Foreigner - Cold As Ice (Stereo)

Oh what a weekend! A lesson learned in the value of family... and friends... and home, even in Dumb Potter's Hell.

I left school early to hit the road... a big freezing rain storm was brewing from the south up through Portland and then on into the gorge... to glaze Dumb Potter's Hell and eventually shut down the gorge freeway. But that is getting ahead of myself.

I managed to get all the way past the turn off to Lebanon... only about half an hour normally... from the Deer Hunter's offering of sanctuary. (Not much football this weekend, but the company is so far impossible to beat.) It's the last time I'll be going there for a few weeks, until Rose Bowl weekend.

That last half hour took me an hour and a half of crawling over slick beads of ice. YIKES! I found a sane person to follow and kept pace with him. Hey... he had a "Go Duks" license plate. Oddly enough, with traffic on I-5 going 10 to 15 miles an hour as soon as I got off in Springfield the Parkway okay for much higher speeds. I guess they do a better job of keeping their roads de-iced than ODOT does.

Once I arrived, I was greatly relieved and settled in for a nice weekend. Pretty normal stuff. We worked on cleaning and organizing his shop, watching videos and some TV. He made a wonderful diner on Saturday. Sunday we were lazy. Then it was time to go home.

I never leave there empty handed. Between him and his mom, I get all sorts of stuff. This time some tools for Squeaky and the offer of Deer Hunter teaching him how to use some of the tools in his shop. I got a Duck's birdhouse... no not for ducks, but The Ducks. It's cute. And a bunch of other odd things I liked. I said I like boxes... so now I get lots of boxes. He sends food home for the boys too. That means that I don't have to cook when I get home. Isn't that nice?

Things on the road home went pretty well until I was almost half way home. Isn't that how it always goes?

I've known for awhile that there was a problem because the battery light would go on for a time then shut off again. We... as in X and I... thought it was a loose battery cable. Wrong. My cruise control shut its self down. Ut-oh. Odd. I kept driving until I noticed that my lights were fading. Not good. I pulled off into a well lit rest stop and parked the car... wiggled the cables and nothing happened. You can't drive without lights obviously.

I texted Bear. My phone was about to die. She texted back to call the Deer Hunter and have him pick me up... so I texted him. He called... my phone died with no solution and no way to contact the Bear. Crap. Okay, worse, I'd taken my blanket out of the car to wash it and forgotten it. Double crap.

Now the Bear is a smart cookie. I knew that when she tried to call me... I could hear it, but not answer it... I knew she would go back into her computer to when I met the Deer Hunter and get his information. You know, the old joke of telling me she needs to know where to look for the "glad bags" after I've been cut into pieces by the strange man I am going to meet. (Though with the Deer Hunter, I had already met him in Dumb Potter's Hell very publicly.)

She did. She called the Deer Hunter who told her that he had lost me in conversation. Both were concerned and a plan formulated for rescue. Meanwhile... I weighed my options. Someone would come for me eventually. I did managed to get my location out and a a request for a fully charged battery before things went to tripple crap.

No blanket, but like most females, I had a ton of clothing with me. Hey... you never know what may come up. But no coat... only my hoodie. I don't own a coat yet. That is a big expese and I was planning on getting one from the Goodwill on payday next weekend when I have nothing better to do. Live and learn. So I put my baggy old way too big sweat pants on over my clothes that I was wearing and covered myself in the remainder of my clothing, then went to sleep.

Sleep is a time machine. If I don't want to be somewhere... I can go to sleep until I do. Time passed totally unnoticed by me. Someone tapped on my window and there was Boo... behind him sweet cousin J! They got exuberant hugs. Yes, they had the battery and in short order we were all back on the road with the guys behind me just in case.

It was very cold by then and my toes were glad to be going home. Naturally there was mist on the windshield, so the wipers were the only things I used besides the headlights. I did not mind being cold for the remainder of the trip if it meant there was a warm place at the end. Ice in the gorge, but I am used to that. It took longer, but hey... here I am!

The first thing I did was sit down to let the Deer Hunter know that I was okay. He gets up super early, so I thought that once he and the Bear had worked things out that he would go to bed. Nope. He still worried. I can't say that makes me sad. We fired some emails back and forth... he likes my Bear. But then who wouldn't? And balled me out for making her sound so mean. He says she's a sweetheart. Yes she is! So everyone is now happy and sleeping like babies... I hope. I intend to do that now for the next 3.5 hours before I have to go to work. Good thing I slept in the car to pass the time. Tomorrow the car goes to the shop. Cool beans.

I hope your weekend was less chilling. hee hee. What did you do with yours?