Durn, Durn and Double Durn!

Have you ever been down the road apiece and things just don’t go right?  That was us Thanksgiving weekend.  The trip to Texas and back was not particularly smooth.  After having minor surgery on my back and happy on drugs to kill the pain for a 5 hour car ride, we came upon an accident at the Windstar Casino just outside of Thackerville, OK.  Going at speeds of 75 to 80 mph, you know with the flow of the holiday traffic if you don’t want to be run over, all of a sudden we were doing NASCAR all over the road avoidance maneuvers. Dave did a great job of keeping us from getting hit or hitting someone else.  2 miles and 35 minutes later we passed three very totaled semis, 2 on their sides and 1 upright but horribly crushed.  Across the highway was the huge flashing casino signs.  I thought to myself, yep look over to see what is going on with the sign and you pay the price. Traffic moved fairly rapidly once we cleared the wreck.

Surprisingly traffic through Dallas was not bad at all for a Wednesday evening.  The rest of the drive was uneventful. We made good time and hit the kid’s front door at 10:30p.m. 
The visit with the kids was wonderful, great company and great food.  The boys are growing so fast.  Little Andy is now rolling over and Noah is demonstrating his command of NO, not that it gets him anywhere.   

J’s mom Irene made a wonderful Thanksgiving Day meal complete with a desert bar filled with goodies.  There must have been at least 14 deserts.  I made a minced meat pie complete with a 1/4^th cup of rum and a rum based hard sauce. That’s Dave’s favorite pie and since his birthday was the 27^th that was my gift to him as I never make pies.  After dinner Noah spent his time running up and down the front porch of his grandparent’s house kicking the soccer ball.  He is so full of energy and going constantly.  We had a ball watching him play and playing with him.  Andy got passed around amongst the Aunts and Uncles and cousins. He is such a good little guy.  We started him on cereal and he picked it right up and glommed it down.

After 4 fun filled days we packed up to go home along with 100,000 other people out on the road when the light on the dash came on and said our battery was not charging.  Oops, let’s turn around and head back to the kids house.  Fate had been on our side when the alternator failed as we were heading into another traffic stoppage at Exit 571 on I-20 westbound and would have been really stranded had we not been able to do a quick roundabout and head back when at mile marker 579 we were finally dead in the water, 17 miles from Longview.  We managed to get off the highway, but it is super scary to have big semi’s passing us at 80 mph. We hoped our emergency flashers would hold out.  An hour after calling FarmTow services our tow truck showed up, after being lost for about 30 minutes of that time, and got us back to the house.  J had to retrieve us as 4 people would not fit into the truck cab.  The dogs were able to ride in the car on the flatbed. Poor babies…they were confused as to why we were not in the car, but could see us out the back window. 

Thanks to a neighbor’s suggestion of a good mechanic, a new alternator, serpentine belt and $335.00 lighter in the wallet we were once again on our way home.  It was Groundhog Day all over again or so it seemed.  Hadn’t we done this earlier…leave? But getting to spend another day with the boys and family was wonderful.  We hit Dallas at 6:00p.m. HUGE MISTAKE!  It took us a good 40 minutes to get from Mesquite, TX to the Farmers Branch exit. Traffic was a nightmare due to a stalled semi on I-635E.  Once past Dallas we were able to make up some time.  We got home at 10:30 p.m. none worse for the wear.  We even stopped for some good ole Starbucks coffee in Denton, TX.  What would we do without Starbucks? 

Hope all of you had a great Thanksgiving weekend. Whoa Nellie...Christmas is just around the corner! I must have lost track of the time.  Eh?  Is that Santa I hear loading up his sleigh?

Happy trails, stay safe if you are traveling over the holidays…