Happy third anniversary!

We are at the Wal-Mart supercenter in Murfreesboro (map). Today marks three full years since we moved aboard Odyssey full-time, although, in some ways, it seems like just yesterday. And, while Wal-Mart may seem an inauspicious place to celebrate this milestone, it is in a way fitting, reinforcing our old joke that Wal-Mart is our home park.

In actuality, we had not intended to be here. We lingered this morning at Poole Knobs recreation area, rolling through the dump station and out of the park just ahead of the 2pm checkout time. Our plan was to come down here to Murfreesboro, where we had our mail sent to the main post office in care of General Delivery, then head north toward the Kentucky state line. Since our mail left Washington Wednesday by Priority Mail, we were certain it would be here by this afternoon, but, alas, it was not. We have our fingers crossed that it is merely a minor delay and that it will show up tomorrow, but we are, after all, talking about the US Postal Service here.

Of course, had we known, we would have stayed at the lake another night, where it was lovely and we had a 50-amp power outlet. Now that we're in Murfreesboro, there are really no close camping options other than one commercial park in Smyrna, and even that's 10 miles away. By the time we drive the 20 miles round trip and pay whatever the camping fee is, we can just run the genny for the eight or ten hours it will take to keep our air conditioning running while we are here.

There is an Outback Steakhouse right next door, and we'll wander over there for dinner in just a few minutes. An ironic twist on the anniversary theme, as Outback was the very first place we ate while driving Odyssey. Not three years ago, but, rather, the day we picked it up after we bought it, back in March of 2001. In what ought to have been a foreboding harbinger of things to come, we had barely driven 100 miles from where we first saw Odyssey when the right inner dually exploded on the freeway in Valencia, California. That little episode sidelined us overnight on the street in front of the Hampton Inn there, and we had dinner at the Outback next door while we contemplated our options. (The damage caused by the exploding tire was so severe that, the next day, we limped the ten miles to the Castaic Garage, where we had to leave the bus in the hands of a mechanic for over a month, while we flew back to San Jose and our jobs.)

We'll hang here until at least 11 or so tomorrow, to allow time for the morning trucks to come in, then trundle back over to the post office to see if our mail had arrived. I'm not sure what we're going to do if it doesn't -- perhaps ask them to "return to sender" and then retry the whole mess somewhere else.