Stella and the Injured Puppy

January 2, 2016

Okay, we got the truck. We got our new South Dakota Driver’s Licenses. Time to pick up our new home and start our adventure! Larry got to pick out the truck’s name so I wanted to christen the 5^th Wheel. Our new travel cards, truck license plate, e-mail and blog were all going to be some version of Lucky Stars so I wanted something celestial. I thought Stella was perfect. Plus… Marlon Brando!

Ringing in the New Year with family was a bittersweet event. I was exciting about the future but wondering how I would make it without my daily hugs from my Grandkids. I knew missing them would be the hardest part of all this! I started EVERY SINGLE MORNING with a big hug from my sweet Delaney! She’s a morning person like me and was usually the first of them up. That last morning hug on January 1^st was difficult. I knew I’d hug her again but not like this. I spent most of the day just looking at all of them and randomly hugging who ever was near.

We had to be up early on the 2^nd so the plan was to get to bed early. What do they say about the best-laid plans? We’d been packing the stuff we had to transfer to the new rig in boxes so we could grab and go. We were still packing at 1 AM. Morning came fast. We were up before the sun, hitched up and said a tearful farewell to our very sleepy kids and Grandkids!

Despite my paranoia that we’d crash and destroy our down payment, the 2-hour drive to the RV Dealership was uneventful. Wish I could’ve said the same for picking up the rig. We had more papers to sign and no one knew where the keys to our new home were. It took a while but we finally got all that taken care of and got a little tour and tutorial of how things work. Along with the keys the sales person handed me an envelope with a $40 gift certificate to their RV store. I went to the little store to browse, the dogs got comfortable on the new couch and Larry started transferring boxes from our old rig to the new one. 

I found out for $40 I could buy a wraparound step cover for 1 and 1/3 of the 4 steps leading up to the rig. We decided to go ahead and buy the other 2 and 2/3 as well. I wanted to install them right away but Larry wanted to get everything in first. Guess who won? Guess who should’ve been more insistant?

We were hoping to finish packing in time to take off for Carson City, NV. We had tentative reservations at The Silver City RV Park there. By 4 PM we were pretty sure we weren’t going to make it. The dealership said they had a spot with full hookups so we could spend the night there for free. We took them up on the offer and continued packing. At 7 PM we ordered a pizza. I started to explain to the guy where I wanted it delivered. He told me they delivered there all the time and knew where it was. I guess we weren’t the first to underestimate our ability to pack up a new RV.

We ate. We packed. We decided enough was enough. It was late, so I decided to take the dogs out for one more potty trip before going to bed. Dachshunds aren’t supposed to go up and down stairs so I try to carry them down. I got Jackson down and turned around to get Jenny. I think she thought I was going to leave her there because she took the steps on her own. She made it to the last step then fell off! I freaked. I thought she’d hurt her back but she recouped quick and started walking to the place I’d been taking them to pee. It was on the trip back that she started limping and I noticed the blood. I picked her up and realized one of her nails was completely gone and another one was a shredded mess. Her poor little paw was all bloody!

The steps of the trailer have little holes in them just big enough for a dog’s claw. I knew I should have insisted that we put the step covers on! I bandaged her up and tried to make her comfortable. I told Larry when we got to Carson City, NV the next day the first thing we were going to do was find a vet!

Meet Christine

November 2015 (Part two) 

Barely awake, I wasn’t completely sure I heard Larry correctly when he crawled into bed and with a shaky voice told me we bought the wrong truck.

“Huh?” I asked.

He said something about the truck pulling the weight of the trailer but the bed wouldn’t support the tongue weight with anything else in the truck. Including me!

I was sure he was just tired and had read something wrong. “It’s 2 AM! We’ll figure it out in the morning.” I told him.

The next morning, fully awake, we went over the numbers together. Even I, with my limited knowledge of trucks and trailers could see, WE BOUGHT THE WRONG TRUCK!!!!

I was sick. “What are we going to do?”

“I’m going down there today with that paper he signed and demand that they take the truck back and find us the right truck!”

Larry went to work. I stayed home and worried. I really didn’t think the “signed guarantee” was worth the paper it was written on. They’d probably take the truck back but we still needed a truck and I figured they’d have us over a barrel. There was no way we’d get a bigger truck for the same money and I was sure our fantastic deal was out the window.

I really need to stop underestimating my husband’s negotiating prowess!

