hit the road, jack
driving with penny is more or less a request for scratched skin, torn clothing, and a j-lo buttload of patience.

after driving to houston on friday night with penny refusing to stay calm in the car, i figured the ride back to austin would be better. she had to have gotten used to it, right?

nope. she firmly rejects the nice bed i had made for her on the passenger seat, so i just decide to let her sit in my lap the entire ride.

unfortunately, the good ol' civic was low on juice, so i had to stop to fill her up.

i hop back in the car, ready to hurry back to campus to coach the aacmaballers, but penny is nowhere to be found. i even check the glove compartment, though i'm still not sure why. i finally look under my seat, and there she is -- nestled in the crevice of arguably the dirtiest and dustiest place in the entire car.

it takes me a total of 12.14 minutes to yank her out from under there, and i would have totally confused her for a huge dustball if it wasn't for the purring. but back on the road we go..

2 minutes later, apparently my lap isn't good enough for her anymore, so she claws into my chest and just starts climbing. she gets to the top of the mountain known as my torso and decides to set up camp. i will convenient provide you with visual evidence of this situation in order to show you the full extent of the circumstances thereof.




in hindsight, i probably should not have taken these pictures because it was most likely during this 2 minutes or so that i miss the exit from i-10 to highway 71. then everything starts looking more and more unfamiliar, until finally i call up ophelia to see if she knows the exit i'm supposed to take. she tells me it's exit #295.

sweet! i haven't missed it yet!

"oh, but the numbers are counting down. so if your exit number is less than 295, then you've passed it already."

i was at exit 265.