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Tuesday morning, I got up at 5:30 sharp, thanks to my Dad waking me as he went out for training for the day. I got up, had breakfast, and drove to Benbrook, TX to pick up an old friend and a moving truck, as we'd planned for the past few months.
I also rented a tow dolly so I could get my car to where we're headed. And promptly smash the passenger side wheel well into another truck as I'm attempting to load my car onto the dolly.
We get the truck and my car off the lot, and to her old apartment. Only to find out the strap drifted off the passenger side tire, and it would be dangerous to continue with the strap like that. So, after having loaded her boxes, we wasted another hour or so just trying to get my car off the dolly so we can reposition it. Somehow, during said repositioning, the strap tore. Yeah... so, we drove off to Auto Zone on her sister's recommendation, because they'll have duct tape or nylons... and they'd drive the car up onto the dolly. Yeah...
We get there, they do have duct tape, but they won't drive my car up onto the dolly. Oh well, we 'fix' the strap, reposition the car, and head out again. Only for me to notice about ten minutes away that the dolly is smoking as we drive. oogh... we pull into a grocery store parking lot and get out to look, only to find my car straddling the dolly, in such a way that it can't just be driven off the dolly. Well, crap, so we head inside to ask if anyone working has any ideas or could be of help removing it. The AM on duty comes out, looks it over, and says, "Well, there's no damage to the car, but you're going to need a wrecker to get it off, looks like."
Friend and I despair, sitting idle on the rear bumper of the truck. Just kind of staring at my car, trying to think of what to do about it. I call my Dad, who has no ideas, so, we despair some more. She eventually notices an emergency number on the keychain, and calls it, and sits on hold for fifteen minutes or so. When she finally gets through, they send out a mechanic to fix the strap.
We wait a good two hours minimum for him to show up, and he jacks the car up over the dolly and holds it there with a wooden beam (he only had the one, sadly) then has us drive the truck and dolly out from under the car. Eventually, it works, he replaces the strap, and gets the car up on the dolly nice and securely.
We drive an hour to get to my parents' house to get my stuff, that takes a good forty five minutes, just long enough for my parents and my brother to show up and meet her, and we go... continuing along the highway, up into Oklahoma. Around 8:30 PM, our soon to be roommate calls to ask where we are, and we tell her, only for her to say, "I'll leave a key under the mat for you," as it'd be well after 10:00 PM by the time we get there at the rate we're going.
We get near Muskogee, and I'm driving. I pull off the highway entirely the wrong way, start one direction, realize that's wrong, make a Uturn, realize the other direction isn't better, pull another Uturn, and start to turn left to get bak on the highway, only to realize there are flashing lights behind us. So, I pull way to the right and stop, roll down my window, and watch as the officer looks at my car on his trip up to the cab, and asks, "You folks lost?"
"Yessir, how do we get to Tulsa from here?" friend asks, and I look over, to see an officer hanging outside her window as well. Oh, goodie.
We get directions, and the officer on my side says, "You made two Uturns in two minutes, that was suspicious."
"Sorry, Sir," and he lets us go on our way. We get to Muskogee, and swap places in the truck as I'm starting to drift mentally.
Somewhere along the lines, we end up in Minnowbrook (or something like that) in the search for a restroom and gas, finding no gas stations open or existent... Eventually, we find one, and I try to use my debit card to get some gas at the very least, but it gets declined every time I try, so I go inside, he tries it there, it still declines, and I have a mini breakdown at that point, as it was probably near or after midnight, and we're out of cash.
Or so I thought. Then I remember I have a roll or two of coins in the truck, and ask if we can pay with those? "Sure..." Turns out we had $15.00 for gas, and I grab a map to get vague directions to where we need to go.
The closer we get to our destination, the less sense our soon to be roommate's directions make. I drive one way down a road that leads us around the airport, get a bit out of our way, and go, "This can't be right," and turn around to go the other direction down the road, until it turns into an entirely different road, and attempt to do similar by pulling down a barely paved road, which ends in a culs de sac. Mid turn, I look into my rear view and can see the rear bumper on my car, and go, "Oh, shit." I stop, park, and get out to look, yeah, car's resting crossways on the dolly, driver's side tire resting atop the dolly's tire, having sheared clean through the wheel cap. Friend just loses it, "It's 5:00 in the morning, we should've been there yesterday! My phone's dead, I can't get her phone number, we're in the middle of nowhere, I'm tired, sticky, hungry, and gross!" She sits in the truck's cab, while I stare at my car, trying to think of what to do about it this time. Around 6:30, I start making calls. The truck company, my mom to let her know we haven't made it just yet, my brother in an attempt to find our new roommate's cell number, etc. Mom suggests I call AAA, because she and dad have coverage, but it's in a different state, so they're not sure if it'll do any good. I try, and no, it doesn't.
