When I was a kid, all of our vacations required traveling by car, er van (that's what it takes when you have a big family). Preparing for a trip didn't just mean getting packed and putting the house in order ('I don't want to come home to a messy house and sink full of dishes') - it also meant getting the vehicle prepared as well.

So early this week, I had the oil changed and a minor repair made to my 2-piece front bumper.  Every day this week that I drove the car (which was a lot for me since I work from home) I made sure to clean something out of the car.  Today I treated myself to the 'elite' services at the local car wash (vacuuming, waxing, etc.) and that means my girl is ready to help me hit the road on another adventure!

I'd like to say it is for fun, but like most of my trips - it is for work and hey, I do prefer to drive over flying, so I'm kinda looking forward to this jaunt despite the fact that Nick won't be along this time - he has been on every one of the work trips over the last year and it won't be the same without him!  However, I'll have a co-worker & friend with me who, besides being a multi-time road trip companion, also just happens to be a professional photographer, so I may actually get some awesome photos to post here for a change!  (keeping the fingers crossed!).

I have thought about making the traditional road mix, but she and I usually end up talking so much that we never really get to listen to the mix so and I have Kara Cooney's new book about Hatshepsut on my audible, so..... anyway, I have a few hours to think about it!

Anyway - Nick - the posts on this trip are dedicated to you!  We will miss your looking out for us, the conversations we have while you smoke cigars in front of the hotel, the laughter & hard work and the kind little things you did to help us feel not so far away from home while traveling for work.  Thank you for everything!

Yes, you would be correct - that's the beautiful city of Chicago off in the distance and that's as close to it as I got! Not to worry, I've sampled Chicago before so staying outside the city on this brief jaunt was quite alright with me!

I flew out to visit Michael (see previous posts all over this site) and a lovely time was had by all.  US Airways Vacations got me a terrific airfare/hotel combo so I stayed in a lovely hotel (with a free shuttle from & to the airport) and I upgraded to first class coming home using miles (yes I'm spoiled, don't judge me).  Grubhub provided a wide range of places that delivered (room service is expensive).  It wasn't a "cheap" trip but it certainly was affordable and that's the point, right?

Yes, I know the airplane is American Airlines - but with the merger with  US Airways.... you get the point.

And now a word about RC Cola..... you can get it in Chicago!  It used to be more readily available in the Philadelphia area - in fact, growing up in Oaks, there was one at the gas station down at the corner across Egypt Road and the sodas were a quarter! Of course that was back in the days when soda cans didn't have those nicely rounded bottoms..... Ah! memories!
Unfortunately it doesn't taste the same as I remembered it - which was quite a disappointment, but still - nostalgic!

But back to the trip.... 
I will admit that I have a huge guilty pleasure when I stay in hotels - I watch as much cable TV as I can.  Why? Because I don't have cable TV in my house and without cable, I have NO TV in the house (thank goodness for my wireless blue-ray player, Netflix and Hulu!). Let me tell you - hotel cable is such a disappointment!  There isn't much to watch and I suppose the point is to keep people OUT of the room and into the world.  That said, I still soak up as much as I can on my visits.

Our hotel had round towers as part of the structure so a room in the tower ended up being pie-shaped with the widest part at the windows and the narrowest part at the bathroom/entrance.  I had the tiniest shower EVA (at least there was good water pressure)! One neat thing was that the fire tower was inside the center of the tower - so exiting in an emergency would have been quite efficient (if we had had to do that, which we did not).  Many of planes taking off from O'Hare flew over the hotel and let me tell you, some of them were so low I thought I could reach out and touch them!  It was neat and disconcerting at the same time.

On the way to the airport, I saw this sign which made me chuckle - note the very bottom "kiss & ride" - I hadn't ever seen a sign like this near an airport before - certainly NOT at Philadelphia! ;)

Once again another great road trip that didn't involve driving but in my book still counts as a road trip!  One of these days I will get to make an actual road trip with driving and all that good stuff so stay tuned!