Russ-capade

If you knew my late Father-in-law you totally get the title.  If not I'll explain.  My FIL was the king of Murphy's law with the inevitable thing of of it could go wrong it did with every adventure he tried.  Granted much of his problems arose from poor planning and lack of maintenance on his part but he was dogged with ill luck.  Our recent camping trip followed in Grandpa's footsteps.

The problems began probably two weeks before the trip with a rash of expensive car repairs and the decision to put a hitch on the car so we could take the boat along on the trip.  The last repair had Hubby tinkering just before left and delayed us leaving town by several hours.  $1500.00 later and we thought the car was road worthy, hitched up the boat and ran.

We made it to northern Wisconsin early evening with only a vague plan of where we would camp.  We found a state forest map and plotted a course to check out several campgrounds.  We get to the first campground and as we discussing the merits of a particular campsite the car overheated.  Hubby in blind panic shut off the car and it refused to start again.  We we camping there for the night regardless.  After some redneck shenanigans of hitching and unhitching campers and the boat Sonny Boy and I pushed the car into the campsite. Hubby and I drank a beer and worried about the car engine.

The next morning the car miraculously started so we found a Ford dealership and started towards it about 15 miles away.  I was following Hubby when he swings into a parking lot with the car stalled.  Seems he lost all electrical.  We charged the battery a little with jumper cables and held our breath as we limped it to the repairs shop.  A phone call the next day and the alternator was dead, $600 later and the car was moving but the A/C wasn't blowing too well.

The rest of the trip went well believe it or not.  The boys spent hours playing and fishing from the kayaks.  Hubby fished and played and Sonny Boy and I explored a kayak trail a bit.  We had a good time despite the brutal and expensive beginning of the trip.

Of course all good times must come to and end (and I discovered I only have a week limit of camping with two kids in a very small camper) and we packed up and headed home.  The trip home was going well until about Madison and the traffic was crawling.  We had noticed the Sunday evening exodus south of Madison on our way north and decided to take another route to hopefully avoid all the Ill-anoy license plates.  Less than three miles from our exit the camper blew a tire.  Nothing like changing a camper tire on the side of a VERY busy interstate.  I'm so glad Hubby was behind me and there to do it, I might would have had a breakdown if I would have been alone.

Despite the the crazy and expensive trip, Hubby still declares this wasn't Russ-capade worthy.  Seems we need a car accident, the boat to strand us in the middle of a large lake, and a fairly serious injury to qualify.

Misc.

Sometimes you just know.  I was just reading my post and got a giggle because I predicted Sonny Boy's return home to include smelly feet.  I'm not going to tell you how bad the kid smelled after a week of no shower, but his friend wandered over today and told me that Sonny Boy took his shoes off in the truck on the way home and nearly killed them.  I'm sure it was bad as he had run out of clean socks at some point.  Pheww.

While we were gone on our epic camping trip (it deserves its own post) Mom got a wild hair and decided to go get a hair cut.  That in its self wasn't bad, I've been harassing her for months to cut her bra strap length hair mainly because she does so little with it and it was straggly.  In my mind I was urging her to say shoulder length.  Mom resisted this like I wanted her to have an arm removed.  I came home to Mom with hair shorter than most men's.  I've never, ever, ever seen her with hair that short in my memory, though there are pictures of it when I was a toddler.  Whatever, my thought is it will be easier for me to take care of the next time she lands in the hospital.

Mom finally moved to the top of the list for the senior housing place.  We went to go look at it, the apartment was small but not really all that bad, honestly I think it would have been good for her as she'd have neighbors to interact with.  Alas she turned it down because they didn't allow smoking in the building.  Imagine that, she'd pay less than half of her current living expenses but still won't give up the damn cigarettes that are causing a good chunk of her health issues that she complains about.  While we were there talking to the manager , Mom looks at her with all honesty and sincerely says "you didn't even notice my hair!"  Ha ha, that has been my tag line the last few days.

My neck is still giving me fits.  Last Friday I called my doctor, she was leaving for the day but called me in some muscle relaxers and made me an appointment for first thing Monday.  I got a referral for a neurologist who will hopefully Botox things into livable states again.  In the meantime I struggle and hang in there.