Where have I been?

I have been in a car for over 1,800 miles over these past few days. It's been crazy. Sadly, my grandpa passed away and so Smiley and I started our journey on Saturday, driving 1000 miles from our house to my parents and then added an addition 400 on Sunday to get to Michigan. And then 400 more miles back to my parents today. And in another day, 1000 more miles. I am so thankful that our car gets good gas mileage and that Smiley will drive the majority of those miles.

So now I'm behind on my NaNo novel like crazy and really dispirited because the day that my mom called me in the afternoon at work to tell me my grandpa had died, I had been writing during lunch for my novel. In my novel, the main character's mom called her at work to tell her that her aunt had died. So I'm really not excited to write about the funeral scene I had planned and that's throwing off the rest of the plot.

Of course, out of the gloom there are always good points. First, I got to see my family and a lot of my extended family. It's not great that I saw them because of a funeral but still.

Second, I got to see my brother who I haven't managed to see since Christmas.

Third, I got to have a breakfast pasty from Roy's bakery. As was the case with my novel funeral scene, I had actually just been extolling the glory that is the UP pasty. So yeah, I had a pasty. I also had a taco pizza from the Ambassador restaurant and one of their signature drinks. And maybe in a year from now, I'll be up there to do the same. Just hopefully, it will be because I planned a nice vacation there and not a funeral. I would prefer for no more funerals for a bit.