From the backseat

I spent EIGHT FULL DAYS in the backseat of the Buick and such an experience is definitely not one to be tossed away and forgotten without at least a small blog post commemorating it. Indeed the long hours of repositioning for comfort, teasing the guys in the front, rocking out with Jess in the back, digging around for lost phones or iPods or treats or what have you, cannot be treated as some lousy old bag of potato chips, crumpled up and thrown in the waste basket, considered useless and undeserving of further contemplation. Truly, they were important hours of my life full of laughter, sleep, music, and, yes, learning how to have patience and deal with people in such close quarters for so long.

Interestingly, the poor fellows up front were forced to be entertained by my iPod of Jess's most of the time as theirs were too new for our radio transmitter ma-bob.They were very well cultured in pop/rock from Jessica and everything else from me. :) As some of you may know, I like pretty much EVERY genre of music and so over two hours, shuffling my 1400 songs gives you quite the mix! Everything from a cappella groups to Skillet to unique French styles to Michael Buble to Switchfoot to country to Lecrae to Jack Johnson and more! We took great joy in driving them a little bonkers with our enthusiasm and obnoxious singing. Also, they were introduced to my random skipping through songs which I'm sure they appreciated.

I was also in charge of the cooler and snacks within as it resided quite happily at my feet all this time (which greatly limited my sitting/sleep positions). We had made almost 200 Oreo truffles (ended up with about 40 left over), a couple dozen Scotcheroos, a bucket of gingersnaps, and a bag of double chocolate cookies. We also had apples, carrots, chips and drinks to consume along the way. Me thinks we made far too much food for ourselves because we were quite sick of it all by the end and didn't even finish it!

We had some very amusing moments in the car. We all traded easy-going jabs at each other and spent many hours laughing hysterically. One hilarious instance was when we played a prank on Josh. We were sitting at a gas station and Jess is like, "we should totally prank him when he comes back!" so we decided to throw crackers on his sit just before he sat down. Derrick was armed with the three Ritz crackers and as Josh went to sit down, he casually chucked them onto the seat. At the CRRRRRRUNCH!!! we all burst into hysterics, Jess and I practically rolling around in the back seat. Another rather amusing ride included making up stories sentence by sentence as each person took a turn adding to it. Here's an example:

One day Prince Derrick went out fishing. He caught a 50 inch trout. It ate him. So he was swimming around in the stomach acid for awhile. Then he used his amazing physics skills to turn the chemicals into a bomb and blow himself out. He sat rather happily in the fish guts on the beach. Suddenly a beautiful princess named Analea came by. It was love at first sight... when Prince Derrick saw the cracker in her hand. Analea left Derrick and the cracker to be alone with each other and walked off down the beach.

The rest were equally ridiculous but occupied us for about 20 minutes. 

As the hours dragged on, I would alternate between trying to sleep and watching my surroundings. From my position in the backseat I would stare out at my surroundings, unimpressed for the most part by these flat states. Seriously, from the desolate wasteland of southern Wyoming to the dried cornfields of Indiana, to the dead, brown fields of Nebraska, this part of the country is really rather dull. Kentucky was rather beautiful as well as southern Missouri. The fall colours in the trees were stunning. Other than that though, the flat flat flatness of everything was just so bizarre to me and odd to my senses. How I missed seeing even a distant mountain range! I really don't know how people do it!

It was altogether a very interesting trip both in the car and out. I definitely had a blast chillin' in my seat but... if I ever see the inside of the Buick again...it'll be TOO soon!