So...

Site visits are fun. I get to see what other teachers do and what other classes do. Tuesday, I went to Clarksville. Good teacher, great students. Good stuff.

I had the bright idea that I was going to head up to my parents' house from there, since it is in the same general area. (Clarksville is in Johnson County-- parents live in Newton).

I set my borrowed TomTom GPS for their house and took off. It led me down the road and out of town. Then it led me down a dirt road. I approached this road with a bit of trepidation. But I know, from growing up in the country, that sometimes short stretches of dirt road connect two paved roads. So I headed on. And on. After a while, I decided I must have done something wrong. Or if not, I still could not manage this; my spare is inoperable. Dirt roads are, well, bumpy. I was concerned about my tires. And my well-being. The van has been in less-than-perfect-running-order of late. So I check the settings on the GPS. Turns out, I had told it to take me to Vendor by the shortest route. So I told it to take me by the fastest. And I went down the road again. As I got more dirt roads, I told it to just take me back to Clarksville.

So it led me further into the woods. Eventually, I started noticing how pretty the area was, how clean, how... dust free. No trash in the brush. The road was a bit washed out (not that uncommon here); then I drove over a broken culvert. At this point, I start looking for a place to turn around. I gear down, because the hill is steep. Eventually, I get to the top of the hill. The map shows that it is not that much further, so I thought I might just follow it. Then I saw the tree. Across the road. So I turned around. The last thing I need to find is someone's patch, or worse, lab.

So I get to the bottom of the abandoned road, and just head for home. Dirt road or not, as long as I saw houses, I figured that I would be okay. At Hagersville, Strawberry Loop (the county road I eventually landed on) turned into a paved road, and I was home free on Hyw 123.

So I made it to my parents' house, where I saw for myself that my dad survived his eye surgery. He had, in his fearless way (I come by my idiocy naturally), punctured his eye brush hogging the field. His eye fluid was leaking, but he finished what he was doing, then he put the tractor up and drove home, then called Mom. Mom left school and came and got him & took him to town, where he saw the optomitrist. Who referred him to an opthamologist. Who sent him to Springfield for emergancy surgery. That was Monday. On Tuesday, when I saw him, he had one stitch, and some eyedrops. And could see out of that eye.

Fortunately, my trip home was less eventful.