There's no place like home....

The truth is, I'm kind of a home-body, homey. Most of the time I would rather sit home with a good book than go out. That being said, I had a blast in Cleveland. And the best part is 28 hours of driving in 96 hours gave me a lot of time to think (and a stomach ache from all the junk food I ate. My stomach cannot handle fried food any more. Darn it anyway).

The bests and worsts of the trip:

Best Price for gas: $2.41/gallon - Cleveland
Worst Price for gas: $3.19/gallon - Chicago (the most I paid was $2.96/gallon)

Best trip time-wise: Trip home: 13 hours and 15 minutes
Worst trip time-wise: Trip out: 14 hours on the nuts

Worst toll: $5.45 for the privilege of driving on the Ohio Turnpike
Best toll: The toll that you no longer have to pay on I-39 just south of Rockford

Worst food: Nothing - I enjoyed it all!
Best food: Mongolian BBQ. Mussel and scallop stir fry, yum!

Worst overall moment: When my check engine light came on about 3 hours into the drive home.
Best overall moment: When I faith-healed my car and the check engine light went off (I'm certain my car is fixed).

Best book on tape: The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin (love, love, love, love, love this book. Zennie Zou if you haven't read this book you should)
Worst book on tape: The Dragon Mistress by Margaret Weis (this may be unfair. I wasn't in the mood to listen to a book today. I was in the mood to give a concert to my Glitter Girl Bobble-head who accompanied me on my trip....more on this later)

Most exciting discovery: I can trip from Minneapolis to Cleveland without a map and/or written down directions.
What I don't want to discover: How many hours of my life I've spent driving between Minneapolis and Cleveland (if you must know, I estimate 364 hours, which is over 15 days).

I play the license plate game (simplified rules: look for different state's/province's license plates and right them down when you see them. Goal: see all 50 states and DC in one trip. The closest I've ever been was 47). I did see a new one - Nova Scotia. I was very excited.

One of these times I'm going to get pulled over for speeding up to look at a plate. I can see it now:

Officer: Did you know you were going 85 mph back there?
Me: Yes sir. I saw a license plate I didn't recognize and I had to speed up so I could see where it was from. I'm only 11 plates away from seeing them all! I didn't want to miss one.

Do you think that will get me out of a ticket?

Anyway, shout out to the following states and/or provinces: Don't you people ever leave your states? I didn't see you on the way out or the way home and I drove about 1600 miles this week. WTF?

Alaska
Delaware
Hawaii (I have seen two Hawaii plates in my life)
Louisiana
New Mexico
Nevada
South Carolina
Vermont
New Brunswick
Newfoundland (Haven't seen this one)
Northwest Territories
Nunavit (My life will be complete if I ever see this one)
Prince Edward Island (Never seen this one)
Yukon (never seen this one)

My father plays the road kill game. You tally the road kill you see by category: Deer, skunk, raccoon, squirrel, unidentified pile of guts and fur. I always forget to keep track of this until I'm halfway there. By my observation, deer were by far the most popular thing to hit on the roads I traveled on.