Late, late, late!

Do you remember the white rabbit in Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland (or was he in Through the Looking Glass)? I felt a bit like the white rabbit this afternoon.

"I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date."

I had a (work) meeting scheduled for 5 o'clock in Acton. I left just after 4 PM to drive the 17 miles to the meeting location, and chose to take route 2A. That's the most direct route, but as it turns out I should have taken route 3 to 495. The 17 miles via 2A usually takes just under a half of an hour, so I should have had plenty of time to be there early (and arriving early for meetings is a normal habit of mine).

Big, big oops! Just after I entered Acton, the road was closed. Closed, as in there was a fire truck parked diagonally across the road, a tow truck on the shoulder, and police directing all traffic to turn right. I turned, following a long line of tail lights, hoping that some stranger would lead me back to route 2A. I drove for what seemed like forever, along very dark 2-lane roads lined with trees. Typical of Massachusetts roads, there were no signs anywhere.

Luckily, the colleague I was joining for the meeting called. When we first started chatting I had no idea where I was, but then the dark narrow road that my car was rolling down joined with route 225. At that point someone (in the room with my colleague) knew where I was and was able to provide directions. A 30-minute drive had turned into 75 minutes, but I finally arrived.

Did I ever tell you how much I hate the unsigned roads of northeastern Massachusetts?