Never done that before...

Dithered in Knoxville and finally set out shortly before noon. It was maybe 15F and things were clear until I hit the mountains south of Jellico, where a lot of cars seemed to think the white salt on the road was the same as the white snow on the grass, and so you never knew when you'd come on a knot trying to pass a car 55-ing it along in the slow lane.

Once into Kentucky, the snow pretty much vanished, although the icicles on the cliffs of the highway cutouts attested it was still cold. Gassing up on the north side of Lexington, it was 21F according to the weather app on the portable magic elf box.

Heading west on 64 took me out from under the worst of the cold. Despite the walls of the steep cutout east of the Kentucky River bridge being draped with icicle sheets that would have looked more appropriate lining I-89 outside of West Lebanon, NH, most of the weather stations around Louisville were already reading ~32F.

Heading north into Hoosierland on I-65, the icy patches on the shoulders began getting closer to the travel lanes, while the petrified turbulence of frozen rapids in spillways leading into the roadside ditches gave mute testimony to how quickly pouring rain gave way to lunar cold earlier in the week.

I did something I never would have done before: At exit 29, bearing in mind the pictures from Indy traffic cams and Bobbi's reports of surface streets in the Circle City, I pulled off and got a motel room to shoot the final into Roseholme Cottage after rush hour the next morning.

Under regular conditions, I'd be maybe an hour from home. Realistically? I didn't want to tackle the last leg as it was getting dark, with the roads jammed with idiots* in a vestigial rush hour. It's supposed to get above freezing today, and I'll take the last bit after morning rush hour, fresh and rested.

*If it was just me? I'd drive that Subie home like I had a Finnish last name. But it's all those other people, the ones that want you to be part of their wreck, that worry me.