700 miles, 48 hours and 10 pounds of cat shit
I went to see my mom and grandfather this weekend in Pittsburgh. Haven’t seen them since late March/early April, so I figured it was time for a road trip to the hallowed South Hills.
My nerves are kind of shot from a ridiculous six-hour drive back (it’s usually a four-hour trip), but it was wonderful spending a whole weekend with the family. Usually, my trips home are overscheduled with visits to a dozen people, but I kept my presence unknown so that I didn’t have to feel pressured to run all over creation and not get to spend any quality time with my family. That, and trips to Pittsburgh always involve me running the wheels off of my car to go meet people everywhere — most of my trips are always spent en route, and well, I just wasn’t in the mood for that. (Shawn and I have learned the hard way that trips to the homeland do not include people actually coming out to see us, even though we’ve already put hundreds of miles on our cars just to get to their fair city.)
But without an itinerary, I can say that the trip up was a riot. But that’s what I get for traveling with two pissy pussies.
Somewhere on the PA Turnpike, just before the entrance of the Allegheny Tunnel, I smelled a heaping dose of cat shit (with two sick kitties in the back of the car, I expected it, but not a mere two hours into the trip). I figured it was Maddie because she was sicker than Chloe, but when I could pull over (after the tunnel and another 20 miles of construction), we found it was Chloe who shat herself silly in her brand-new cage. Gaah. I had to pull over in Somerset and give her a quick bath and fumigate her cage. And can I say how HUMILIATING it is to walk into a service plaza with a big steaming bag of cat shit to throw away?!?! 😉
But once I got safely to Pittsburgh and let the little hellions frolic through their weekend abode, the family and I went for ranch wings at Getaway Cafe (I used to get drunk and have wings there all the time — I missed them desperately!). And because life revolves around all the greasy, wonderful food in my old hometown, Mom and I took the day on Sunday to wander around the Allegheny County Rib Cook-Off, which we wrapped up with a journey to nearby Trax Farms, where we bought all kinds of specialty foods that I’ve been missing having in my cupboards. Later that day, I took my grandfather to Starbucks (his favorite) for some quality grandfather-granddaughter time, and we all enjoyed a phenomenal lemon cake from the famous Bethel Bakery.
And yes, I did have to lie down to get my shorts zipped up this morning, especially after breakfast at Eat ‘n Park. 🙂 Now I probably won’t eat for two weeks, to recover.
Mom’s high school friend and her son came down on Sunday to visit for awhile — they wanted to meet the the Little Terror, whom Mom and I have renamed “Short Bus Girl,” because she’s cute as hell but dumb as bricks. I haven’t seen her son in years — he’s in ninth grade now, and I was in ninth grade when he was born. I always hated it when people commented on how much I’d grown during those years, but I had to exclaim in shock when I realized that he’s taller than me now (and will be much taller, I’m sure, in the coming years).
All in all, life changes a lot when you’re gone. But it’s nice to have everything and everyone to go back to, once in awhile. 🙂 Good weekend, no question. The drive is nice when there aren’t torrential downpours for 85 percent of the trip, but I’m pretty good in heavy rains. But my wiper blades are just shot — I’m practically scraping my windshield with the metal blades. But I’ll replace them after I get these sick kitties to a vet — and get some Prozac for Maddie, who’s so depressed about not being an only child anymore. Poor kid. 🙂 But she’s not so depressed that she doesn’t swat at her lil sister whenever the mood strikes, and the sad thing is, Chloe usually deserves it! 🙂