Road Trip to PA 9/2009

Road Trip to PA 9/2009

Had to believe it has been since July since I posted on my blog. Not that any one reads it, but I thought I would be able to add things here about my various projects and creative outlets.

The truth is, back in August, I found a GREAT old sewing machine desk on Ebay. I could see that the seller would not ship, but I did watch to see if her desk sold. I had planned to trying to find a shipping service to use, but could not find a company that would pick up with out 'crating' the item.

Since the seller lived in New Jersey I thought it was a lost cause, since it was way too far to 'drive'. But the seller and I began chatting via email and she offered to take the desk to her 'cabin' in PA and therefore my drive time would be closer to 7 hours [rather than the 12 to her Jersey home].

The week before the labor day weekend, we made plans to hook up in PA. Keith 'invited' himself to 'drive me' there. So on Sunday morning, Sept 6th, we heading for PA in Keith's truck.

I took my knitting, but forgot my camera. Lesson I had learned on my last trip to San Diego, was to NEVER travel without a knitting project...and NOW I have learned, NEVER leave home without your camera!

Our drive to the 'cabin' [that turned out to be a house on a fabulous river area in a wooded setting that was breath taking!] was very uneventful, except for the 5 times Keith had to stop to go potty! OH MY.....

But we chatted briefly with the seller Lyn and her husband Jim, loaded my new very cool sewing desk and headed back south to hit the turnpike back to Ohio.

We made it to the turnpike in good time and it was about 8:00 pm, Keith was hungry, so we stopped to get a sandwich and fill up with gas at one of the exit areas. We ate on the road thinking it would save drive time and about 2 exits later, the truck started to make a 'terrible' noise from the underside of the truck.

Keith was sure it was the muffler or tail pipe but he didn't stop...just kept driving. From his side mirror he could see sparks flying behind us..and when I turned around to look, the traffic behind us backed off and looked like tiny stars in the sky! I turned back to look ahead of us and saw a sign that said 1 mile to next exit. I mentioned this out loud and Keith said he would pull off on this coming up exit. The sound was something else coming from under side of the truck...it just didn't let up!

As we pulled of the exit, I didn't pay attention to the exit number or even the mile marker we had just pasted....and just like that the sound 'stopped'. The silence was only for a few seconds, and as we turned to the right to what I thought was a 'gas station', the sound started up again. We pulled into the business parking lot, that turned out to be a tire repair place and Keith out out of the truck to 'look' and see what was happening. I had to put my knitting down and when I hopped out, I could see a HUGE puddle of something coming out of the truck. As soon as I said, 'What is that?', I could smell gas!

I walked around and looked at the left side of the truck and the gas tank was laying on the ground with all the full tank of gas, now making a HUGE river that was running all over the place!

It was kind of shocking to see, and knowing we were now stuck in PA with a broken gas tank that could have totally blow up...I called AAA on my cell phone and the next task was to find out where in the heck we were so someone could come and assist us.

Not having the exact address of where were were, the AAA operator told me to call 911. I did as she suggested, and explain our issue. The 911 operator gave me the address of where we were and I called back on the 800# to AAA.

The second AAA responder, when NUTS when I told her it was our gas tank. She told me to call 911 again and get the fire department there asap. She told me I would need a safety 'clearance' from the fire department BEFORE AAA would pick us up! AND if she did call them now, it would use up one of our tow calls and they would have to leave and come back after I had the needed paperwork. SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO thus started the next phase of our evening!

I called back 911...and told them we needed the fire department to come and give us the clearance to get the pick up..and within a few minutes we had talked to AAA again..and they were on their way. There was NO such thing as needing or getting a 'clearance' to be picked up...but within the hour a truck finally pulled into the lot where we were sitting.

Of course by then all the volunteer fire folks were long gone but Alan and his son. Alan had spent most of the hour 'talking' to us. He was a truck driver and knew right were Findlay, Ohio was since he would pick up tile at Hancor. But the main jest of his chatter was about how he had about died, his son had driven him to the hospital at about 140 mph and he was VERY proud of this fact...and he was then life flighted to Pitts where they had finally saved his life. He also shared, he was declared dead twice and during one of these death experiences, God talked to him and did send him back to talk to a dead friends dad.

After all of this 'sharing' I was very ready to get on our way home...but trick was going to be, the AAA driver only had enough log hours left to drive us half the way home. Alan of course thought we were going to get stranded somewhere on the Ohio boarder so he gave us his card and 'promised' he would come and help us, drive us home or whatever it would take! He gave us his card and let us know he would also come and speak to any group that would listen about his born again experience. It was really an oh wow kind of thought for me!

We climbed into the back seat of this huge tow truck. It was full of 'stuff' everywhere, looked like it had not been swept out or picked up for about 10 years! I never found out the couples names, but it was a husband and wife team that works that part of PA doing AAA work. We could only drive so quickly and did make some stops to use the restroom on the turnpike and get some soda and a free coffee from the folks that were working the break center at the rest stop. It was labor day weekend and so they do that on the main roads...anyway I heard the life story of this couple. The have a house full of cats and one son. He now works in a factory for the health insurance but has helped out the 'family business' of driving this tow truck over the years ..and it is still his dream to own that truck again...dear god the truck is so banged up I don't know what the poor kid is thinking...but I think they probably have relatives living near Williamstown for sure! :)

We finally got to Rivanna Ohio. It was the plan for the driver to leave us there, in a dark parking lot and then we would just call AAA again and say we were broken down. So that is just what we did. The new AAA responder said it would be another hour or so. It didn't take that long for the new nice and shinny tow truck to arrive. We had had time to walk to the 'light' across the street and get coffee and some snacks at the Speedway. As soon as the new driver hopped out, I could see the clearance lights on his cool looking truck did not work! He saw it too and called his boss and told him he was going to go back and get a different truck. The Boss told him there was no need to do that, but the driver did it anyway. That was a good move for sure, at least we thought that, until this young driver came back with this most god awful truck you can image.

