The Trip

It has been a tad over a month since my last blog post. What can I say?

I had to take a trip out of town. It was a fast trip—there and back quickly. I left town on a Thursday morning and returned on Saturday. 

It really started before Thursday. I drove to the Richmond airport on Tuesday and picked up two female guests who had traveled to the US from Costa Rica. (That's Costa Rica, not Puerto Rica. Costa Rica is a country. Puerto Rica is a territory of the United States.) Then on Thursday, we drove to Roanoke, Va. I live near Richmond,Va., so the trip was a three hour drive—each way. I've made the trip a few hundred times, but the last time I made it was 18 years ago. Things have changed.

I had a few worries about whether my 26 year old Jeep had another trip left in it. Most of the vehicle is original equipment, including radiator hoses and heater hoses, and it would take only a crack in an old hose to leave the Jeep disabled and steaming beside the road. But I needn't have worried. The Jeep got us there and back just fine.

Our primary mission was to spread the ashes of the husband of one of my lady guests. He grew up in Roanoke and his final wish, as he died from cancer, was to have his ashes returned home. We did that.

I have friends in Roanoke that I would like to have visited, but there was time for only one visit. I drove to a small rural community 45 minutes from downtown Roanoke and visited a friend I met many years ago and for whom I later worked at a robotics company that he launched in the mid-1980s. 

Of course, inasmuch as there were two women with me, there was much shopping to be done. First we went to a shopping mall in south Roanoke that, in my opinion, is a pitiful shadow of its former self. Then we went to another mall, near the airport, that appears to still be doing well but with ominous indications of trouble ahead. For example, the JCPenney store at that mall was running a huge discount sale with signs announcing "Final Clearance — 70% off." It looks like the store may be closing soon. The ladies scored some bargains there.

The next morning I gassed up the Jeep and we hit the road eastbound to my home city. There, more shopping was accomplished, as well as more restaurant meals and a nature walk beside a river that runs along the southern border of my city. The mall in my city is also doing poorly with many stores closing. Maybe the Covid is keeping people away.

One of the ladies has returned home. The other decided that my home needs cleaning and organizing from top to bottom and enlisted me in her program to remake my home.

My main impression from visiting Roanoke was how much the city has changed in 18 years and how little of the city I remember. It was easy to get lost while driving in parts of the city that were once very familiar. The traffic on major roads in the city was insane, not at all as I remembered.

I do have some stories from the trip, but after much thought I've decided they play better in my head than they will play on a blog post. Maybe I'll dribble out a few from time to time.