Travail Log--I'd Rather Be Driving

The day did not get off to an auspicious start. I got up a bit later than I had planned, so I opted to skip a shower and jump right to the road-trip. I left the motel at about 7:05 am to join the mass of other travelers on this wet, dreary day in Tallahassee. Just as I got beeyond the western edge of town, I saw that the eastbound roadway was completely shut down by what appeared to be a major accident. The remnants of the involved vehicles were smashed nearly flat and there were literally dozens of emergency vehicles on the scene, their red and blue flashing lights giving the dull morning an even more gritty, hopeless appearance. I noted quietly to myself that I was glad I was heading west.

About twenty minutes later, I reached for my blackberry, just to see if I had any unread email messages. The device was not attached to my hip and it usually is. I felt around for it and quickly came to the realization that I left it in the motel room. For a brief, confused moment, I considered calling the hotel and asking them to mail it to me, but quickly realized I had no way to call them, since they had my phone. So, I began looking for a place to turn around; it took another ten minutes to finally come to an exit near an overpass, which I took and wheeled around eastward. A lot was done in the half-hour since I saw the accident site. The traffic was still backed up, but most of the clean-up work had been completed, so by the time I reached the place, my wait to get through the carnage was only about ten minutes. My room had already been stripped of the bedding, but my blackberry was there, attached to its charging station. I grabbed them and headed west again.

The loss of just over an hour had an impact on how far I got, but I would not have made it all the way back to Dallas today anyway. I'm staying tonight in Shreveport, which is a good 175 miles from Dallas. I stopped here after dark, so the best I would have done would have been to get 60-70 miles closer had I not had the little delay.

I roared past Pensacola without much of a glance. As I neared Mobile, I thought it looked like an interesting place and might be worth a look someday; there are a few tall office buildings and lots of military ships all about the port area, as well as a very long causeway on the east side of the city. And, there's a tunnel on the western edge of downtown. I didn't pay much attention to most of the cities and towns that I bypassed, thanks to Interstate 10. As I zipped through Pass Christian and Biloxi and Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, I saw only a few obvious signs that Hurricane Katrina had been there, but I was on the interstate and did not get near the beaches. I'm sure I would have seen unrelenting devastation if I had done that.

I did stop in Slidell, Louisiana for lunch, having gotten off I-10 there at the recommendation of Google maps, which apparently did not want me to get too close to New Orleans. I ate at a barbeque place called Bad to the Bone, a cutesy name that was almost too much after I saw that the seafood place next door was called Good to the Gill. Beyond Slidell, I didn't have much rain...not more than a sprinkle, really.

After lunch, I zipped northward on Interstate 12, discovering during my afternoon of travel that Louisiana has a lot of territory to cover, south to north. I had not expected it to take a large part of the day to get from Slidell to Shreveport.

Once in Shreveport and onto Interstate 20, I made an exit after spying a large group of motels. I made the mistake, though, of thinking they were on the eastbound highway feeder road, which was not the case. There is no eastbound feeder. So, I watched the motels disappear as I re-entered I-20, heading east. I tried to recover as best I could by taking another exit which I expected would allow me to turn around soon, but that was an unmet expectation. Instead, I found myself wandering down some very dark and seedy-looking streets until I saw another outgrowth of motel lights, this time much less upscale than the places I had seen earlier. I'm not a fan of driving in the dark, so I stopped in to the first place I could, a Days Inn. They gave me a room at a rate I find outrageous...$50 or so...for a badly run-down motel in a questionable area, but I figured that was probably the best I'd get.

After settling in and verifying that their wireless Internet works, I went out in search of food. I discovered as I drove out of the hotel that I am almost on I-20 again, but a few miles east of where I started. I drove across I-20, only to discover that the Shreveport Regional Airport is just on the other side of the freeway. I learned this after I had already entered the airport. I intended to turn around, but there was no place to do it and very soon I came upon the official entrance, sporting a booth and a stop-sign. I stopped and a guard came out and told me immediately to pop the trunk. I explained that I did not intend to go into the airport; I just wanted to turn around. He said I had to loop through the airport, so he would have to look in the trunk. Not knowing how to open it from inside the car, I jumped out and opened it for me. I also said I was looking for a place to eat and asked for a recommendation. He asked what I was looking for and I told him anything, just not a chain. He suggested a seafood restaurant attached to a gas station just outside the airport entry. So that's where I went, The Monkhouse Seafood Restaurant, where I got an oyster po'boy and and cup of gumbo to go. Nothing to rave about, but not terrible food.

And so there it is, in all its intensely-interesting glory, my day on the road. I did take a few pictures with my blackberry camera; I may post some of them in the not-too-distant future, if they're even moderately in-focus.

Tomorrow, I'm up at 4:30 am for a 5:00 am Skype conference call for a client, hosting people from around the globe. I'd rather be driving.