Happy New Year, part 1 (the journey north)

Late as usual, just want to wish everyone a happy new year. Ours was fun and fulfilling but filled with the usual drama. Then again, what else is new with our lives? We took a trip up to Quebec City for our annual New Year's Eve celebration and it was a really good time, though the drive is a tough one and this year was particularly brutal.

There are, of course, many reasons for this. First off, it's a long drive through desolate farmland where you really feel like you're in the middle of nowhere, probably because you're in the middle of nowhere. Secondly, we got a late start, as usual, and ended up spending most of our time on the road at night, which I prefer to avoid on this sort of trip. Thirdly, my back has been killing me and it only seems to flare up when I'm sitting down, which many of you know is the position most people assume when they're driving. It is especially trying on long drives like this. Finally, and I guess this is a situation of getting what you ask for, or maybe being careful of what you wish for, but we got slammed with a major snow storm on the way up, and it was really tough.

It's crazy because we haven't had any snow all winter, and of course I have been whining about it, and then the very day that we leave for Canada we get this major snowstorm. Talk about a total bummer. A little sprinkling is one thing, but it was a complete white-out at times, and on more than one occasion I thought the conditions were very dangerous to be driving. I couldn't see the road or anything ahead of me, it was coming down so hard. Plus, the drivers in Canada don't mess around or let a little snow stop them, so they were zipping by me at crazy speeds. When the big rigs went by, and there were plenty of them, they kicked up so much snow that I couldn't even see their taillights. Factor all of that into a 6 hour drive and you can imagine how I felt when we finally got to the hotel. I couldn't wait to get out of that car.

All in all it was a brutal trip, but we made it safely and had a really nice time in Quebec, but more on that later. Kudos to the kids for quietly sitting in the backseat for what was a total bummer of a trip, to say the least. For the record, we hit really dangerous road conditions on the trip back home, but that, as the saying goes, is a story for another time. I'm just grateful that we made it there and back safely. I don't take that for granted for one second.

Until the next time, thanks for reading, and thanks to Finn Frode for the pic.