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4/21/2007
Saturday, April 21
was a day when everything went wrong, or so it seemed. The weather
forecast was great, and so I planned to get outside with the family.
The plan was that my mother would take my wife to Wal Mart, where my
wife would get her nails done. While that was happening, I was
going to take the kids for a hike, and then meet up with my wife at Wal
Mart. Well we all got off to a late start. My son scraped
his arm pretty early on in the hike, and did a good bit of whining and
crying during the rest of the hike. I made a wrong turn, and side
tracked us in the wrong direction, which wasted a good half hour.
Before we were done with the hike, my wife was done, and instead of
starting the shopping and waiting for us, her and my mother drove back
home from Wal Mart.
Once we got home, we were going to get things together,
and go to the car races. It wound up taking way too long to get
going. We stopped at McDonalds in Fishkill for lunch, and then
went to the Home Depot to pick up a couple of things. While we
were there, my wife realized that she hadn't packed the BBQ grill to use
at the races. Since it was already going on 2:00, and the race
track usually opens at 4:00, I called my mother, and convinced her to
grab the BBQ grill, and drive it up to Wal Mart in my car. We went
on to Wal Mart, and my mother met us there. By the time she got
there, my car was nearly out of gas, so I had to go to Mobil with her,
and buy gas. I then put the grill in the van, and mom headed back
home. I finished the shopping, packed everything in the van, and
we headed to Middletown.
We got into the race track a little after 4:00.
When we got out of the van, and set up the table and grill, somehow one
of the sliding doors on the van didn't get closed completely, so the
interior lights stayed on. Unfortunately, no one noticed it until
three and a half hours later. Even then, we didn't notice the
door, we just noticed that the battery was dead. Since the keys
were in the ignition, and it wasn't all the way off, I figured that was
what killed the battery, and never spotted the door.
After asking a few folks for jumper cables, or a
booster pack, I finally gave up, and called my mother to bring the
booster pack from home. Once again, she came to the rescue, and at
about 10:00 she showed up at the track. I walked out to meet her,
and drove the car in. The booster pack did the trick. Once
the van was running, I left the booster pack with the van, and drove the
Maxima back out the gate to my mother. I thanked her, and she
headed home.
The races didn't get over until nearly midnight.
When they were done, we found the nearest gas station, fueled up, and
headed for home. On our way home, just outside of Beacon in
Dutchess Junction, a deer ran out in front of the van. I tried my
hardest, but I couldn't avoid it. Thankfully, there was no major
damage. The license plate was bent a bit, and there was some fur
on the bumper, but otherwise the van was unharmed, no one was hurt.
What a long, difficult day though! |