Every year, for the past three or four years, my wife and her mother travel to Sacramento to visit family over Memorial Day weekend. It’s a trip they enjoy, and one that I typically don’t join them for. We spent some time in the past week lamenting the fact that because Logan is only 8 months old, traveling by airplane wasn’t something we likely wanted to do with him if it could be avoided.
My wife was lamenting the loss of the annual trip and the opportunity to share our son with her family. I was lamenting my now traditional Memorial Day weekend of Drunken Debauchery and Not Wearing Pants. It was a painful decision for both of us.
Nearly at the last minute, sometime on Wednesday, my wife IMs me and asks how I would feel about her driving to Sacramento with the baby and her mother.
I had a chance. I had to play it cool. Come on too strong and she’d ask why I wanted her away (drunk, no pants, video games all day), come on too soft, and she might decide not to go. This was a situation that required delicacy and diplomacy, neither of which are skills frequently attributed to me.
Sacramento is a 9.5 hour drive from Vegas. It’s a trip that I wouldn’t personally want to make. After about 5 hours in a car, my crippled knees start to painfully cramp.
I played it cool.
“It’s a long drive. If you’re going to do it, I’d rather you take my car.”
“That makes sense,” was her reply. It did make sense. My Tdi Jetta Sport Wagon has far superior fuel efficiency to her Mazda 3s, as well as more storage room and more torque for climbing mountain passes. The conversation quickly and naturally turned to one of logistics, and I knew I was home free.
I loosened my belt in preparation for taking my pants off.
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Cameron left Friday morning, and after visiting every rest stop on the way, arrived in Sacramento that evening. They had picnics, went to the zoo, and Logan spent a good amount of time crawling around in an entirely different and new house. Which must be something like the experience I would have if I went to the moon for a weekend.
From what I understand, Logan was very good on the trip, his first long car ride, and spent most of the time alternating between sleeping and keeping up a runny commentary on what he could see out the back window of the car in a language that no one can understand.
While they were gone, I started painting my Bronco. I wore pants for that.
