Greetings from Goshen, Indiana

Specifically, greetings from Panera Bread in Goshen. I've been here (Panera) before; this is like a homecoming. I left Holland, Michigan at approximately 8:30 this morning and took a State Route south to Indian. I owned the road!! There wasn't any traffic; the road was great; the weather was perfect!!

This is brief because Panera is now limiting WiFi access to half-hour on weekends (new to me). I'll be back as soon as possible.

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Postscript, 11 o'clock, Labor Day Monday, Sept. 6th, 2010: Above is the message I published yesterday. Below are the details of the day from my handwritten notes. I'm in a McDonald's, in Wakarusa Indiana, using their free WiFi.

"It was a beautiful sunny morning as I prepared to leave Sam's Club parking lot in Holland, Michigan. The wind had subsided, the rain had long-since stopped. However, it had been a cold night and I had two blankets on top of my sleeping bag!
* Sixty-three degrees at 10:25 PM when I went to bed.
* Sixty-four at 11:15,
* Sixty at 3:00 AM,
* Fifty-seven at 6:00 AM,
* Fifty-six at 7:02 when I got out of bed because a big truck arrived and left the engine idling so no going back to sleep.
* Fifty-three at 7:30 with the thermometer on the ground outside the T@B. My cute little weather station (that records info from a satellite) said the current temperatures was 46 degrees in Grand Rapids.
* Sixty-four at 8:20 when almost ready to leave Sam's.

"Carmen (my Garmin) was not happy when I turned off U.S. 31 onto M-40 (Michigan 40) shortly after leaving Sam's. A nice man--in Barnes & Noble--suggested M-40 as a direct route 'and nice farm countryside.' I decided to challenge Carmen hoping she would 'recalculate' and decide that the alternate route would lead to Wal-Mart in Goshen. (She was programmed for Wal-Mart in Goshen.) Carmen was 'recalculating' every few miles; she was determined that I would turn around and eventually get on I-196. Carmen was tracking my every move, she knew the names of all the crossroads before I got there. So I listened to her irritating voice for two hours twenty minutes. When I was approximately two miles (five minutes?) from Wal-Mart (at 10:56) the GPS was advising that I would arrive at my destination at 1:35 (two-and-one-half hours). She NEVER 'recalculated' to put my KIA in relationship to my destination--Goshen Wal-Mart.

"I arrived at Panera at 11:05. I've been there previously and thought I'd get there on 'autopilot.' Things didn't look the same; the railroad tracks were on the wrong side of U.S. 33. I overshot it by three miles and had to backtrack. PBKTL (please be kind to Lorraine): This Panera is NOT in my Garmin GPS; I was relying on my memory (and let's be honest, a lot has happened in one year).

"While the computer was booting, I got my customary whole grain bagel, veggie cream cheese, and hazelnut coffee. Boy, did that taste good!! IF my memory serves me correctly, the last Panera was at Plymouth, Massachusetts. (Nope, it was Danvers, Massachusetts.)

"I knew my WiFi time would be limited because Panera limits us to thirty minutes between 11:30 and 1:30. To my surprise, a new message said customers are limited to thirty minutes on weekends. So I prepared a brief blog and checked e-mail messages.

"When 'they' (Panera) logged me off the Internet, I packed up and went next door to Great Clips for a haircut. I'm please with the nice way she cut and styled my hair.

"Because the weather was warm and beautiful, I took time (in a discrete corner of the parking lot near Panera) to arrange things in the T@B, and sweep the floor. I can't eliminate all the clutter but I can organize and clean before 'cousins' look at Mercedes.

"I tried several times to contact cousins. No answer and no voice mail to leave a message. Then I drove to Wakarusa, to the home of a cousin (didn't have her phone number). She wasn't home. I sat in my folding chair, in the shade of an enormous old tree. I read for awhile and I sat quietly doing nothing for awhile. It was so peaceful. While writing the details of the day, and watching the sunset, I finally reached 'cousin' Dale.

"'Cousin' Dale arrived about 7:45 and stayed for approximately two hours. Here's an interesting note: Dale and I were en route to Menno-Hof, in Shipshewana, eleven months ago when I saw this T@B parked along the road--with a 'for sale' sign. All these months later, Dale was my first visitor! He made a point of driving to my location; he sat in the trailer for two hours reminiscing with me. My first visitor!!

"You ask 'How can that be? You always have 'visitors.' Yes, many people stop to converse about 'That cute little trailer.' They step in and check the headroom and admire the efficiency. Nobody sits down for a prolonged social visit. I think it is so appropriate that 'cousin' Dale was the first.

"Going to bed at 10:10; 70 degrees. Sixty-eight degrees at 2:00 AM and I reached for a blanklet to put over the sleeping bag. Sixty-seven at 7:40."