At my house I have these things called books. They’re kind of like stories online… if you printed them out on pieces of paper and then you glued all the pages together. (Usually they come with these cardboard-y pages on the top and bottom called the front and back “cover.”)

Recently I’ve found two books worth your time. The first was written in 2018, though I hadn’t come across it until about two weeks ago. It’s called Don’t Make Me Pull Over!: The Informal History of the Family Road Trip. Richard Ratay looks back on the family road trips he took as the youngest of four children in the ’70s and ’80s, that God-forsaken time before cellphones, GPS, and online hotel reservations. (Seriously, I don’t know how any of us functioned.) In addition to his personal story–side note: he’s a great storyteller–Ratay offers the history of many of the roads and destinations he mentions. And that uniquely American contribution to the world… the roadside attraction.

World’s largest chair, anyone?

It’s in the book, and my hometown of Binghamton, New York, gets a little ink. The giant chair on top of Pa’s Woodshed. Haven’t thought about that since about 1992.
That one was a pretty short road trip for us.
And we didn’t need a GPS.
Tune in Friday for a hot tip on another great read.