Softball Road Trip, Part 1

Danielle's travel team finished up their fall season with a showcase in southern Tennessee this past weekend. The fields we played on were actually across the border in Georgia. Danielle left school an hour early on Friday so we could get a good start on the 7 hour drive. Tyler opted to stay home for the weekend, which was probably for the best. He was able to take care of Clara for us. He also would have been miserable with the hotel accommodations and cranky about the fact we listened to Christmas music pretty much all the way there and back. I know he enjoys having the house to himself and having the freedom to come and go and get up and go to bed when he pleases. I am thankful he is responsible and trustworthy enough to leave home alone for a weekend.

We took a break to stop for dinner somewhere in southern Kentucky. There was a Halloween store with sale signs on the door just a few doors down from the restaurant, so we made a quick trip through there before resuming our travels. Tyler really, really wanted a fog machine to enhance the Halloween décor this year, but we didn't want to spend that much money. We promised we'd look for something on sale after Halloween. We found one for a decently discounted price at the KY store, so we picked that up for Tyler. We may have tried on some costume heads, too.

We finished our trip and finally rolled into the hotel a little after 11pm. This showcase was a "stay to play", which means we had to stay at an assigned hotel if we wanted to participate in the tournament. Unfortunately our team drew the short straw and got stuck at a Motel 6. And, since all the hotels in the area were full because of the showcase, they all inflated their prices. So, we paid twice as much as usual for a sub-par hotel room. And it was just about as bad as we had feared. The towels were dirty. The sheets were dirty. It smelled bad. They didn't offer shampoo. Even if we left we were stuck paying for the room for 2 days, so we made the best of it. (Of course the first thing I did was check for bed bugs. I don't care how much it cost, bed bugs are a deal breaker. Fortunately there wasn't any evidence of those!!) Ron found a 24 hour Walmart and bought some shampoo, a couple sleeping bags, and some pillows and pillow cases. The one nice thing about the hotel was that it was only 10 minutes away from the softball fields, which was a good thing since it was late when we finally got to bed Friday evening and we had to be there by 7am Saturday morning!

Not a happy camper