Well, my friends, here's an update to my original An Unexpected Journey blog post.
I rolled into Memphis, TN about 10:00 PM CDT. Although the time and distance for Sunday's portion of the trip were less than Saturday's, it sure felt longer. The "max" speed limit in Oklahoma and Arkansas is 70 MPH as opposed to 75 MPH in Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. Not that it kept me from speeding, but it did seem like every time I decided to exceed the speed limit by more than 10 MPH, my radar detector threw a hissy fit. Sometimes the hissy fits seemed to be false alarms, but there were definitely some ticket saving occurrences. In addition, there were these short construction zones on interstate 40 at various intervals across Oklahoma and in Arkansas between Little Rock and Memphis that kept slowing me down, too.
I spent all day at the hospital with my mom, aunt and uncle. We got there about 5 AM and didn't leave until after 8:00 PM.
My dad's surgery went about as well as expected. The doctors removed the tumor and filled in the hole with muscle tissue from his lower back. They weren't able to completely close the hole. If they stretch the skin too tight, it will split during the radiation treatments that he will start in September. In about 10 days, he'll have to return for a skin graft. Looks like I'll be staying longer than 2 weeks.
Tomorrow we will visit him, but I cannot imagine staying there all day. Besides, I have to get some work done. This isn't a vacation. I do need to put in work hours, even if I don't have any work tasks... I do have self-directed study to do.
Stay Tuned...
DeadGuitarist