Civil insurrection.

LL#1 is still home on break and has to head back to her college in Ohio in time for class to start Jan 25. Her college has scheduled a pre-semester covid test for her on Saturday the 23rd. She's currently taking a winter term class (15 weeks of cell biology jammed into 3 weeks) and due to trying to work around scheduled tests and assignments, she was planning to drive back this Sunday. But lo and behold it seems there's an armed Trumpster protest planned in Columbus OH on Sunday -- apparently, the chatter and threats have been pretty significant, since Ohio has already activated the national guard in preparation for it. I heard rumors that during last Wednesday's shindig, people were throwing bricks off the overpasses and hitting cars on the highways in and around Columbus. LL#1 does not go to college in Columbus, but she has to drive the highway right through it in order to get where she's going and I'd prefer she does not meet any bricks on the way.

So given that this protest is on Sunday and inauguration is on Wednesday (and she has to work around all her tests and assignments), I was thinking perhaps the Friday after inauguration was the safest bet. Hoping that the trumpsters will have burned themselves out or gotten themselves arrested by then. On the other hand, I suppose the entire country could be in all-out civil war by then..... What say you, o WTF?

Can she go around Columbus?

On smaller roads, and through much redder territory ...

There's a big ol highway bypass (Route 270) around columbus, but I believe that is where the brick throwing was occurring.

quote:

I was thinking perhaps the Friday after inauguration was the safest bet.

I would say she should head back on the 22nd, and that should allow her to get the test on the 23rd.

Do they have Sunday testing options?

My uni currently requires us to get tested once every 7 days, but there are no testing sessions on Saturdays or Sundays, and the weekday latest time slot ends at 2pm. It is so inconvenient!

Can she go up and over Columbus through the town of Delaware? Two lane highway,maybe.

I don't know. I think it would be pretty out of the way. I lived in Columbus for a few years and even taking the bypass highway vs straight through adds a lot of time and miles. Taking back roads up and around even further out I'm sure would be way more time/distance. And it's already a 10+ hour drive that she's doing by herself (well, with her cat, in a carrier, oof!).

I will keep it in mind if things still look to be unstable in Columbus after the inauguration though! Delaware is a college town and likely to be slightly less red than other back ways she could take, so it's a good suggestion. Her school is in southwest OH, though, so perhaps it would make more sense to exit the highway and kind of head southwest (Delaware is super north so the totally wrong way) on back roads the rest of the way. That would probably mean 2.5-3 hours of driving on much a much hicker much more remote route though. Not sure I trust the cell phone service on those roads, actually.

SK, thanks for confirming my thoughts -- I'm hoping that by Friday after inauguration, life will have settled down and rioters will either have gone back to work or to jail. There supposedly was Sunday testing, but by the time she signed up (just a couple hours after the email went out), all the Sunday slots were booked, so she took the latest appointment she could get on Saturday to give her the most flexibility.

Note to self: Restrict LL#2's college search to blue states only.

When we moved, we tried to take alternate routes around some of the bigger cities, some of them are pretty decent. What about gettting off 70 before columbus (zanesville) and taking 22 southwest.

And completely off topic, but I grew up in central Illinois (Champaign/Urbana) and worked in Rockford (northern Illinois) right after college. I got bored with the interstate and decided to find a way home on the blue and grey roads (smallest roads on the state highway map). Took a lot longer, but saw so many awesome little towns and countryside. (Obviously not what your daughter wants to do with such a long trip) We do that here too, but much more rugged - Find a way from point A to point B on the jeep roads.

Also not relevant: when I was little, my maternal grandparents lived in Zanesville. I have many fond memories of that little town! <3

22 from Zanesville looks pretty direct, actually, but google maps says its at least an hour longer. Still, definitely a plan if Columbus is still a hot mess. Does anyone here know if 22 is a two lane road or a 4 lane highway -- I can't tell from google maps?

I belong to a facebook tag group called "I apologize on behalf of Ohio" (if you don't belong, it's worth joining!) They post a lot of super strange things/people from Ohio. Lately it has been mostly photos of super-Trumpsters who have graffiti-ed up their trucks or houses or whatnot with over the top conspiracy theory nonsense. It seems like Zanesville has been featured on there constantly as a hotbed of those sorts of folks, to the point where I have specifically told LL#1 not to stop for gas anywhere near it, LOL! Somehow I suspect that taking route 22 from Zanesville will be a non stop "I apologize on behalf of Ohio" feed.

A typical Zanesville post (I apologize for the cussing):

OMG!

In that case, I apologize on behalf of Zanesville!

Welcome to small town red America today.

Driving through east Tennessee a few days ago we stopped for gas at an Exxon station (I-40 and route 127 to be precise). No one was masked, not even the employees. I notified Exxon, for all the good that will do.

Where do you see reports of this happening by Trump supporters? There was a bit of it last June, allegedly by Antifa/BLM/whatever, but I can find no reports of anything recent.

Mik - the planned rally/riot/whatever -- I think the term they are using is "armed march" -- is all over the front page of the columbus dispatch.

https://www.dispatch.com/

The brick throwing - I saw several reports of it on facebook - I think mainly from parents who belong to the parents board for the college and live in the Columbus area. Specifically they referred to I-270 near westerville (which I know is not close to where she'd be driving if she stays on 70). Obviously it's facebook, so who knows if it's true, but I figure better safe than sorry. I know 70 isn't particularly close to the statehouse but as far as highways go, it's one of the closest (670 is closer, I guess). And brick throwing or no, I'd prefer to keep my teenage daughter in her Kia soul with her "Nevertheless She Persisted" sticker on the back as far away as possible from any armed marches and their associated lunacy.