jynxed's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Back to Big Bear - Part Three Clark: "Eddie, has anyone ever told you you're bad luck?" So, Friday, July 2, 2004...circa 4:20 pm After we finished packing, I started loading up the Santa Fe. It's quite amazing, actually, how much shit you need for just three days. Of course, it's all a matter of Guys vs. Girls here. A guy could go three days with simply a bar of soap and a clean pair of underwear, and even those two things are optional. Girls need body soap, facial soap, shampoo, conditioner, comb, brush, deodorant, toothbrush, toothpaste, floss, two outfits for each day (plus one combination that includes warmer clothes), three pairs of shoes for each day, pajamas, and so on. Girls. Sheesh. Anyway, I packed up the car with my back throbbing, but not too badly. As I came back inside on my last trip, Amanda had just gotten the mail. "God DAMMIT!" she snarled at an open envelope which, when opened, kind of looked like it was sticking a tongue out at her. "What's wrong?" I asked, stupidly. If you remember from my last entry (and if you take anything away from these moronic postings of mine, remember this one), the worst thing you can do when someone is in pain or upset is ask them what's wrong. The best thing you can do is make a beeline for the exit faster than a flaming fart. "It's the Old Navy credit card bill. Shit! I guess I forgot to pay it last month. Fuck!" Her dad was in the Navy and hearing my cute little wife swear up a storm always cracks me up. She dropped the bill and shuffled through the pile of papers near the phone. "It's not here," she said. "Fuck! I could've sworn we paid it. What happened to it?" I shrugged. I've always had the notion we should just pay the bills as soon as we get them instead of piling them up on the counter in the first place. This isn't to say I actually do that...on the contrary. But I think it would help avoid this exact brand of shit. As it turns out, we now have to pay a $20 late charge on a $35 bill. What a crockola. Add to that the fact that the U.S. Postal Service somehow lost my last car payment and we got burned with a $25 late fee from Honda as well. I'm half-inclined to send a bill to the Postmaster General. Freakin' bastards. I swear our mailman is a drooling half-wit. On several occasions we've ended up with our neighbors' mail. Damn postman's probably smokin' phatties on his lunch break. "1946? 1948? Fuck it, y'all...I wasn't even born yet. Whee! I'll just stick this shit in anywhere. Who cares? Not me! Roll me another, homes!" So now Amanda was all cheesed off. What fun. My back is aching, Amanda's pissy, we've got no money and we haven't even left the fucking house yet. At that point, I distinctly remember thinking that the best way to spend the fourth of July weekend might be to just curl up in a little ball under the covers and hope that the house doesn't burn down. But we're hearty adventurers for Chrissake, and we're not going to let a little something like complete misery keep us from having a good time! Hell no! So we through Cooper's kennel in the back of the truck, lured him in with ice cubes and Milkbones, shut the back door, and got the hell out of Dodge. "Okay," I said as we headed back to Costco to fill up the Santa Fe with cheap gas. "Let's just forget this afternoon ever happened and have a good time this weekend." "Sounds good to me," Amanda said, doing her best to smile. As we got up to the gas pump, I gave her a little kiss, and everything started to seem like it was coming back together. HA! The good thing about her Santa Fe is that even though it's an SUV, it gets pretty decent gas mileage (22-27 MPG) and it has a big ass gas tank. It took me a few minutes to fill it up, and then we were on our way, Miraculously, the Costco was even more deserted than it had been earlier that day when I had filled up my Civic. Now, it had been reported that one of the country's top fourth of July destinations was going to be Las Vegas. Our drive up to Big Bear consisted of a hundred miles or so up I-15. Want to guess what freeway you take from San Diego to Las Vegas? However, almost as if we were witnessing the second coming of Christ (which is quite a shame, actually...I mean really, the guy got nailed to a cross when he was like 30, and had only come once in those 30 years? Sad...), we only hit one tiny batch of bad traffic due to construction. The rest of the time we were cruising along with the flow of traffic at 70-75 MPH. Nice. That's pretty mind-boggling for a Friday afternoon, much less a Friday afternoon leading into a holiday weekend. Wow. I honestly thought our luck was changing at that point. HA! A few miles out of Temecula, our designated "Dinner At McDonald's Stopping Point" and nearing the half-way point of our sojourn to Big Bear, Amanda suddenly wrinkled her nose. "I smell dog food," she said. "Oh. No." [to be continued...] 7:51 a.m. - July 12, 2004 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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