The owner of the house we stopped in front of and her son in law come out to inspect the problem, SIL says he might know some people who could help if it comes to that, but the truck company should be able to send assistance. I call them again, and give them the road I'm on, which I didn't know earlier because I hadn't looked when I turned onto the road. She says she's not sure if they can help this time, due to liability issues with the car (they might have to just pull the car off the dolly entirely, if that ruins, say, the suspension, will they pay for it?) The homeowner invites friend and I to sit in the shade, gets us ice water, and lets friend charge her phone so I can get our roommate's phone number and call her at work to update her on our progress.
An hour or so later, I get a call from Uhaul, saying they're sending a wrecker. Huzzahs all around!
Wrecker calls, asking how to get to us. I relay directions as friend and I talk with the nice lady who is watching out for us. Wrecker eventually arrives, takes one look at our predicament, looks at me, and says, "Backed up a bit too quickly?"
No, didn't back up at all, jerk.
Anyway, he eventually gets my car off the dolly, and I ask him to just take the damn thing with him, we're close enough to our destination, surely.
We drive to a Kum & Go, go inside, talk to the lady at the counter, and ask for help getting where we're going.
"Oh, it's just down the street about three miles."
Yay. We drive on, finally finding the apartment complex, park, grab clothes, go inside our new apartment, take showers, rest, eat, and unload, finally. Roommate comes home around 5:00 PM that day, looks at us, and says, "Where the hell have you been?"
Yesterday (Thursday) we took the truck to the drop off station. I followed her there in my car. We park, I poke my head into the passenger's side of the cab, clear a bit of junk, and start to close the door, only to realize the rear view mirror on that side is cracked all the way through, badly. Oh, crap, says I...
We go inside to wait, a family ahead of us waiting for the system to come back up so they can finish their reservation. Turns out, they'd been sitting there for about an hour, and the system was down, at that drop off and three others in the surrounding area. Eventually, they got a hand-made reservation at a different rental yard.
Friend and I go in, get our contract review, and end up paying an extra $150 something, for going over our miles and for keeping the truck an extra hour on accident, having gotten lost on our way to the depot. Yerg, but, luckily, I'd gotten my disability check a few days prior. So, covered, and no more worry about the truck or the dolly. Now to focus on unpacking.
I also rented a tow dolly so I could get my car to where we're headed. And promptly smash the passenger side wheel well into another truck as I'm attempting to load my car onto the dolly.
We get the truck and my car off the lot, and to her old apartment. Only to find out the strap drifted off the passenger side tire, and it would be dangerous to continue with the strap like that. So, after having loaded her boxes, we wasted another hour or so just trying to get my car off the dolly so we can reposition it. Somehow, during said repositioning, the strap tore. Yeah... so, we drove off to Auto Zone on her sister's recommendation, because they'll have duct tape or nylons... and they'd drive the car up onto the dolly. Yeah...
We get there, they do have duct tape, but they won't drive my car up onto the dolly. Oh well, we 'fix' the strap, reposition the car, and head out again. Only for me to notice about ten minutes away that the dolly is smoking as we drive. oogh... we pull into a grocery store parking lot and get out to look, only to find my car straddling the dolly, in such a way that it can't just be driven off the dolly. Well, crap, so we head inside to ask if anyone working has any ideas or could be of help removing it. The AM on duty comes out, looks it over, and says, "Well, there's no damage to the car, but you're going to need a wrecker to get it off, looks like."
Friend and I despair, sitting idle on the rear bumper of the truck. Just kind of staring at my car, trying to think of what to do about it. I call my Dad, who has no ideas, so, we despair some more. She eventually notices an emergency number on the keychain, and calls it, and sits on hold for fifteen minutes or so. When she finally gets through, they send out a mechanic to fix the strap.
We wait a good two hours minimum for him to show up, and he jacks the car up over the dolly and holds it there with a wooden beam (he only had the one, sadly) then has us drive the truck and dolly out from under the car. Eventually, it works, he replaces the strap, and gets the car up on the dolly nice and securely.
We drive an hour to get to my parents' house to get my stuff, that takes a good forty five minutes, just long enough for my parents and my brother to show up and meet her, and we go... continuing along the highway, up into Oklahoma. Around 8:30 PM, our soon to be roommate calls to ask where we are, and we tell her, only for her to say, "I'll leave a key under the mat for you," as it'd be well after 10:00 PM by the time we get there at the rate we're going.
