Prelude to a Vacation

Well, I made it through Friday, although of course things got weird toward afternoon and I ended up working frantically, and much later than I wanted to. Oh well. It's over now.

The petsitter is coming Sunday morning to pick up a key and meet Tidbit. Our plan after that (always subject to change) is to head out around noon and hit Oklahoma City by dinner time. We hope to overnight at a B&B in nearby Arcadia and head out first thing Monday morning for Tucumcari, and stay at the historic Blue Swallow Motel. I've read that it's fabulously retro, down to the TVs and the rotary dial phones. I was going to make reservations today, but Dan thought he might be picking up my cold and I wanted to make sure he was still going to be able to head out this weekend. He seems to be okay tonight, and other than a slightly scratchy throat, I'm okay too. So I'll make hotel reservations tomorrow.

I figure it'll take us all day to get to Tucumcari, since we won't be driving straight through on the interstate. No, siree! We're taking Route 66 and stopping at anything that looks interesting. I suspect we'll find a lot of shops and museums closed, it being Monday and all, but I'm really more interested in the things you don't have to pay for, like semi-ghost towns and overgrown abandoned things.

On Tuesday, after overnighting in Tucumcari, we'll head down to my Dad's place in Bosque, just south of Belen. And from there, who knows? Our agenda includes, but is not limited to:

• Sightseeing on Route 66!
  


• Horseback riding in the arroyos near Santa Fe
  


• Hiking to Lake Catherine
  


• Camping in our new tent
  


• A visit to Pie Town and the ghost towns in the vicinity
  


• Tour other ghost towns or Indian ruins
  


• Visit relatives in Albuquerque
  


• Relax on my family's property near Belen (south of ABQ)
  


• Anything else that strikes our fancy
  

We haven't yet planned our route for the return trip. The quickest way would probably be to cut through Big Spring, but we might go via El Paso instead and visit a cousin who lives there.

I'm thinking of blowing off my Saturday long workout, or else doing a fairly short one of no more than an hour. That will give me more time to do things, and there's so much to do! And as luck would have it, I've just broken through a block in my writing where it was a bit of a struggle to keep churning out the pages. So now I want desperately to write but I need to be cleaning house, packing, buying last-minute stuff and all those other things one has to do before heading out the door for two weeks.

Thank God and Dell for laptop computers! I can keep on writing, even if I'm at a hotel somewhere!

I'll be blogging, too, and hopefully posting pictures. More on that tomorrow-- I've got fictional characters I need to torment tonight.