Close to the end of the day he called me and asked if I would rather have a black truck with a moon roof or a white truck with the bed liner already in. (One of the pluses of the “wrong” truck was it already had a bed liner) Easy decision: I’m not fond of white vehicles and… ZION! I kept picturing all the beautiful places in Utah and around the country I wanted to go that would look spectacular through my new moon roof! He said I should come down there now because he needed me to sign all the papers again! The truck wasn’t on the lot but it was being delivered from another dealership.

I started to ask what kind of deal he got. He just said quietly, “Really good, come down now.”

I got there just in time to see our shiny new Black Chevy 3500HD Turbo Silverado dually with a moon roof being delivered.

I found out as soon as Larry walked into the dealership a sales person approached him, he showed the guy the figures about tongue weight and the signed guarantee from the sales manager. The guy looked at him and said, “They sold you the wrong truck!”

He knew right then he was going home with the right truck! We didn’t really want a dually. I knew eventually I’d have to drive it and I wasn’t crazy about driving anything that wide but that’s what we were going to need to pull our trailer.

And for some reason the sales person was all excited about our “Black Bow Tie”!

“What’s that?” I asked him.

“The Bow Tie on the truck! It’s black, not gold! Not a lot of trucks out there with a Black Bow tie!” He seemed very impressed.

My I-don’t-know-what-you’re-talking-about face must have translated to him as an I’m-not-impressed face.

“People special order them!” he gushed.

“What is that?” I asked.

“The Bow Tie! The symbol of Chevrolet!”

Finally Larry pointed to the front of the truck where the little Chevy symbol is. “It’s black.”

“Ohhhh, okay.” I understood but still was not impressed.

The salesperson gave up.

On the drive down I remembered that we had left our Mickey Mouse antenna ball on the old truck. I figured I’d retrieve it while we was there. “Do you know if the old truck is still here?” I asked Larry.

“Yeah, I saw it in the parking lot over there. Why?”

I started to head that way saying, “I want the antenna ball.”

“We need to get the paperwork done first,” he insisted.

“Okay, but it better be there when we’re done!”

Thank goodness most of the negotiations were done before I even got there. Pretty much all that was left was talking with the finance guy and signing the papers. Even so it seemed to take a long time. Larry wanted to get everything we could out of them. After several hours we were both tired from our (mostly his) exhausting research from the night before. The last line was signed and we were ready to be on our way when I remembered… the antenna ball!

“We’ll get a new antenna ball!” Larry said.

“Kelly got that for you!”

He looked beat, but I was insistent!

“You said we’d get it when we were done! Where did you see the truck?”

He pointed to a far corner of the parking lot. I headed in that direction.

No 2006 Chevy Silverado in sight!

“They must have taken it already,” he said.

“Wait, there’s cars back there!” I pointed to a fenced area.

“There’s no way to get in there accept through that office,” he complained.

“So I’ll check the office.”

“Sherry, they’re closed! No one is in there! I’ll buy you a new antenna ball!”

“There’s a light on! I’m going to check the door!”

The door opened so I went in and looked around. Most of the lights were off and it was a bit creepy walking around but I was determined! I walked to the back of the building where I figured it opened up to the fenced in yard. Locked! I was pretty sure my search ended here. Disappointed I decided I would just have to call them in the morning to see if anyone knew where the truck was. I left the building and Larry and I walked toward our new truck. It was kind of hard to be too disappointed because… NEW TRUCK!

“Hello! Can I help you with something?” The voice came from behind us.

I turned around and saw a women walking our way.

I told her we were looking for the truck we had traded in the other day because we left an antenna ball on it. She looked at me like she wished she hadn’t bothered. I told her it was a gift from our daughter.

She brightened up, “Well we’re just going to have to find that truck then!”

“Really, it’s okay. We don’t need it.” Larry said.

“Nonsense! Of course you do!”

I looked at her and smiled. “You’re a mom aren’t you?”

“Yes I am and we’re going to find that antenna ball!”

“I’ll wait here,” Larry said.

She took me back into the building. Opened the lock door to the yard and helped me search! I found the truck, retrieved the Mickey and thanked her.

“Us moms, we know what’s important and we stick together!” She said.

So we got the Christine we needed to pull our new trailer and thanks to a mom whose name I wish I knew we got our lucky Mickey Mouse golf ball antenna ball right where it’s supposed to be!

Time to hit the road! (well almost)