We get near Muskogee, and I'm driving. I pull off the highway entirely the wrong way, start one direction, realize that's wrong, make a Uturn, realize the other direction isn't better, pull another Uturn, and start to turn left to get bak on the highway, only to realize there are flashing lights behind us. So, I pull way to the right and stop, roll down my window, and watch as the officer looks at my car on his trip up to the cab, and asks, "You folks lost?"
"Yessir, how do we get to Tulsa from here?" friend asks, and I look over, to see an officer hanging outside her window as well. Oh, goodie.
We get directions, and the officer on my side says, "You made two Uturns in two minutes, that was suspicious."
"Sorry, Sir," and he lets us go on our way. We get to Muskogee, and swap places in the truck as I'm starting to drift mentally.
Somewhere along the lines, we end up in Minnowbrook (or something like that) in the search for a restroom and gas, finding no gas stations open or existent... Eventually, we find one, and I try to use my debit card to get some gas at the very least, but it gets declined every time I try, so I go inside, he tries it there, it still declines, and I have a mini breakdown at that point, as it was probably near or after midnight, and we're out of cash.
Or so I thought. Then I remember I have a roll or two of coins in the truck, and ask if we can pay with those? "Sure..." Turns out we had $15.00 for gas, and I grab a map to get vague directions to where we need to go.
The closer we get to our destination, the less sense our soon to be roommate's directions make. I drive one way down a road that leads us around the airport, get a bit out of our way, and go, "This can't be right," and turn around to go the other direction down the road, until it turns into an entirely different road, and attempt to do similar by pulling down a barely paved road, which ends in a culs de sac. Mid turn, I look into my rear view and can see the rear bumper on my car, and go, "Oh, shit." I stop, park, and get out to look, yeah, car's resting crossways on the dolly, driver's side tire resting atop the dolly's tire, having sheared clean through the wheel cap. Friend just loses it, "It's 5:00 in the morning, we should've been there yesterday! My phone's dead, I can't get her phone number, we're in the middle of nowhere, I'm tired, sticky, hungry, and gross!" She sits in the truck's cab, while I stare at my car, trying to think of what to do about it this time. Around 6:30, I start making calls. The truck company, my mom to let her know we haven't made it just yet, my brother in an attempt to find our new roommate's cell number, etc. Mom suggests I call AAA, because she and dad have coverage, but it's in a different state, so they're not sure if it'll do any good. I try, and no, it doesn't.
The owner of the house we stopped in front of and her son in law come out to inspect the problem, SIL says he might know some people who could help if it comes to that, but the truck company should be able to send assistance. I call them again, and give them the road I'm on, which I didn't know earlier because I hadn't looked when I turned onto the road. She says she's not sure if they can help this time, due to liability issues with the car (they might have to just pull the car off the dolly entirely, if that ruins, say, the suspension, will they pay for it?) The homeowner invites friend and I to sit in the shade, gets us ice water, and lets friend charge her phone so I can get our roommate's phone number and call her at work to update her on our progress.
An hour or so later, I get a call from Uhaul, saying they're sending a wrecker. Huzzahs all around!
Wrecker calls, asking how to get to us. I relay directions as friend and I talk with the nice lady who is watching out for us. Wrecker eventually arrives, takes one look at our predicament, looks at me, and says, "Backed up a bit too quickly?"
No, didn't back up at all, jerk.
Anyway, he eventually gets my car off the dolly, and I ask him to just take the damn thing with him, we're close enough to our destination, surely.
We drive to a Kum & Go, go inside, talk to the lady at the counter, and ask for help getting where we're going.
"Oh, it's just down the street about three miles."
Yay. We drive on, finally finding the apartment complex, park, grab clothes, go inside our new apartment, take showers, rest, eat, and unload, finally. Roommate comes home around 5:00 PM that day, looks at us, and says, "Where the hell have you been?"
Yesterday (Thursday) we took the truck to the drop off station. I followed her there in my car. We park, I poke my head into the passenger's side of the cab, clear a bit of junk, and start to close the door, only to realize the rear view mirror on that side is cracked all the way through, badly. Oh, crap, says I...
We go inside to wait, a family ahead of us waiting for the system to come back up so they can finish their reservation. Turns out, they'd been sitting there for about an hour, and the system was down, at that drop off and three others in the surrounding area. Eventually, they got a hand-made reservation at a different rental yard.
Friend and I go in, get our contract review, and end up paying an extra $150 something, for going over our miles and for keeping the truck an extra hour on accident, having gotten lost on our way to the depot. Yerg, but, luckily, I'd gotten my disability check a few days prior. So, covered, and no more worry about the truck or the dolly. Now to focus on unpacking.
you. I would have been a screaming mess within the first hour.
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