KNOXVILLE, Tennessee to BALTIMORE, Marland, July 7, 2005 — So it's raining when we get up, early, and earlier still on our internal clocks since we lost an hour. We shower and gather up our stuff. We watch the news about London, first in the room, then in the breakfast area. One other couple is there. The woman comments that the English let this happen by "letting anyone in." We grab a couple of bananas and I get some coffee. FFP gets the rest of the stuff from the room and I bring the car around and then we go to the portico and check out. We have a brief wait while FFP searches for his cell phone. That resolved (it was in his backpack somewhere) we head out.

It is a little after 6:30, Eastern time. It is raining.

I drive, it rains. I drive more. It rains more. On and on. I stop for gas. There is a pretty cemetery across the road from the station. I drive more. Finally I turn it over to FFP. He drives for a while and stops for a sandwich. I drive. We are going through what is, even on the highway, pretty Tennessee and Virginia hills. And rain. And trucks, trucks, and more trucks. FFP naviagates us around D.C. and to Baltimore and the door of our hotel.

We rest a while and then go out. It's threatening to rain. We've foolishly left our umbrellas in the car. We end up dashing into a place called Sasha's 527 on Charles Street. They aren't open to serve food but the bar is open. We get a bottle of wine and help the bartender with a crossword. We get a table for dinner. We tell the waitress that we like Baltimore because it's the home of John Waters and Anne Tyler. She knows John and even worked on Pecker. We get into a huge discussion of movies. It turns out a bunch of the paintings decorating the restaurant are by Susan Lowe who has played bit parts in all John's movies. It's a small world. The food and wine (Ridge Three Valleys Zin) we have is good.

And it isn't even raining when we head back to the hotel. We turn in for TV and reading and snoozing. It will be good to sleep as long as we please and spend a day being tourists instead of driving. The real vacation begins. Sleep comes pretty early, too.