“In a manner familiar to anyone who had ever packed a car for a family trip, genial confusion gave way to impatience, then furious ultimatums, then ill-advised snap decisions.”

“Contemplating leaving everything I had ever known of one ill-advised hour of passionate lunacy.”

“He ordered a family pack of chicken, and sat and finished it off without any help from anyone else in his family.”

“I tell the kids that, even in a childhood marked by despair and deprivation, I knew that no matter what happened, I still had my family, or at least the remnants of a family ripped apart by divorce and then glued back together in various odd arrangements through a series of ill- advised remarriages. It was good to know I had a solid foundation.”

“The car was full of unhappy people heading west. It was the Great American Family Road Trip, all right. Whaaa-hoo!”

“I paused for a moment, debating whether to turn and look what was happening. My senses told me Obo’s presence was still at my side, and turning my face into the barrel of a gun seemed like an ill-advised way to cap off this day of monumentally stupid decisions.”