We moved from the suburbs of Atlanta Georgia to Austin Texas this weekend. Actually, we started on Thursday night. The trip turned into a 1,000 mile odyssey. We were traveling with our two kids, the babysitter who has family in Austin and came along for the ride, and Petunia. So we were limited to pet-friendly hotels like Residence Inns. Oh, and we were wagon-training: Susan was driving the van and I was driving the car.
Because we left in Atlanta traffic at about 4pm, we only got about 150 miles on Thursday, stopping in Birmingham for the night. On Friday we drove for about 10 hours, not including an abortive stop to search for a Starbucks somewhere in Mississippi where we almost ended up in a four-car rear-end chain reaction. The little old lady in front of the truck in front of me jammed on her brakes, then the truck jammed on its brakes. I missed the truck’s bumper by inches, and Susan swerved onto the shoulder to avoid hitting me. She missed a telephone pole by a few feet. Oh and Hattie puked in the van around this time.
Sometime late Friday I noticed that my car was overheating. The temperature gauge was floating up to the top of the range, staying there for a few minutes, then dropping back down to somewhere above the midpoint. I’ve seen that behavior before. It’s usually indicative of a bad thermostat or a faulty water pump. So we stopped in Tyler Texas, at yet another Residence Inn.
On Saturday morning when I started the car it was still overheating, so I looked in my GPS device for nearby service stations. At 9AM I went to the closest one and told them that I suspected it was the thermostat. They told me they’d check it out in about an hour. I decided to send Susan and the girls ahead to Austin in the van and wait out the repairs by myself.
Seven hours later the mechanics were still struggling to get the thermostat into the car. Evidently it was a real bear to access, and another bear to swap out. They finally got the part installed and I hit the road at 4PM, with about a 6-hour drive ahead of me. Susan and the girls had arrived hours before and were shopping for house stuff.
About four hours into my drive Susan called to say that the van had a flat, and AAA was flummoxed because we changed our membership to the Texas “club” but Susan’s mobile phone still had an Atlanta area code. They hung up on her four times. She finally gave up and decided to change the tire herself. Oh and Hattie had a fever and it’s 102 degrees outside. A good Texas samaritan pulled over and helped her change the tire. Thanks for nothing AAA.
So it’s Sunday and we’re waiting for our moving truck full of stuff to arrive. We made it to Austin safe and sound, and only a little the worse for wear.
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