Slept in until 6:30 (took a trazedone at 3:30) but still got Mom’s and my bedrooms and bathrooms ready for the next “shift” (daughter and SIL of Sandy’s BFF Sally) which is set to arrive this coming weekend.  We enjoyed the Bayside Skillet’s leftovers for breakfast (and packed a full bag of snacks so we wouldn't have to worry about going hungry on the way home <g> even if we got hung up at the bridge.) 

We did manage, rather easily, to get out at the appointed time, 10:00-ish.   The other good news is that I was able to maneuver Mom’s walker into the way back (on the drive to the beach house it had to travel sitting in front of me next to Andy’s chair) which meant that Pippa actually had room to move around instead of being forced to stay crammed in between the front seats.  She's not a very happy traveler and I hoped that would help.  It didn't seem to; she would have been much happier back at The Institute, relaxing!

 

Pippa did come back to say hi to Mom and me (possibly somewhat confused that there were extra people in the van?) and also peered out the window a few times.

But mostly she opted to lie up front between her parents.

However at one point she did get up on the back seat with us - which apparently she never does even when it's empty.  I grabbed the opportunity (and my camera) to snap some pix of her with Mom.

We passed the scene of a bad accident half an hour into our drive.  One vehicle had already been cleared from our side of the roadway, though pieces of it were visible scattered all along the now mangled road making it seem like it had exploded on impact. Fire engines and ambulances were of course on site, with EMTs working on the victim(s?) on the other side of the road.  We experienced a bit of a slowdown when our two lanes needed to merge into one, but despite the obvious seriousness of the crash we passed by without much delay - though soberly (and properly) quickly reminded of how fast things can (and do) happen.  

Later we breezed across at the Bay Bridge - but then a major incident up ahead of us created stop/go traffic (MUCH more stop than go...)   Almost an hour into the delay Andy’s WAZE app informed us that we were still at least a mile from getting past it.  

Traffic, continuing to pile up behind us during that hour we barely crawled, most certainly was backed up well before the bridge, which Andy guesstimated was about 3 miles behind us. Drivers heading to the Bay Bridge no doubt assumed things would improve once they got past the bridge, and (no doubt!) were sorely disappointed!

To make things worse, we got notice that there was a second accident behind us, and shortly thereafter a whole fleet of emergency vehicles were racing, sirens screaming, to that scene.

Once we finally crept up to where we could see some of the flashing lights we were definitely encouraged by our progress.  Mostly, however, we were simply grateful not to have been involved in whatever had occurred up ahead, and of course our inconvenience disappeared as soon as we were past the scene.

When we dropped off Mom I went upstairs with her to help with the suitcase - 

and then it was goodbye.

My next visit isn't planned until May, 

when as usual I'll fly out to celebrate her birthday and Mothers' Day.