Join Me in Snarkville

…I don’t think I could stand anymore of this kind of fun.

Ok, today, Prince, Duke and I headed off to Vegas for a long weekend full of fun and car folks.  As I type, it is 12:0something AM on Thursday morning.  My Wednesday began at 6am and it just hasn’t stopped yet.  In the immortal words, this has been a no-good, rotten day.  And while Prince could not will himself to sleep fast enough, I’m still attempting to unwind and de-clentch from the events of the day — thus you get my (right, true, and proper) version first.

It began Tuesday night.  I packed us up in two suitcases.  Those two bags were loaded and Prince began to install the Joe Hauler to back of the car so we could tow the Vespa.  Now the thing is, we aren’t staying at the same hotel as the REST of the folks — oh, no, we are staying elsewhere and thus we will be “commuting.”  Since we learned last year that having two cars that Duke could ride in was key, we have planned for a year for both of us to drive to Vegas.  More recently, Prince thought it would be a good plan to park the MINI with the other MINIs (lest it get lonely) and commute on the Vespa.  (Note:  even he admits this is a thinly veiled excuse to drive both the Vespa and the MINI a lot.)

So, while installed the thing we carry the Vespa on, Prince becomes concerned with a sound.  After sliding under the rear of the car, he thinks he sees a bolt without its washer and nut where the hitch itself attaches to the car.  We discuss.  Do we ditch this plan or push on?  (Had we been smart we would have ditched — but still)  We decide the thing to do is get the hitch on the  car inspected in the morning on our way out of town. Quick check of Google and theplace we are heading opens at 7am.  Ok, 6am wake up it is.

We pack the car.  Now bags, boxes, and people are flying around my house all morning.  Basically, three people were washed, dressed, packed, fed, and loaded into the car by 7:30am.  We added to the stuff packed from the night before snacks for the road, our computers (as if we’d go unwired for any length of time) and our blue bag of tolietries.  Great this is going well.  We get on the highway.  We slow to a near stop.  We crawl along for an HOUR.  To get to the place 30 minutes away.  They check the hitch and declare it good to go.  Super.  Duke requests a car change and rides with me.  No problem.  Off on the road, next stop ….  the first corner — where Prince (who has in his car the Vespa on the back, Duke in the back seat, AND the GPS) makes a turn in front of a LONG line of cars and effectively looses me.  I call him on his cell.  He does not answer.  I think he tries to call me; I’m in the process of calling him.  Come to find out he is 20 feet to my left behind a sign.  Ok, let’s try this again.  We’re off.

15 more minutes in the car: suddenly, Prince pulls off to the shoulder of the road.  (I need to pause to mention that this way the Vespa sits on the back, I can not see his right turn signal.  As long as we only make left turns I’m good, but sudden moves to the right — bad, very, very bad.)  Ok, I pull in behind him.  He had noticed that the Vespa had slid backwards towards the edge of the hauler.  Good catch, Prince.  He tightens everything up and off we go again.

30 more minutes in the car: Call from Prince to Queen. “I need gas, let’s stop in about 15 minutes.” “ok”

15 minutes later: We stop for gas.  Prince declares the need to potty but returns to tell me that there is no way he’s allowing me to enter those bathrooms.  Since I wasn’t that bad, I thought I’d wait a bit.  I grab snacks from Prince’s car for us.

We drive almost 2 hours.  Duke declares, “I’m a little bit hungry.”  I offer the snacks he inhales them and then declares, “I’m a lot hungry.”

11:15am: “Have you thought about lunch? Duke says he’s very hungry.” “Ok, next exit.”

11:40am: Lunch break.  Duke and I get to potty at this point.  We all eat.  Prince tightens the Vespa again and we all move along merrily.

12:10pm (exactly 30 seconds after passing the last exit with services, Duke declares a need to go potty.

24 of the longest miles later, we make it!!  And Prince looks at the Vespa and thinks it is listing to the side — he tightens and we hope.

10 minutes later - the cover on the Vespa (tied down to the bike and the ramp) comes loose and begins to pop off.  We pull over, re-adjust and re-tie.

10 minutes later - Prince pulls over to re-check the Vespa.

10 minutes later - the cover ties break and the cover is literally hanging on by the mirrors until we cross three lanes of traffic to pull over.  While Prince is laying on the ground re-tieing the cover, a tracker trailor drives by a blows his horn — FREAKS both of us out a lot.  I begin to cry.

We get back on the road only to get back off at the next rest area.  Both of us seriously freaked out, worried about the hitch, the trailer, and the Vespa; we decide we need a real plan.  Ok, we are 40 miles away from a large town and we will find a Uhaul place, a place that sells real enclosed trailors or SOMETHING to change the way this thing is being hauled.  I try to get online with my phone and fail, so I do the only thing I can think of — “Phone a Friend”

I called a friend and asked him to be my Phone Google.  And wouldn’t you know, he was willing.  Sent us the numbers of 4 bike shops in the up coming town.  About the second the text came in, Prince spots a Uhaul rental place and makes a sharp left into the place.  We meet two guys who frankly couldn’t have been nicer, excepting one of their use of the phrase “little lady.”  The hooked us up with a real trailer (though not enclosed as we would have prefered.  And we drove out of there thanking the founders of UHaul for being in business.

Relaxing, I stop for a drink for Duke and we move forward.

Not 45 more minutes down the road, it was all stop for another potty break.   Crashing from the stress rush from earlier, Prince and I were already pushing ourselves by 5pm.  But to our credit, after that last potty break we went nearly 2 hours without stopping.

We stopped for dinner that was horribly slow, but we made it.  Revised time in as we turned into the home stretch put us in at 10:30pm.  We pulled up.  We checked-in.  We unloaded the cars.  I met the world’s nicest bellman.  Things were looking up.  The bags came upstairs.  I got Duke settled in bed.  I went to grab the stuff to wash my face before putting my own tired butt to bed.  I looked and looked…there was no blue suitcase with ALL of our tolietries.  I call Prince and ask him if it was still in the car. He says, “What blue bag?  I never put a blue bag in the car.”

Anyone know where the Target is in Vegas?