From San Diego to Quantico

I had the recent joy of participating in a cross-country road trip with my husband, two cats, and the U-Haul trailer we affectionately dubbed "Chucky" because it was red and it was evil, just like the doll.  

There were two large roadblocks- pun intended- on our trip that managed to suck all the fun out of it: 1.) Chucky, and 2.) the cats.  When planning the road trip, we thought towing my car behind his truck would be a good idea because we would have it when arriving in our new home, without the wait or worry associated with shipping, and we'd be able to ride together in one car. We were wrong.  I don't know if anyone is aware of this, but when you Google Map your directions, the estimated time it shows that it will take to get somewhere is calculated under the assumption that you will be driving the speed limit, which is up to 80 miles per hour in some stretches.  When towing a vehicle, you will be lucky if you can get up to 60 miles per hour.  So instead of taking 8-10 hours to get to each of our destinations, it took 12-14.  

The extra time, however, was the least of our worries.  Our sweet, lovable little house cats had never left the comfort of our San Diego condo.  So sticking them in a crate in a car for 12 hours, then letting them out in a strange place turned Tito into a frightened shell of his former self. Mr.Belding was, for the most part, less traumatized, but I managed to fix that a few days into the trip. Luckily, our trip ended in the happiest place on earth (well, before we made it to our new home, which was the last last stop, of course) and it definitely ended better than it started. Mostly.