332 miles in 4:48

Just did the long drive back from Gainesville. It was a new personal time record of four hours and forty eight minutes. Thats one stop for gas with relatively light Sunday afternoon traffic.

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I am always sad when I drop my kids off at their mother's apartment. I think about all I am missing, and everything they are missing. Then I get in the car and just go. I watch Florida zoom by the windows and remember the miles and miles of Orange Groves that used to populate the Orlando area when I was a kid. Those groves are mostly gone now, just like my old married life. Both the groves and our marriage were a victim of cold snaps and economics.

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The snapshots of their lives are full color prints, loaded with fun, but they are still just snapshots. Having them down here in Miami was awesome. They loved riding around on the Metro Mover, and we mixed in some Chucky Cheese, the pool, the beach, a Dolphins and Marlins game and some movies, along with some boredom as they watched T.V. and I worked. They also witnessed the drubbing we took in Softball.

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Today as we woke up in the hotel room in Gainesville and I knew I would be dropping them off and doing the 332 to the 305, I was grumpy about it. I always am a little grumpy on the Sundays when I am leaving them to come back to my new life here in Miami.

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I think you take a beating in softball the same way you take it in life. You keep playing, you play your position as best you can, when you get your at bat, you try to hit it hard and also where the other guys aren't. Thats me, driving my car past the old Orange Groves, fielding my position and trying to hit it where they aint. Occasionally mixing in a little Chucky Cheese and riding the Metro mover.