On a whim, Carrie and I decided to drive to Ikea. The nearest one is three hours away. I’m not sure if we’ll ever be doing that again. Given the choice of no furniture versus spending three hours in the car, three hours chasing after Leah, then three hours in the car again, I’ll take the no furniture.
But it wasn’t all fruitless – we secured a new breakfast nook table to replace our current ultra small one, some extra chairs for the upcoming Thanksgiving crowd, and a futon for the guest room. And I had Blue Jell-O in the Ikea cafeteria, which was a special treat.
All parcels were wrapped obsessively in a tarp in the back of my truck for the trip home. Driving north from Portland to Seattle, we drove through some of the heaviest rain I’ve ever been in, and I wasn’t about to have my newly secured goods tainted by water. On the trip up we saw at least four rainbows, downed powerlines, and a derailed freight train. On the trip back, with water tight cargo, just a bit of rain, and a crew of men investigating the derailment.