I had the misfortune of driving past this accident yesterday:
Charleston woman dies in I-64 collision with tractor-trailer
MILTON — A Charleston woman died Monday afternoon when she rear-ended a tractor-trailer on Interstate 64 in Milton, said Deputy Chief Bob Legg of the Milton Fire Department.
The woman’s name was not available. The accident happened around 2:20 p.m. in the westbound lane at exit 28. The tractor-trailer was pulled over on the side of the road when the woman’s car hit the truck from behind, Legg said.
The woman was pronounced dead at the scene. The interstate was closed for about 2 1/2 hours.
I knew the occupant of the vehicle, a Dodge Intrepid, was dead. The authorities were on the scene and were making no attempt to extricate her from the car. They had simply draped a tarp over what was left of the passenger compartment and were supervising the tow-truck removal of the trailer from atop the car.
The thoughts that go through your mind -
- A life has come to an end - in the blink of an eye.
- A family somewhere is about to receive some shocking and horrible news.
- A prayer is offered up for the souls affected by the accident.
- There but for the grace of God ...
- An admonition - Pay closer attention as you head on down the road.
I went on down the road.
Well, the company got its money's worth yesterday. I was (I think) on the first flight out of Greensboro yesterday morning at 6am and came in on its last flight last night at 11:10pm. I got back to Big Walker Mountain at 1:20am. And my day begins again. I'm heading for Pennsylvania this afternoon.
I've decided, by the way, that four planes in one day is my limit. I enjoy flying on those regional jets that all the airlines have deployed for non-transcontinental flights but my butt was not meant to be in those tiny seats for too many hours in one day.
The upside to this is that my meetings in Kansas City went well. And I survived.
Today brings another adventure.
Yippee.
Well, I'm back on my mountain this morning. I rolled in late last night from San Diego via a completely chaotic O'Hare.
An odd occurrence:
A group of passengers at our gate at O'Hare had attempted to go on standby. Wherever they came from, apparently their luggage had gone on a different plane because these people had been on standby too long - or some such.
Well, the attendant was giving them hell because their luggage had gone a different route and FAA regulations require that one's luggage be on the plane with the passenger. She was refusing to allow them on the plane because of this. They were all mad. She was frenzied. I was shaking my head in amazement.
To put an interesting twist on the story: when I got into Greensboro last night, my luggage didn't appear on the carousel with everyone elses. My thought was, "Uh oh." But it had arrived on an earlier flight somehow - from Washington Dulles ......
Somewhere in the bowels of United Airlines headquarters, all this makes sense. Or is accepted as just another day in happyland.
Me? I'm just glad to be back on my mountain.
Here's something you don't see every day in Bland, Virginia. I walked out the front door of my hotel yesterday morning to see this, the MS Oosterdam cruise ship, docked right in front of me. It had apprently come into port the night before for provisions and was gone again - headed toward Mexico, I'm told - by the time I returned from work. Having never seen a cruise ship up close before, I can report to you with confidence that this boat was really really big.
Work brings me to San Diego for the next several days. I come to you this morning (more on that later) from a hotel on the harbor, a few blocks up from the aircraft carrier Midway and across the harbor from a huge naval base (the name of which I think someone said was Coronado). An honest-to-God three-masted schooner, the Star of India, is docked nearby for your tourist pleasure. The Padres were playing a few blocks over; the towering stadium lights illuminating the night sky to the south of downtown.
I got here in time last night to wander the area. Every restaurant was jammed with patrons and music was blaring from every one of them onto the streets. This being Southern California, each eatery has tables set up outside along the sidewalk. One doesn't need to consult a menu in order to determine what entrees are offered; you just gaze at the array on the plates at the various tables to get a good idea what's available. It all looked fabulous.
The natives here in Southern California dress differently from the rest of the world. All the women are made up as if they're going to get a casting call from MGM at any moment (the display of cleavage must be a job requirement), and all the guys try to be as effeminate-looking as possible. I fully appreciate the former; I don't understand the latter. But to each his own.
As I mentioned several days ago, my brain stays on eastern time and I always get up at 4am. It's 1:55 in the morning here (PST) but my brain clock says it's time to get up so my day has begun. My guess is, if I were to walk downtown, the bars would still be hopping, and I'm up and ready for a new day. One of us is going to have to give on this. Either I conform to Pacific time or San Diego adopts Eastern Standard Time the way God meant for it to be. I'm going to campaign for the latter.
Anyway, this is as beautiful a city as you've heard it was. In every way. Wish you were here.