BLOGGED AFTER THE FACT: PART 1 - HELL IS FULL OF SEMI TRUCKS

Hello, friends and random Internet people who've never been here before!

I went on an adventure last week!  Sara (one of my best friends in the world) and I have been wanting to go on a girl's only trip for some time now, and after talking about it for a year or two we finally decided to do it!

Sara, who is used to organizing things for her family, basically planned it for us.  I'm very grateful for that! She found a nice Air BnB apartment (this one, which was awesome and you should go and stay there too) which is located in New Smyrna Beach, FL.  I'd never even heard of New Smyrna Beach. It was charming and small, had all kinds of shops and restaurants, and it wasn't anything like Panama City Beach, which is a plus. Trust me.

My part of the adventure actually started on Thursday morning, because I was going to be driving down to Sara's house, which is located in Valdosta, Georgia.  I'll admit, I was a little nervous about driving all that way alone.  After getting my license, I was never allowed to take long trips by myself (I was quite sheltered. Heh.) and even when I became an adult, driving long distances my myself was heavily discouraged by my family.  I'd love to say that I thumbed my nose at them and went where I wanted anyway, but when you have people who you love and trust telling you all kinds of horrible things, it can get in your head. HOWEVER...I finally decided that I needed to be an adult and do this thing, because I'm way too old to have people telling me what I should and shouldn't do, don't you think?  (Yeah, 39 IS a little old to come to this conclusion. I know this. Bite me.)

At first the drive was fine. I had my audio novel going and my GPS directing me through some twisty little north/east Alabama roads.  I was so chill and wondering why I had waited so long to do this.  Then I hit I-75 and was transported into straight up flaming hell, and hell is full of semi-trucks.  I've driven on interstates before, and I've driven next to 18 wheelers, but I swear to you, almost the moment I merged onto I-75 I was surrounded by these things, and I was not prepared. It doesn't help that this particular road is very wide and full of traffic, all going much faster than I had anticipated, but Brunhilde is a small car, and being surrounded by giant trucks unnerved me.  I know it wasn't anything horrible, really, but since it was the first time driving I-75 myself around all the traffic, I was very nervous.  Actually, I did pretty well, all things considered.  I managed to make it to Atlanta and take the proper exit to the perimeter roads so that I didn't have to drive straight through the city (another level of hell altogether) and had just made it to the other side of Atlanta when I almost died.  It was my fault, because I didn't realize the lane beside me was a merging lane, and I was trying to speed up to get ahead of this big semi.  He sped up too, and I had to slam on my brakes to keep from getting destroyed.  It rattled me so badly that I had to take the next exit and sit in a parking lot until I could stop shaking.  Once I got back on the road, and further away from Atlanta, things got a little better.  It was still unnerving to get surrounded by semi-trucks, but at least the traffic thinned out a little.  After that, my main issue was that the last leg of my journey was 127 miles of straight road, and I'd catch myself sort of zoning out while watching the lines go by.  I know road hypnosis, but I'd never experienced it like that before.  Bleh.

Anyway, as you can see, I finally made it to Sara's house in one piece!  Thank goodness!  She and her family had just moved into this house last summer, and so it was all brand new and gorgeous.  Her three dogs tried to eat me the minute I stepped into the house, but they are all small, so I wasn't too worried.  We sat and talked until Ron, her husband, came home and then we all set out to Parent Teacher night at Sara's stepson's high school.  Yep, I went to parent teacher night.  I told them I'd just pretend I was Sara's sister wife if anyone asked.  Ron liked that idea, haha! When we got back, we all sat around and talked until bed time.  Sara and I needed sleep because we were heading out to Florida the next day!  Woo-Hoo!