Michigan, my Michigan, Pt II

It was lovely driving up.



It was less pleasant driving back.



Just to vary my route I came part of the way home via the Indiana toll road. East of Shipshewanna there is one particularly prosperous looking farm with big red barns and outbuildings. Half a dozen draft horses were standing in the pasture next to the highway, shaggy and huge in their winter coats, watching one of their number curvet around looking like a beer commercial.

I actually had great visibility, dry roads and little traffic until we hit South Bend and then it got ugly. There may or may not have been some cosmic significance to that.

Driving in the Midwest in the winter is not for sissies. One needs a keen eye, a cool head, a steady hand--and a liberal supply of windshield wiper fluid doesn’t hurt. I am extremely pleased with Flora’s performance (she is an Impala, the color of Paloma Picasso lipstick, and her name is Flora, the Red Menace) but hate the way she gets snow caught in her wheel wells. It makes a hell of a racket on those blasted 360 degree on-ramps on I-94.

I had to leave the interstate before my usual exit due to a bridge outage; the cell phone rang about five minutes later and the Spousal Unit wanted my location. I told him and he said worriedly “Be careful – the road is really bad east of 116.” I wanted to tell him that west of 116 it wasn’t exactly kippers and a cup of tea, either, but refrained.

I lucked out and got a semi about 100 yards ahead of me and another about 150 yards behind, and made it safely to my turnoff bracketed by these two preux chevaliers.



Got home just before dark.