Vacation - Day One

Pulled in a parking space next to this car, and I decided that this is what our vacation house will be: a recovery house for (three) women!

I'm in Salisbury, Maryland, after successfully making it out of NYC. I got to the rental car place at 10:02 -- Ok, I am paranoid as they have a sign that if you're late, they can not honor the price you've contracted for -- didn't get out of there until 11. Even when it was my turn, there was a delay. The clerk told me my American Express card was expired. No, it's not, I say. Yes, she points the computer, this says it is. She hands me the tainted card, and I looked at it (since I thought I"m losing my mind) and I say, the card says 5/17 -- that means May 2017 so it's not expired... "but this [pointing to the computer] says it's expired.

How do you counter that? I point again to the expiration date... and finally she did something and the computer "accepted" it.

Oh well, not much traffic. Stopped for lunch on NJ Turnpike, stopped and took a little nap in the car when my eyes were getting heavy.

This hotel was the ultimate in "you can't get there from here." I had the printed directions which can get very confusing when often you can see the hotel and just drive there rather than go .1 mile this way and 500 feet that way -- especially when the street names aren't showing. I knew I was close and then I saw the hotel, pulled into this parking lot hoping the lots connected but they didn't. I was tempted to drive across about 20 feet of grass.

But I tried again and I swear I went about half a mile away from the hotel on this back road, then made this big turn and got there. When I checked in, I asked if I had come on the hard way, and the clerk said no, that's the way.

The view from my third floor room where the windows were full of condensation but the only view that's obscured is one of the parking lot.