do with a crockpot in the tropics. You can put something on to cook, it won’t turn the kitchen into a sauna, and by the time you get home from work, dinner is ready or mostly so.
I occasionally get cravings for sunflower seeds. Must be a cockatiel in my ancestry 😀
YouTube: “Maned Lioness Shows Male and Female Traits”
https://youtu.be/HcvRM4oqCAY
A short video on a lioness, one of a few around Okovanga in Tanzania, who are lionesses who have manes and some other masculine traits. The video goes into this as likely a shared mutation causing a hormonal condition. The video theorizes that this gives their prides a competitive advantage, in that more lions who appear male can better defend the pride. (The video states that they think more males in the pride help defend the group better. But my understanding is that females also act in hunting and defense of their pride, not only the males. So I stated it differently.)
The lioness they show appears both somewhat masculine and feminine. The video said she’s “truly female” despite the mane and a deeper voice. It did not say if she has other male-like physical traits, and did not mention at all the concept of being biologically intersex, which can happen with humans and other mammals.
This caught my interest, and I wish they’d had more about it.
A good friend of mine is a wildlife – specifically lion – biologist. I often help put these days when she gives lectures. Lion manes are very hot, heavy and “energy expensive.” This is one of the reasons the lionesses do much of the hunting. It “costs” them less energy… and ensures their cubs are fed. So, I suspect in the long run the partially maned trait on females would prove evolutionarily maladaptive.
The Nature video noted the Okovanga area was geographically just isolated enough that it was likely preventing the local mutation from being diluted or bred out by the majority population genetics. That, and the slight advantage of appearing to other prides to have more males, were the video’s claims for why it was persisting. The video also said that within the pride, the maned lionesses were recognized as female, although with some masculine traits. The point that the extensive thick mane of a male lion is a heavy heat and energy burden, they really ought to have pointed out. That’s a really good point. I would guess that the climate there is subtropical but dry, somewhat similar to parts of central Texas in water and temp. (I don’t know.) But if their daily summer temps are in the mid to upper 90’s and above, as they can be in central Texas, say, or toward San Antonio or down toward the Gulf Coast, then yes, a heavy mane would be a hindrance in the heat of the day and in extended exercise. But apparently, there’s variability there, for nearly all males and occasional females to have a mane.
Interesting too about the maneless male lions. That would indicate other (but similar) hormonal or physiological stuff going on with them. I hadn’t known until recently how there are a range of things that can go on with humans that affect biological, physiological gender characteristics. So presumably, many of the same sorts of things could affect other mammals.
I had biology in college, the usual two semester freshman intro course for my science requirement. I remember we went by any of that very quickly, though we did have part of one lecture on how hyenas mimic both genders, or other such things in other animals.
So Mother Nature is not always so perfect as we think, and yet there are adaptations.Raesean, really interesting that you get to help out with a range of fields. That must be exciting. 🙂
“The Shadow” and “The Darkness” were unmaned males. You can see them at the Field Museum in Chicago.
I had something similar happen to my Prius a couple of years ago – it was something metal, and I couldn’t dodge because it was one of the middle lanes of a busy freeway. Clang! It dinged the transmission crankcase, but it was a very slow leak. (I got it fixed a couple of months later.)
The last object I hit was a small bird, probably a bushtit, that was fluttering over a freeway transition ramp. At 50-plus mph, it died really quickly, with no mess. (Its revenge was having to get it out from under the wiper actuator, where it had ended up.)
Oh, dear. I wish the world would lighten up on you guys and let you stay put and breathe for a while.
I hope you guys get to stay put for a while now, finally get out of damage control mode and go back to normal mode for a long while. I hate flying, too, for exactly those reasons. Such a PITA dealing with the TSA.
I think I would rather have been on your whirlwind 3000 mile trip than where I was — in hospital again, ostensibly with pneumonia. Admitted on the 20th with a fever of 103 — no difficulty breathing. Was in 10 days and glad to get out before they killed me. Fluid overloaded me first crack out of the bag (puffing like a locomotive, yet oxygen saturation was 95%) Took an x-ray and my lungs were full of fluid (DUH!). They were going to have the radiologist siphon off some of the fluid between my lungs and chest wall. He cancelled the procedure as not necessary. (Nobody bothered to tell me. I was without food or drink for almost 12 hours. Finally at 10 AM I got the nurse to call to find out when I was supposed to go in — only to be told the procedure had been cancelled!) THEN they decided I was fluid overloaded and started giving me a diuretic — at 9 PM! Four days they did this. I’m so punchy from lack of sleep from having to get up and down to go to the bathroom about twice an hour til 2 or 3 o’clock in the morning, I hardly know which end is up. When I mentioned this to a friend who is a PAC and works in another floor of the hospital, she couldn’t believe they were doing it. It’s supposed to be hospital policy that diuretics are not to be given after 5 PM. Mysteriously, my next dose of diuretics was given at 5 pm! By the time I finally got out of the hospital, I was exhausted, coughing because my lungs still weren’t dried out from the fluid overload, and they sent me home on oxygen, which I am weaning myself off of as quickly as possible. You’re supposed to be better after you’ve been in hospital, not worse!!! Amazing how much better a good night’s sleep made me feel, not to mention the peace and quiet, and (as the Aspies in the crowd will appreciate) not having people walking in and out of my room at all times of the day and night.
It was even more of a bummer this time because I not only spent my birthday in the hospital, I got rooked out of a birthday steak dinner at Outback!
I took my oxygen bottle on its trolley today to get my hair cut and do some grocery shopping. Got to use the little scooter in the grocery store. Driving it has a bit of a learning curve. I haven’t tried driving myself in my car with the oxygen bottle in the passenger foot well yet. Don’t know if I’m allowed to. Be just my luck you’re not allowed to do that and a cop would stop me.
Welcome back, Wol! You are having far too many hospital and health adventures. Glad you’re back at home and — yes, able to get a good night’s sleep.
I was on I5 or 99 once, two cars behind a semi when one of his rear retreads exploded! Rubber flew everywhere! Don’t know about the guy ahead, but a smallish piece flew over him and bounced off the center of my hood, leaving a small depresion I never did anything about.
I was on 99 in Bakersfield, a couple of years ago, when a section of space-frame, the kind used for lights on temporary stages, bounced off the truck in front of me. I was far enough back I could slow down a bit to watch it land – it landed to one side of the lane, so I easily avoided it. (I was more afraid of the idjit crossing the freeway in Bakersfield, on foot, a few hundred feet from an overpass with a sidewalk, on a different trip.)
I’ve had a similar encounter with a tree stump in the middle of the lane. It was on I-17 approaching downtown Phoenix in the middle of five lanes of traffic going 60 miles a hour. I’m driving a small Ford Ranger pickup with somewhat high ground clearance. Behind me is a semi and a gaggle of other cars around him. Ahead of me I see a small GM car violently swerve to my right into an empty slot in traffic. Right in front of me is a multi-armed tree stump. Two things registered right away. I couldn’t change lanes with traffic to either side and I was going to get creamed by the semi if I tried to stop.
I did the only thing I could. I took the tree stump head on. There was a small chance the ground clearance on the truck would be enough to clear. A low clunk, then a grinding sound and a slight tilt as one front wheel lifted off the ground by a couple inches proved me wrong.
I’ll never understand how the semi driver understood quick enough to slow himself down or how I managed to slowly maneuver my truck to the side of the highway across three lanes of traffic, riding that stump the whole way on three wheels. It punched a small hole in the lower radiator hose fitting and scared the bejesus out of me, but I lived.
Wow!