A song, and a bit about my day

meee meee meee....

test, check. Can you hear me back there?

Ok, this is a sing-along. Here are the words. The tune is "If You're Happy and You Know It." Ready?

I'm a happy, happy backwater hick
I'm a happy, happy backwater hick
I'm a happy, happy, happy
I'm a happy, happy, happy
I'm a happy, happy backwater hick

Great! I really liked the swaying from side to side bit and the little extra twang I know you added to your voice.

Now, you'll want to know the source of my inspiration, I'm sure. If you must know, I spent the majority of today driving in and around Pittsburgh, which is the big city nearest my home. First, we survived with relative ease the Herculean task of finding a parking place downtown. It was relatively easy because it took us less than 30 minutes. However to get through this particular parking structure one needed to get one's vehicle through spaces leaving about 3 inches leeway on either side (and no, I'm not exaggerating).

Part of the fun was that I was driving using Google directions to places I'd never been. On the third major leg of the trip, imagine my delight when I met the actual locations described in the directions without a hitch. The only problem was that the supposed destination Google found for me ended up being a storage facility instead of the museum I hoped it would be. A kind and clear-speaking gentleman in a gas station gave me perfect directions to the real location I needed. (I, for the record, am rarely clear-speaking when giving anyone else directions. It takes a certain type of brain to do that well.) I was then able to wed those directions to the next set of directions my husband had given me some hours before, and we picked him up from work.

Then the real fun began: a traffic jam causing the 45 minute trip to last close to two hours. And the car in front of me didn't even provide me with any entertaining bumper stickers! But at least my family was all together. (I have to publicly applaud my children who were amazingly good troupers all day long.)

So, I'm happy to live in a place where "bad traffic" means that school has just let out and it takes us 7 minutes to get home from the grocery store instead of 5, or that my biggest frustration is that the driver in front of me is going 15 in a 25. Or that a parking problem means walking an extra 50 yards. I've lived in medium-sized cities and in huge cities, but I have to say if ever I live in one again, I want to do so without ever needing the use of a car. At least, never in Pittsburgh!