It’s been a long week, what with rolling out our new website and other items at work.

I’ve been splitting time between being here in the Mount Vernon and Lisbon communities and spending time with family in the Tipton area, it has meant there have been days where a lot of driving was on my plate. Like Thursday, when my sister and dad decided “you know what sounds good for a family dinner we haven’t had in a while? Happy Joe’s Pizza.”

And for them, the drive was 20 ish minutes to Muscatine on Thursday.

For me, it was an hour, no matter which route I took. I had been on Interstate 80 for a stretch of a few miles Wednesday between Atalissa and Tipton exits and semis still tried to kill me by putting on hazards or signaling they were trying to get back into traffic when the route for them to do that was not clear… The backroads during the afternoon and rush hour traffic seemed the safer option.

And of course there is arguing with Google’s GPS when it tries to force me on the detour it wants to take me in around Tipton’s road construction down their main street. “I lived here for more than 18 years. I know what roads I’ll detour on, thank you! I have never gotten lost in this town!”

There was also the stink eye I gave my sister and dad hearing “we were just over at Palisades-Kepler State Park Tuesday with Elysia and Daijon to run off more steam.” You couldn’t give the guy who lives roughly seven minutes away from that park some heads up that we’re at a park near you after asking what I was up to a day before and knew my schedule was flexible? To which they answered “we were only there for maybe 30 minutes…”

It was good family time, though. Got to watch my niece and nephew learn how to play hangman because of a product advertised on the television Elysia saw and said “oh, I need that!” Every adult at the table in almost unison said, you really don’t to play hangman. All you need’s pen and paper and a modicum of spelling. Of course, when mom went to spell a word she almost forgot the second vowel in her three words that would help the youth figure out the puzzle.

And the Canadian bacon, sauerkraut and pineapple pizza is as good as I remember it.