Thunderstorms, Kentucky, Dead Deer and the Waffle House

Greetings from Ohio!

I am currently hangin’ out with my dad in lovely Toledo, Ohio. I’m accompanying him to his 45th year class reunion as well as exploring greater Ohio and the Upper Peninsula (UP) area of Michigan. It is already proving to be a very interesting and entertaining adventure, indeed.

We sort of arrived in the area on Thursday afternoon. I say 'sort of' as we were supposed to fly all the way into Toledo, (via a connecting flight from Cincinnati) but due to possible thunderstorms, all flights to Toledo and surrounding areas were cancelled. So, rather than hang out at the airport until later that evening or more likely the next afternoon, we decided to chuck the whole flying plan and simply drive to Toledo. SO THERE. :)P

$130+ later and a touch and go luggage retrieval situation, we were on our way to Toledo…

When we arrived at the airport, I was surprised to learn the airport was shared between the Cincinnati area and Northern Kentucky. I knew they were close, but I had no idea they shared an airport. (They’ve always been so close – they really seem to get along well…) As I’ve always wanted to visit Kentucky, I was a bit bummed I wouldn’t be able to officially visit the state. And since I rarely count the airport as an ‘official’ visit to a state, I couldn’t legitimately add a Kentucky magnet to my growing and rather dorky US magnet collection… (Sure – I could’ve cheated, but I would’ve been living a magnetic LIE!!!) The situation was clearly saddening…

As we drove out of the rental lot in our very overpriced car, we headed North towards Toledo. As we were driving along, I kept seeing references to Northern Kentucky. I thought it was a bit odd to see so many official references, but didn’t seriously question it as the border was so close by. I continued to be bummed to have not visited Kentucky and tried on several occasions to get my dad to head down the highway in the wrong direction. I assured him we’d need only go across the border and to the nearest truck stop where I’d procure the first, dorky magnet I saw. He wasn’t on board with my plan. Crap.

ANYhoo – As we got closer to downtown Cincinnati, I saw a sign that would make my day considerably brighter. “Welcome to Ohio,” the sign said. WOO HOO! Seems that we had been in freakin’ Kentucky allllll along! HA! Sure, I’m an idiot for not realizing this fact sooner, but whatever – who cares?!? When we go back to the airport, I can legitimately scoop up a Kentucky magnet and all will be well with the world. There will be NO living of the lie and I’ll have a groovy Kentucky magnet to slap on my refrigerator. (Maybe I’m livin’ a few other lies, but whatever. What’s your point? I mean, there’s the whole “I’m a rockstar!” one I love to play out, but we’re not discussing that one right now…)

The drive to Toledo was lovely and definitely quite interesting. Not only had the area suffered rather intense thunderstorms the day before, but there was an AMAZINGLY large amount of semis out on the road. I mean, I was passing 5+ semis at a time! And I occasionally would get sandwiched in between several of them… ACK! I hate that. At one point in time, traffic was backed up in the opposite direction for about 20 miles and the majority of traffic was semis! Traffic was at such a standstill that families were out of their cars, hanging out in the middle of the grassy medians playing Lacrosse and catch! What the hell?!

In addition to very flooded-out farmland and millions of semis, we also saw a few unfortunate deer casualties on the side of the road. Wasn’t really expecting to see a lot of deer road-kill on the way to Toledo… Who knew?! As we were discussing this fact, we noted that we were just entering Dayton, Ohio. My Dad then realized he had seen a dead dear in the road on the way to Dayton, Washington a week prior. Weird! We then further worked out that Dad and Dayna see dead deer on the way to Dayton. Dammit!! Ahhh, fun with words… It was also decided that Dad and Dayna are dorks…

Another couple of fun words I latched onto along the road to Toledo are as follows: 'Waffle' and 'House.' There were many Waffle House restaurants, signs and other assorted advertising blurbs along the way into Toledo. I became very entertained by the sheer amount and decided to announce the existence of each and every reference as I saw it. In a monotone voice… Hey – stupid things start to become veeeeerrrryyyy entertaining when you’ve been up since 3am and traveling all day long. AND didn’t really get much sleep for two days prior… Yeah, ‘lots of things start to seem reeeeeaaaallllyyy funny. Like dead dear on the way to Dayton, dammit!

As I continued to obsess with the Waffle House sightings, we came closer to Toledo. As my Dad hadn’t been in town for a few years and when he was there last, didn’t have the chance to drive himself around, we took the loooooonnngggg way into town and towards the airport. However, as I’d never been there before, it was nice to get to see some of the town before I had to see the airport. (We had to take our rental car to the airport in order to pick up our OTHER rental car… Silly…) When we finally got to the airport, got our car, found a hotel to stay in and got everything up to the room, it was almost midnight. Yeah, that was a long-ass travel day…

However, it was allllll worth it as the next morning, we had breakfast at… THE WAFFLE HOUSE. HA!!!

And with that, I will bid you adieu for now. Coming up next: Maumee, the ‘All-American City’ and drinking several Labatts at the Maumee Eagles club. True story…