Woke up at six and was out the door my earliest yet. Today I missed the school buses and made very good time getting out east. There was some emergency, though, and while in South Salem they closed 35 east bound and I had to turn around and take the 121 route instead of taking 123 like I always do. This actually worked out well as I only lost six minutes and I’ve spent the last two nights learning this route in the opposite direction so I was able to do it. Seeing the route in the light gave me a completely different impression of where I was. I had no idea that there were so many houses along this path. You cannot see them in the dark of night.
The drive was quite picturesque. The early morning light filtering through the trees. And oh were there trees. It is deep in the forest, winding along the reservoir. Huge mansions on knolls overlooking the water or a stream or just hidden in the woods. I had no idea that this was all here.
Driving into Connecticut this way, into New Canaan on 124, you see a stunning transformation as old New York “deep in the woods” mentality instantly gives way to the human modified, tree-cleared New England style mansions with their expansive lawns. It is very clear that there is a cultural difference between the two places, only minutes apart from each other. The instant that you cross the border the trees thin and houses are more orderly having shaped their environments to them rather than having been built to organically fit into the existing landscape.
This path, the 121 path as I call it, appears to shave about four or five minutes from the drive. Very hard to tell. And leaving just a little earlier, I was about ten minutes earlier than normal today, helps as well. Even with the closed road and turnaround, I did very well this morning. I’ve studied the map a bit more and believe that I have an even more complicated, but shorter and faster route to try tonight. Every minute counts when so much time is spent commuting.
It is a bright, sunny day but cold. It was 25 degrees on my commute in. My windscreen was covered in frost and took a while to thaw before I could drive. I’m wishing that I had a remote starter these days. That tiny little 1.2 litre engine takes a very long time to produce heat for the car. I’m also thinking that a winter coat might be in order here soon, especially as I always wear my fleece all day long while in the office.
I did a crazy amount of catching up on SGL today. I got probably five posts written during the day filling in all of the gaps in the recent news (the last ten days or so.) Now I just need to get back to filling in the Disney Vacation days so that I can get all of the stuff that I have already written finally published.
Today was a good day at work. Feeling good about things. Feeling productive.
I left work at 6:19 PM and tried the new, very complicated, way home through the backwoods of Westchester County. There wasn’t bad traffic and I made it home in 61 minutes, pulling in at 7:20. That was great. It’s only three minutes off of my record but that adds up and the route was more interesting.
The girls were camped out on the new couch when I got in the door and Dominica was down in the basement working on her computer. Dominica pretty much headed straight out to go shopping. She had been waiting for me to get home.
I did a bunch more posting of SGL tonight. Very good progress at getting the Disney days documented. Once the vacation days are written up, I will be all caught up.