Random highway traveler observations

1) Living in the Northeast, we’ve always heard that Boston drivers are the worst. We hate to deprive them of that title, but Boston drivers ain’t got nuthin’ on Louisiana drivers, and New Orleans drivers in particular. When we drove around Boston, I shut my eyes on 128 because it was so nerve wracking. Three thousand or so miles later I no longer feel the need to close my eyes, but we had a few scares on I-10 through Louisiana. They drive fast, even by my standards, weave all over the place, hit the bumps on the highway and fly briefly out of control, think nothing of cutting off an aged truck and trailer and then slamming on their brakes so they can get on an exit ramp. It seems like every other car has a crushed side, or at least a dent, so you know they hit each other pretty frequently. We’d heard horror stories of Atlanta and Houston, and both cities had a lot of traffic, but they also have 10 or 12 lane highways that are designed to take the traffic, so while you have to pay attention, they’re not all that bad.
2) Louisiana bathrooms are also worst we’ve encountered. They’re all dirty, and most of them don’t have any paper. This goes for both the women’s and the men’s. I guess they have bigger things to worry about than clean bathrooms for travelers. Or maybe we just picked the dirty ones.
3) All states have dead raccoons on the side of the road. It seems like almost every state has some dead animal common only or mostly to that state, like armadillos in Florida and coyotes in Texas, but dead raccoons are everywhere.
4) Canadians talk more than Americans. We always end up talking to people, and for some reason, most of the people we’ve talked to since we left Georgia are Canadian. Maybe they’re friendlier than Americans, or maybe they’re just weirder, since Tom and I are both known weirdo magnets. Or maybe we’ve talked to more Canadians because more Canadians are doing things like what we’re doing, so we have something to talk about.