It looked like it needed to be retired a few years ago, it had a stub nose cab and was NOT designed to haul 'people'. I had to sit in the middle and it was like sitting on a slab of cement. We only stopped twice on the LONGEST drive ever to get home, and I tried to walk as much as I could when we did stop, but my ass was totally numb when we got home and it took 30 mintues of 'needles' to get blood to flow again in my butte cheeks!

This drive, was the longest 'haul' this young guy had ever done and he was SURE he would 'hold' a company record for the longest haul now! I asked if he got a prize or some bonus..and when I would try to make jokes he would look at me with this blank total stare on his face ...again I think he could have had some relatives that were in the movie Deliverance! We had not gone far and when we hit Akron, he starts asking me where he needs to go! He didn't have a GPS or even a map. It was something...so I kept telling him where to turn and we finally were getting closer to the middle of Ohio when the thick FOG hit!

As some point, and I really don't remember how far out of Akron we were, there was a vehicle that would drive up close to us on the left side of the truck and just hang with us...then fall behind and pull up on the right side that wasn't really a lane at all. The driver kept repeating this and it REALLY spooked the driver. He said no way no how was he stopping for this guy...he even said that is how people get shot and robbed! DEAR GOD....finally I just looked back and said...I THINK all our clearance lights are out!!

The driver slowly pulled over...got out and sure enough, we had break lights and that was it..not even sure the turn signals worked! It was like on my god when else can possibly go wrong!!!!!!! We had no choice but to keep driving and hope a cop didn't pull us over. BUT thing was..the fog was getting thicker and thicker....the cops were not even out on the roads it was just like some Chevy Chase movie...but I had a sleeping husband sitting next to me.....where the hell is Chevy when you need him or anyone else with a sense of humor that is...or someone to slap me down when I had my next out burst!!!

As the fog got thicker, our driver didn't seem to mind or really notice. We are looking right out the front of that short nose cab, can see the white line as it feels like it is touching our feet and the glass of the window is hugging my knees. All of a sudden a huge deer runs across the 4 lanes of traffic and he leaps at the very last second out of our way. All I could see in my mind were deer parts, glass and lots of blood covering all of us. I was uncovering my face when the drives says.............whoa, did you see that deer! I was starting to get slap happy and had so wished I would have bought a bottle of wine or a BIG boy at that last truck stop!! But I just starting laughing to the point I totally sounded like I was losing my mind...and then got my composer and started to tell the driver how Channa had hit a deer with this little truck we had and so on.

As we get closer to our part of the state, finally we saw a sigh for Mansfield. I don't remember if the driver said it first or if Keith asked him after we passed Mansfield, but we were now about out of fuel...and were driving on fumes. Keith kind of yelled at him to 'get off here' as we saw the exit for Bucrus. ..but most of the side of Bucrus we were on was totally closed. Again, being a holiday weekend and WAY after midnight, few things were open.

We got back in SR 30 and kept driving toward home.

Keith told him Upper was the only place he could probably get fuel, so we got off and by now Keith has had a nap so he is going to direct he poor guy to the closest gas station. Now, keep in mind ALL THE Speedways we have passed in hours and hours were CLOSED! BUT Keith told him to turn right..and sure enough a Speedway is on that side of the highway and it was closed. We then drove down to the Pilot or what ever is next to the McDonald's. This is where things got even worse for the poor driver. The whole time he was trying so hard to be professional and took his job so seriously. He would say over and over, his most important job was to 'get us home SAFE'. So we finally pull up to the station, he has his pilot card...he puts in in and it is totally denied! He didn't want to tell us, we had gone in to go the the bathroom and I was walking trying to get blood back in to my bum...and when we go to get back into the truck that he had now pulled into a parking space...he finally tells Keith the card will not work...

Of course, we just want to get home, but this poor guy, has to get back somehow!!

Keith goes ahead and offers to pay for the fuel and then the total can come off of the towing charge. The guy has NO choice...he says OK.

We fill up and head on home. We take him the back way to our house or try to..thinking it will be faster but he drives right past the road. So we go on to road 177. As we drive there are corn fields on both sides of the road. Our driver comments he has never been 'surrounded' my corn before ...and he is driving a totally normal speed. Then I piped up and said this is JUST how it looked when Channa hit that deer with the little truck...so the poor guy slows down to like 10 MPH the rest of the way to our house...it is now 6:00am as pull into the lane.

Keith was all about trying to get his clearance lights working...so he has him pull in to the morton barn. I grabbed a beer...and tried to unwind! After about 30 minutes, and a no go on fixing the lights....our driver hands Keith his bill and comes up with a little note that states we paid for his fuel. Keith was NOT happy with the way did did the paperwork...but it was a one time thing...poor kids had no idea how to do it!

He pulls out and head back to Ravenna. As I start my third beer, a light rain starts to fall..and we go take my wonderful sewing cabnit out of the back of the truck and carry it into the building just in case since keith is going to drag the truck somewhere as soon as possible to get the gas tank fixed!

I spent part of the next day cleaning my cool cabnit and then moved it into the house! I was pleased as punch with my new buy....and I think I would do the same again..even though as as after thought, I would have probably been able to get it in my truck of my car. I never thought to measure!

Live and learn!