Keeping the CB on during road trips is a good way to annoy your wife... most the time I just hear random truckers talking about what they are hauling or how long they have been awake. If you have music on or talking its kind of annoying to have random chatter break in all the time. I think if you are expecting a great community of people ready to chat it up with you, you will be disappointed with the CB.

As mentioned in earlier posts if you want to chat with others I would stick with HAM. There is a bunch of people talking in most major cities on the 2m and 70cm bands which require antennas that are much smaller than CB antennas and you can run more power than the CB which means greater range. Also with HAM you will be talking via FM not AM so the sound quality is much better and you don't get nearly as much static. Also Ham's look out for each other, just yesterday on the way to work someone on 2m told me they ran out of gas and I was only a few miles south of him so I swung by and picked up him and took him to a gas station and back. If I was stranded on the side of the road and my cell phone wasn't working, I would have a lot more faith in getting help via my 50watt 2m radio over my 4w CB

It sucks you have to get a license to use ham but there are free videos online that can help you study for it (google: ham whisperer) but the advantages are pretty big IMHO... smaller antenna, better sound quality, greater range (due to power and the fact 2m can penetrate buildings better than 11m, not to mention repeaters), tighter knit community, etc

I left the CB hooked up when I was caravaning with other Jeeps on a recent trip and it was a fun and a little convenient to chat on the way up but I never use the CB while traveling alone.