Driving Back to Brandon

Today is Thursday, June 20, 2013.

After a leisurely breakfast I started out from Kansas City.  I managed to stay on the right roads through several highway changes, and marveled once again how spread-out the Kansas City metro area is.  Once on Interstate 29 going north, I relaxed a bit and sang along with some music.  The weather was just perfect for driving.

Before leaving Kansas City, I found a bagel shop in Omaha that had free wi-fi and altered my driving directions to find the place.  Fortunately, it was right where I expected it to be.  In order to avoid having to turn left without benefit of a traffic light, I decided to keep going east on Dodge Street, then find an intersection with a street light where I could turn left.  I would just loop around to the left, then turn right on Dodge and be going west, straight onto the Interstate.  (Since the accident occurred while turning left, I'm going to be very leery of left turns for a while, I think.)

Unfortunately, when I got back out on Dodge Street, I kept coming across the No Left Turn sign. I must have passed five or six of them, and started to panic, thinking I would surely be lost in Omaha during rush hour traffic.  Then the road I was on veered to the left, because the street I was on became a one-way street going the opposite direction.  Suddenly I was in a one-way street with several lanes.  Finally, somehow, I found myself in a left-turn-only lane and turned left, and the next street was... Dodge.  I'm still not sure how that happened, but I was thankfully able to turn left on Dodge.  I made it onto Interstate 680 and from there to I-29 going straight north.

With a sigh of relief, now that I was on the road home, I turned on my CD player and sang my heart out all the way to Sioux Falls.  From there, it was a short drive home on slower roads.  As I drove, I thought to myself how lucky I am to live in a latitude where the sun shines on into the evening hours during the summer.  That was one thing I really missed while in Florida.  I really do need my evening sunshine during the summer.  The sun comes up earlier in the morning here, too, in the summer.

In Brandon, I went straight to my parents' place, knowing they were worried about me and my mom (a nurse) would want to look at my bruises, etc.  When my folks were satisfied that I was really OK, I went home and accepted some help with my luggage from my sister, who lives across the street from me. Before leaving the folks' place, I collected a really good-looking zucchini that my folks pulled out of my garden (in their backyard) the other day.  I think I will have a couple more zucchini ready to eat tomorrow.

It's so good to be home!  :-)