Okay, scribblers!  You didn't want to talk about middles so much.  How about "clunks"?

I'm curious to know if anyone else hears a "clunk" in the following passage?  And, if so, what needs to be done to repair the metaphorical pothole in the prose?

The situation:  the narrator has just come from a swim in a cold lake, where he faked his own death.  He's now in the car of a reluctant accomplice, who's driving him to Canada.  (By the way, the passage also begins a chapter...)

"Wrapped in a blanket, Stone fell asleep almost immediately.  Paula put the heat up full blast, and gradually Stone's chills melted away.  They took 196 north to Grand Rapids; there they got on 96 and took it across Michigan, skirting Lansing, and into Detroit, where Paula stopped briefly at a Ramada Inn for coffee. It was close to midnight when they arrived at the border crossing at Windsor, Ontario."

Scribite!
kent

p.s.

A writer I know e-mailed me this the other day:

"Actually, I'm wondering what all these lithe young creatures know about 'sagging middles.'  I know about sagging middles. There's one that always comes between me and my. . .shoes."

Sad, isn't it?