A not so everyday story, part II

Click to read A not so everyday story part I

Apparently, in his haste he had left the key in the "on" position and it had worn down the battery. They pulled up beside us in the grass and gave us a jump. It's a good thing I keep cables in the car!

We thanked them and paid them for the gas but they would only take $10 even though the gas was $11 and they had to buy a gas can. They were God's helpers that day I tell you! At that point we figured we were good to go, once we filled up with gas and got caffeine for Tim and me. I popped in a movie for the boys and everyone was happy.

When the movie was over it was bedtime so I got the boys snuggled in, but Jesse kept crying and fussing and was keeping the other boys awake. I turned around and sang to him, patted him, etc. and after a while he went to sleep. AGAIN when I turned around I can see that we've missed exit to get off the interstate. I pulled out one of our maps and found an alternate route that we had taken at some point in the past. It wasn't going to be quite as fast, but it was fine, it would just put us a little farther behind.

With all the caffeine we were drinking, Tim and I knew we wouldn't make it the rest of the way home without needing to stop so we made a plan to stop on a desolate place on the road and just go. Tim didn't want me to have to do that but I didn't want to go to a gas station because the lights would wake up Jesse and while I was keeping my cool so far, I knew if I had to put him back to sleep again while I was pretty tired I would get too frustrated so I opted to just pull over. And so we did. I got back in and waited on Tim. And waited. I was starting to get a little worried.
When he got back in he said, "We have a problem. The trailer broke."

"What do you mean broke?"

"Well, you know how he said he wrecked the trailer last week? (nod) When they fixed it, I don't think they fixed all of the places so one of the places they did fix on the frame couldn't take the stress and it broke so now we only have one place that's holding it all together."

"So what does that mean? Can we still drive it?" I'm thinking, "Really? What is this Murphy's Law in action?"

"Well, I think it broke a while back so I guess it's doing okay. It makes me nervous though so I just want to take it extra slow the rest of the way home."

"Well, okay, that's better than having to leave it or something."

"I'm going to be watching the trailer," he says as he is adjusting his side mirror to be able to see it better, "and I want you to watch for bridges so I can slow down for them."

"Okay." And off we went. As it turns out, it's really hard to tell when bridges are coming up in the dark on an unfamiliar road. I am not a very good bridge lookout, but I stayed awake, talked to Tim, kept him awake and pumped full of caffeine.

We stopped three more times where there were street lights so Tim could check the welds to make sure they were holding and they were, so we kept progressing slowly. When we started to get back in our area there was about a 10 mile section that was really rough road and lots of construction that scared us to pieces, but we made it through. At the end of that stretch we stopped for gas, partly because we were paranoid of running out again, partly because Tim wanted to check the trailer again, and partly because I think we needed to decompress of the stress of those 10 miles.

From there we made it home, at about 2:45 am. Only three hours longer than it took us to get there. But we made it home safe and with the trailer full of our bushes. Be thankful in all things, right?

I put the boys to bed and went to bed at 3:15 while Tim was still unloading the plants and watering them. After all the trouble it was to bring them home we sure don't want them to die. I wanted to go help Tim so he could get to bed sooner, but I had to be at work at 8:00 and I needed to get some sleep and Tim had the week off so I knew he could nap if he needed to.

At about 4:00 Jesse woke up crying and I heard his pacifier drop to the floor so I got up and gave that to him and Tim still wasn't in bed. I felt bad he was still working, but went back to bed.

In the morning Tim said he was turning off lights downstairs when he heard me get up with Jesse and he came straight upstairs but I was back to sleep by the time he made it to our bedroom. Guess I was a little tired!

We made it through the next day fine, we were all tired though. The following morning after that Tim noticed the SUV's oil light was on and was leaking oil. He made an appointment to take that in later in the week--I'm just glad that didn't start on our trip home!

Now when I tell people the story they just laugh and laugh :)