Road Trip

Both of my sons live pretty far away so I don't get to see them very often. Mickey moved closer when he got out of the army last December, taking a job in Lincoln, Nebraska. That's a lot closer than Charleston, South Carolina. Then this May Tim got assigned to the Command and General Staff College at Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas. Since they are only about three hours apart I thought it was a great opportunity for me to make a trip and see both of them. Of course I didn't get around to it this summer because we had a lot of other trips planned. Then Mickey accepted a new job in Oshkosh, Wisconsin and started to plan a move at the beginning of November. I didn't have much time left. When Mickey said that he and Tim were planning to get together one weekend in September, I decided to drive down to join them. It would be just about my last chance.

Frank The Cat tries to make friends with me

I left on a Thursday morning. Although they were relatively close, the key word is relatively. It was still a long drive. It took me a whole day to reach North Platte, Nebraska. Then Friday it still took me another three hours to get to Lincoln. Mickey had started work early that day so he got off at noon, which is just about when I got to his house. He and his girlfriend Allie rent a house near the University of Nebraska campus. In fact, the football stadium is just a block away. After the first weekend of football season, they have already learned to hate "Cornhusker Saturdays" when 90,000 people fill the stadium.

It was good to see Mickey and Allie again. Daisy Bear (their dog) and their four cats were there too. One of the cats, Frank, really took a liking to me and sat on my lap the whole time that I was there. I guess he didn't realize that I'm a Dog Person not a Cat Person. I was polite though.

We were all hungry so we went to Big Sal's Pizza for lunch. It was a typical midwestern neighborhood pizza place/bar and the pizza was good. Afterwards Mickey and I drove to my hotel so I could check in. With a football game the next day there were a lot of people in town and I wanted to make sure that I got my room.

We left early for dinner, going to a sports bar so we could watch the Brewer game. The place we went to was jammed. We went to another one. It was packed too. Lincoln is a busy place on a weekend when there is a football game. Good thing I got my room early! We decided to just get some beer and snacks and watch the game at their place. It was a good night - the Brewers won. Of special interest was a play in which Orlando Arcia bunted for a double. Mickey and I are both baseball fans from way back but neither of us could ever remember seeing a bunt double before. According to my research, as of 2015 there had only been seven bunt doubles in the history of baseball. We called it a night after the game since Mickey had been starting work super early all week and we wanted to get an early start the next day.

Tim and Mickey - I told them to smile

Which we did. I was at Mickey's at 8:20 and we were on the road at 8:30. We took out time driving down to Leavenworth and reached Tim's place around noon.

Once again we headed straight for lunch. From Tim's place we were able to walk to Grinder's, a pizza place with lots of tv's for watching sports. I stuck with my usual cheese pizza (which was good). Tim was adventurous and tried their pepperoni pizza with chile on it - the house specialty. He said he liked chile and liked pizza but that he wasn't crazy about the two of them together.

After eating we stayed to watch BSU play at Oklahoma State. It was a big game. Ranked #17 in the polls and picked to win the Mountain West Conference, if BSU won it looked like they had the inside track to a New Year's bowl game. Unfortunately their special teams were horrible, with a missed field goal and two blocked punts, one returned for a touchdown. They ended up losing 44-21. Oh well. It will save me a lot of time not watching college football this fall. That evening we went to Buffalo Wild Wings to watch the Brewer game which didn't go any better. They lost to Pittsburgh 3-1. Afterwards Mickey and I stayed at the Home2 Suites in downtown Leavenworth. Tim's place is microscopic so there wasn't any room for us there.

Pirtle Winery is in an old converted church building

The next morning we went out to breakfast at Pullman Place, a family diner with a railroad theme and good breakfast food. They even had tshirts but for a change I behaved myself and didn't get one. Afterwards we had time before the game so we drove out to Pirtle Winery. It was less than fifteen minutes from Tim's place, in the small town of Weston Missouri. They opened at 11 am and I felt funny getting there at 11:05 but it turned out that we weren't even the first ones there. They had a Viognoles that was really good. I had never heard of that wine before but apparently it is common in New York state and the midwest. I liked it enough that I bought a half case, although I let Mickey have one slot so he could get a bottle of wine. He and Allie like sweet wines so he bought a raspberry mead.

That afternoon we watched the Brewer game at Tim's place. Once again it was frustrating as they lost 3-2. With two army guys and me, there was a lot of colorful commentary on how the game was going. Tim had to keep yelling "Alexa! Cancel!" Mickey and I left after the game as Tim had reading to do for class the next day. We got back to Mickey's at around 7 pm. Since he had to be at work very early the next morning I left after saying goodbye to him and Allie. I managed to drive about three hours before stopping for the night in North Platte (again). I had thoughts of hiking in Wyoming on the way back to break up the trip but there was too much smoke from a forest fire in Utah. I drove all the way home the next day.

It was a lot of driving but it was a good chance for me to bond with my new Subaru Forester. It had 539 miles on it when I left home and 3269 miles when I got home. It was a lot of driving but it was well worth it. We didn't do anything special but I had a lot of fun hanging out with Mickey and Tim and Allie. I haven't had many chances to see Tim and Mickey together since they grew up and left home so I was glad for the opportunity.