Fifty-five minutes.

That's how long it took me to get home from work yesterday. Four miles. Fifty-five minutes.

The funny part is I really wasn't ready to go home. I wanted to keep working on my project. But I was already a few minutes overtime. I'm tempted to stay extra hours without recording them. I don't know if that's unethical or super-ethical, or a violation of some universal law of contracting. But if I start falling behind on the project, I'm going to want to put in extra hours because I want them to hire me and they're more likely to hire me if I can get my project done on time.

Anyway, I have to go north on 15th Ave. across the Ballard Bridge to get home from work, but in order to get onto 15th Ave. northbound, I have to go south a bit, make a left, cross this maddening overpass with two four-way stops, and then make another left.

My first indication of trouble was that the backup at the first four-way stop was two blocks long. Then I saw that northbound 15th was jammed and not moving. So I decided to go south a bit, cross over Queen Anne Hill, and go north on 99 instead.

That was all good until I got to where I had to turn to get onto the street that leads to 99. There, it seemed, everyone else who decided on the same alternate route I did was lined up.

Okay, well there was one more alternate route: head on north to Nickerson and take the Fremont Bridge.

Not knowing my way around Queen Anne, I decided to take 3rd Ave. to Nickerson. When I got to Nickerson, well, that was backed up just as bad as 15th Ave. It took a full half-hour to get to the Fremont Bridge, maybe a half mile.

It turns out that some construction was going on just north of the Ballard Bridge, and this was what was causing the backup.

It also turns out that my ignorance of back streets sent me on wildly roundabout detours. I was just looking at a map of Queen Anne and marveling out how far out of my way I went.

It wasn't all that bad, though, because I kept thinking how no one would believe me when I told them it took almost an hour to get home from work. In fact, I was a little disappointed when I pulled into my garage and realized my drive had fallen just short of a full hour.

And I was so thrilled to be working somwhere so close to home, with such an easy commute. Ha!