You say Ohio, I say ‘Oh, no!’

The Cunard Line ships used to advertise that “Getting there is half the fun.”

For our recent trip to Ohio, a more apt slogan might have been “Getting there is a sign of things to come.”

Usually it’s Chicago that’s a pain to get through or around, but we managed the Windy City without too much hassle or delay. Indiana, on the other hand, made up for that — and more.

It seems that Indiana is spending all of its federal stimulus money on fixing its Interstate highways — the same ones we had to take to get to Ohio.

It was bad enough to see the “Construction ahead — one lane of traffic” signs right after we turned south on I-65.

But when we saw a string of cars pulling off on the next exit that should have been a clue to something.

That was when I turned on a Chicago radio station to hear a traffic alert that traffic in the construction zone on I-65 just south of the exit we had just passed was at a standstill because of an earlier collision between a bus and a tractor-trailer.

If I was any good at reading omens and signs, I would have found the nearest spot to pull a U-turn and head back to Wisconsin — but I didn’t.

If we hadn’t already stopped for lunch, we could have sat alongside the highway and had a nice, leisurely picnic lunch while waiting for traffic to start moving again. Instead, we sat in the car and waited — and waited — and waited.

We finally got moving and got around Indianapolis, only to run into more construction — and more onelane traffic — on I-70 heading east to Ohio.

We finally rolled into Greenville, our destination, about three or four hours past our original estimated arrival time. Fortunately, the motel left a light burning in the window for us and hadn’t closed up and locked the doors for the night before we got there.

We were late enough that he had to wait until Friday morning to meet up with Terry’s cousin and her family.

To keep the mood going from the day before, her cousin’s husband showed up wearing an Ohio State shirt and hat. Granted, he is a graduate of Ohio State — which he shows off with his apparel every time we see them — but now he’s enlisted my wife, who wore one of her Ohio State shirts that day as well.

Never mind that Terry couldn’t tell you who the football coach is at Ohio State, or the basketball coach, or the starting quarterback, or even any of the Heisman trophy winners from Ohio State, she suddenly becomes the biggest Buckeye fan around when we get to Greenville.

I tried to tone down the rivalry by waiting until Saturday to wear my Wisconsin Badger shirt and hat, but a lot of good that did me.

All of that scarlet and gray would have been bad enough, but Friday was the day Terry started her weekend-long effort to buy out the entire KitchenAid outlet store (if you want to know all about that, read last week’s column — I certainly don’t want to relive that again), and this weekend was continuing in the wrong direction.

The next day, Saturday, was the big Annie Oakley Days parade in downtown Greenville and naturally, the way this weekend was going — you guessed it, it rained.

Actually, the hardest rain came during the night, but it was clear when the parade started — though not for long.

There was a brief shower early in the parade, and then it subsided, only to begin in earnest just as the last unit in the parade passed us by at the end of the parade route.

The rain did hold off long enough for Terry to collect every freebie they gave out along the parade route, however.

I still can’t figure out why we needed a paper fan from the Republican candidate for the Ohio Assembly from Darke County, or a plastic whistle from the local Pentecostal church, or a souvenir baseball from the Dayton Dragons minor league baseball team, but we brought them all home with us.

I have to admit it was a little embarrassing, though, when she started pushing little kids out of the way to scoop up the candy being thrown from the floats.

All right, she didn’t really push any little kids out of the way — but she did throw a few some nasty looks when they got to close to her part of the curb.

As I said, it started pouring just as the parade ended, so Terry and her cousin ducked into the nearest doorway to get out of the rain.

That’s right, it was the doorway to the KitchenAid store. Some patterns just can’t be broken.

Which left me to walk back through the downpour, wearing a drenched Wisconsin t-shirt, hat and jacket, to get our, which we’d had to park several blocks away from the parade route because of the crowds.

I’m beginning to think the Buckeye State is more like the Bulls-eye State, and I’m usually the one wearing it.