OH. EM. GEE.
We had the most exhausting holiday weekend that I'm getting tired even just thinking about how to talk about it.
Let me just say that we traveled overall about 600 miles (no joke), with a different destination each night, three different full-blown fireworks shows, lots of parties, one hot tub, a Spiderman appearance, a zoo trip, lots of friends and bunches of fun. Plus, we got to sleep in the camper for one night, which the kids always enjoy.
Oh, and you can't forget the obligatory Davidson "Moment of Idiocy". In general, on trips, we lose something, break something, forget something, and/or leave something behind. We're particularly notorious for leaving something behind at the Friends' house, and I joke that we do that so they always have a reason to hang out with us again.
This time, I think we managed to not leave something at their house. If we did, it's hidden well enough that they haven't located it yet.
But we didn't get out of there unscathed. We packed up and left the house, and then spent the day with the Friends and the Bersels at the Fort Wayne zoo. Our plan was to leave straight from the zoo to go back up to Ben's parents' house to drop off the camper.
The zoo was fun, kids loved it, we did pony rides and river rides and carousel rides, fed the ducks, played in the water, and otherwise engaged in general merriment.
After a long, fun-filled day, we pulled the kids in the various wagons back out to the parking lot to collapse in the vehicles for the trek home.
Noah and I were in the back of our little group, and when we finally made it to our truck, I saw Ben staring blankly into the truck window.
I left the keys in the truck.
Oh.
I did it on purpose. They're bulky and I didn't want to carry them. But now the keypad doesn't work.
Oh?
Because the battery is dead.
So....we can't get in the truck?
Nope. We have to break in. I left the windows cracked and the sunroof up for this very purpose.
Okay. That's a little weird. You knew this was going to happen? Why didn't you just take the keys then?
Well I didn't KNOW the battery was going to die. But if I leave the keys in the car I always leave myself some kind of a backup.
Okay....so what do we do now?
Well....the windows aren't down enough for us to be able to reach in there. And since the battery is dead, even if we COULD reach down there, pushing the unlock button won't do us any good.
Hmmm. This doesn't sound like such a good backup plan.
By this time, the Friends and the Bersels had been alerted to our dilemma, and as much as I'm sure they were tempted to clamber in their respective vehicles, wave goodbye and say, "sorry 'bout ya," they instead committed to helping us break into our truck.
Dave asked if we had any type of hanger or other 'stick'-like object.
Normally, of course, the answer would be no because anything we had would have been in the truck.
But today, we were pulling the camper. And we generally don't lock the teeny camper door. And just inside the camper door were our metal roasting sticks for hot dogs and marshmallows and any other food that strikes your fancy to poke with a stick and shove into a campfire.
We retrieved the sticks and unwound them. Ben shoved one through the window and pressed the unlock button, for good measure.
He was right. Nothing.
Finally, they figured it out. Ben managed to hook the passenger-side door handle through the window, but didn't have the leverage to actually pull the handle up. Shawn used the second roasting stick through the sunroof to hook onto Ben's roasting stick; then with Shawn's Spiderman-like strength, he was able to pull the door handle up.
We were inside!
Of course, our truck battery was still dead. And as resourceful as the Davidson-Friend-Bersel clan has been known to be, none of us had any jumper cables.
Not to worry. The nice gentleman in the pickup that just happened to pull up at this very moment was able to come to our rescue.
Disaster averted.
Here are a couple other pictures of the zoo trip and other weekend festivities:
Kids in the wagon.
Ten thousand internet points for you if you happened to notice that the little girl in there is actually not one of ours. She makes a good Sophie-stand-in, though. Thanks, Audrey.
Noah and Gayle
Travis the navigator
Us on the river ride. Oops, Sophie's not there AGAIN.
Oh right, there she is. Whew.
And again, playing drums with birthday-boy Ganon.
Awesome pic of Spidey and the kids at the birthday party.
The gang on the ride back from (night 2 of) fireworks.
Getting ready for fireworks (night 3) at Newton Park with the Langleys
By the way, I have a theory. I'm guessing that roughly 90% of times the phrase "grand finale" is uttered.... is at a fireworks show. I never hear it any other time, but on fireworks nights, everyone says it. Sometimes twice. Or if you're Ben, six times.
Get ready for the grand finale.... you don't want to miss the grand finale!.... OOOoooooohhh, look, it's the grand finale!
Think about it.
No comments:
Post a Comment