We arrived in Enid about 17:30, after a long drive.

Before I went to bed last night, Tyler came back from packing for the trip. I told him to go to bed, he was going to have to get up at 07:00 so we could be on the road at 08:00 or at the latest 09:00. He told me that he had to go say goodbye to some friends... and he foiled my plans to wake him up early.... by not coming home. It seems that he had spent several hours sleeping at Chad's house, and someone woke him up at 07:00. In the meantime, I actually woke up on time and saw that he wasn't home. I made a pot of coffee and banged on JD and Lisa's door to wake them up. I took my pills and tried to decide whether or not to go back to sleep. Before I was done with my first cup, Tyler drives up and starts loading his stuff into the Toyota.

JD and Lisa also get up, and hang around looking morose until I get JD interested in fixing breakfast... ham and eggs and toast. JD has turned into a passable cook lately. This has been influenced a lot by the fact that Lisa doesn't, according to JD.

So, after tearful goodbyes, we're on the road at 08:30. We get about a half-mile, and Tyler yells, "O No!" We turn around and go back and he borrows a pair of tennis shoes from JD, since he forgot to pack any.

Repeat tearful good-byes.

Before we hit Dallas, I think about stopping and visiting Epiphany Bill, but it isn't to be. I should have set something up, but I didn't, and Dallas is (duh) a big town. I was just kinda thinking, gee, if there was a big paint plant along the highway, well, we'd just stop. O'well, some other time.

Tyler is not very good company on this trip. He's nodding, then asleep 30 miles outside of Huntsville. I woke him up when we got to Dallas, hoping he could help me get onto I-35, since I had not gotten a map. We get on I-435, which should take us to I-35 north. Unfortunately, there is a massive traffic jam. I see a "toll road" sign heading north, and I remember seeing a sign from I-35 about a toll road... so we head off north on the toll road. And we keep going north, and feeding the toll machines. We hit the end of the toll road, and I make an immediate left.... west, the way we want to go. It's the JC Penny headquarters. We don't want to go there. Turn around, go north further, and see a sign that says "Denton". Well, I know that Denton is on I-35, so we head that direction. And we seem to go west a lot further that I thought that we should have to go. Well, I need gas, anyway, so I stop and get gas and ask directions. Yup, we're going in the right direction, it's still about three miles.

So, we're finally on I-35. Tyler stays awake until we get a little into Oklahoma, around Anadarko, then he starts nodding off again. I see a Kettle resturant (they serve breakfast all day long!) and we pull over and eat. We have to take all of the stuff from the truck bed and pile it into the cab of the pickup, then we go in to eat. Good food. I had pancakes and eggs, Tyler had the club sandwich. Then we pile the stuff back into the truck and re-secure it and head north again.

Just as we hit the Arbuckle mountains, it starts pouring. This does not last for long, and the stuff in the back seems to be OK. about another 30 miles north we run into another storm, so we stop and put garbage bags around the luggage. It contains not as much rain as the first one, however. We continue north into OK city, where I'm hoping to see a cutoff for ElReno, so we can continue north on US 81, a road that I'm not familiar with but which is surely more interesting than I-35. Well, if there's a cutoff, I missed it completely. We come north past Gutherie and get on a different east-west road, a two-lane in good condition, and go the 30 miles west to 81.

Mom was glad to see us, and we were glad to see her, and glad that our trip was over. Riding in a truck with bad shocks and no AC with the windows down and the wind... well, it wears one out. This one, anyway!