Almost Stranded

Last weekend, we had a perfectly lovely weekend at the lakes in Angola.

To prove it, here's some pictures.

Sophie found a shell

Travis floating

Noah cheesing

SMORES!!

The little beach at our campground

Pedal boating

As we left on Sunday, I noted that we were nearly out of gas. We opted NOT to stop at the teeny gas station in Orland, hoping to hit better gas prices in Howe at the halfway point. We had enough gas to make it to Howe with no problems.

27 miles later, I pulled into the gas station in Howe, and told Ben he'd need to get out and pump the gas, since he had my debit card. He'd left his at home, so I had loaned him mine earlier that weekend, as I just really didn't need it.

He got out, opened his wallet, and flipped through it.

He stared at it blankly.

He got back in the van.

Where's your debit card?

 I don't know. I gave it to you. It's not in your wallet?

No. It is definitely not in my wallet. When was the last time I used it? 

Gee, Ben, I don't know, seeing as how I gave it to YOU. It's not my job to keep track of when you use my card.

(Sometimes I get a little impatient.)

I'm pretty sure I used it to get McDonald's for the kids before I left on Friday.

Okay.

When I was in the truck.

Okay.

Meaning, I think I left your debit card in the truck. Which is back at home. Which means we don't have it. And I don't have my card. And I don't have any cash. Which means we have no gas and no way to pay for gas.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhkay.

Ben and I aren't credit card people. So with no debit card, and no cash, and no banks open on the weekend, we started contemplating what we had on our persons or in the van that we could sell for some gas money.

Canada was eyeing us from his spot in the middle seat.

It was tempting.

Then I recalled that I had my checkbook on me. I almost never write checks, but carry it in my purse pretty much solely to write my monthly check to my mom for child care services.

I told Ben this.

Ben, I have a checkbook in my purse.

I'm pretty sure gas stations don't take checks.

Well, you should go in and see.

I should? I think you should. It's your checkbook.

 Your name is on them  too. You should definitely do it.

But I don't ever write checks.

That doesn't matter. You have to do it because it's your fault you didn't put my debit card back in your wallet.

I have no compunctions about using guilt trips to get myself out of uncomfortable situations.

It worked. Ben skulked into the gas station with check in hand.

Rejected. They most certainly didn't take checks.

Neither did the gas station across the street. Nor did the dinky one just down the street from that, but to be fair, they also were shut down with the windows boarded up, so it's possible that at one point when they were still a functioning establishment, they did in fact take checks, but that didn't help us any.

We sat in the van to think for a few minutes.

We finally decided to take our chances and head north into Sturgis, Michigan, about fifteen minutes north, to see if we could find any check-taking establishments there.

Two minutes later, we passed a Dollar store. I whipped the van around (okay, that's not true, I made a very conservative left turn onto a gravel road and then turned around in someone's driveway, and made my way back out to the main street. It drove Ben crazy. He's a sucker for a good U-turn) and sent Ben into the dollar store to see if he could buy a pack of gum or something, and write a check for some amount over, and get some cash in return.

No-go.

But, they steered us to the Wal-Mart in Sturgis, another five minutes north of us and just across the Michigan state line, where they assured us we should be able to write a check and get some cash back.

At Wal-Mart, Ben once again made his way inside to try his luck. He bought a sandwich, some Pringles, Twizzlers (we were hungry) and orange soda, and was able to write a check for twenty bucks over. A maximum of twenty dollars over; Wal-Mart's apparently pretty cautious about check-fraud.

With our twenty dollar bill clenched in our little hands, we made our way to the gas station in the Wal-Mart parking lot.

Gas was a full forty cents cheaper than what it had been in Indiana.

Ben's a bargain shopper when it comes to gas. He can tell you the gas prices of the five gas stations in our immediate vicinity at any given time. He lamented,

This is like a cruel joke. We stumble across the cheapest gas station we've seen in a month and we're not able to spend any more than twenty dollars at it.

He seriously contemplated sending me back into Wal-Mart to write another check and get another twenty bucks, but at this point, we were kinda tired of the whole game. We put twenty bucks' worth of gas in the van, and finally got back on the road.

On the way home, gas tank half-way filled, I told Ben this story would at least make for a good blog post.

He responded, "Hey, if what you want out of a relationship is good blog-post material, you married the right guy."

Amen to that.