Meerkat's Greatest Adventure (of 2014), Part 1

Monday, November 24th- a day that will live in history.

Well, they all do, don't they, but for different reasons.

It's officially December which means its time to recount the adventure which was ... THANKSGIVING WEEK!

I've traditionally taken the week of Thanksgiving off from work. It comes late in the year, but as the company provides two paid days off, it's tough to resist as a holiday. Jennifer and I don't normally travel, but with a bit of careful planning, I can generally get three weeks of vacation out of my allotted two weeks with a bit of creative scheduling.

The problem with my plan is that vacations don't always go to plan. I'm not sure how things work in your part of the world, but the "expectation" in the United States for a "vacation" is that one will travel somewhere. For a myriad of reasons, this has not been possible for Jennifer and I for many, many years. This year, though, we had the opportunity to travel. And so we did... to visit the parents!

We had originally planned to leave on Saturday or Sunday, but I had been experiencing a bout of weather induced tendonitis starting around Friday evening. I popped a lot of little blue pills (naproxen), and by Sunday evening the symptoms were all but gone. As I've dealt with this over the past several years, I had a good idea that the worst of it was over and that I was good to travel. Jennifer and I talked this over quite a bit, and finally decided that the trip was on.

As we had a pretty good idea of how the trip was going to be, we were able to pack with even the short notice that we had. The only major change to our original travel plans was simple but significant: instead of swapping out drivers and driving for as long as possible, we reverted to our tried-and-true method of Chris driving and Jennifer navigating. Win-win!

We took off at 0738 local on Monday morning, and promptly lost precious time in rush hour traffic. Once clear of the greater Chicago area, we experienced a mix of snow and rain and as we approached Missouri, the weather cleared entirely except for gusting winds which stayed with us for all of Monday and part of Tuesday. In our vacation planning enthusiasm, we had thought that there was an outside chance of making the trip in one day, and avoiding a hotel stay. Between the traffic delay when we first set out and a GPS issue outside of St. Louis, we decided that a one night hotel stay would be the best course of action. At approximately 1800 local, we found ourselves in a sort line at the La Quinta hotel in Springfield, MO to get a room for the night. Once we got settled in, we drove over to the Bob Evans restaurant for a nice dinner. I don't recall what either of us had, but it was delicious!

That was the evening when the Ferguson grand jury results were announced. We had a really nice breakfast at La Quinta the following morning, and were bombarded with more Ferguson news. It was at that point that we decided to take an alternate route back home, avoiding the St. Louis area completely.

We drove on, out of Missouri and into Oklahoma, and finally into Texas. As you can see, the "grass" in Texas is more brown than green- Jennifer says they're in year seven of a drought. After driving through more construction than I've seen in quite some time, we arrived at Jennifer's folks home in the suburbs of Fort Worth, TX.

Unlike most traditional "go, Go, GO!" vacations, this one was all about family time, and we didn't do anything "touristy". One of Jennifer's sisters also came to visit, and on one day all three sisters were able to get together. A good time was had by one and all.

The Ferguson grand jury decision was announced when we were in Springfield. Upon seeing the reaction to the decision on the news, we decided to stay as far as possible away from St. Louis as possible- deciding to be flexible and drive north or east. The only major city we went through on the return trip was Oklahoma city, which turned out to be quite fortuitous. Around 800 miles (~1760km) from home, we found ourselves northbound on Interstate 35- right around Norman, OK-, and the oil light came on. Now, I've got to say that both Jennifer and I actually remained quite calm through this adventure. She pulled out the manual and began to familiarize herself with the yellow light. I pulled off the road and found a Firestone repair shop. I parked in their back lot and shut the engine off. I pulled the dipstick and it looked full (silly me- it was A dipstick, but we soon discovered it was not THE oil dipstick). So, we got back on the road and within a few miles the light came on again!

VARIOUS AND SUNDRY FOUR-LETTER WORDS!

Actually, no four-letter words were uttered. We pulled off of the interstate once again and called Subaru roadside assistance. One thing we learned from this trip was to keep one cell phone 100% charged or charging at all times- this was especially important as Jennifer's phone was dying. It was about noon when we called, and then a whole bunch of little miracles followed.

We had parked in front of a long-defunct honky tonk, and the tow truck operator ( a self-proclaimed "rhinestone cowboy") knew exactly where we were. It turned out that he was the owner of the towing company. On his left hip he had a pouch with a spare magazine for the nickel plated semi-automatic holstered on his right hip. His partner was a rugged looking fellow, about six feet tall (just under 2m), sporting cowboy boots, denim jeans and jacket, and a straw cowboy hat. We were in good company!

The local Subaru dealership, Hudiburg Subaru, was only about five minutes away. This is not amazing on the surface, but it turns out that we had broken down near to one of the only THREE Subaru dealerships in the entire state! We rode in the back seat of the truck, and were soon at the dealer. It was 12:50.

We met with Brian the service manager (I think... I should have grabbed his card!), and he immediately said he was not sure the tech was in, as service closed at 1300! He dashed off, and a few minutes later returned saying he had found the tech and Meerkat would be seen. A short while later, Brian came to the waiting room- the problem was merely low oil! Topped off, we thanked Brian profusely and were on the road again.

The rest of the trip was uneventful, apart from the one lane gravel roads in Oklahoma farmland and the crazy meth dealer.

The one lane roads were rather nice, except they seem to go on forever, and it seemed to take an hour to escape them. The crazy meth dealer, on the other hand, freaked me out. There we were, back in Clinton, MO after surviving the backroad that went through Truman Lake. We were in a strip mall parking lot behind a gas station, checking hotel prices on the internet when suddenly a car pulls up parallel to ours. I did not see the driver- all I knew was the vehicle was a beater. I put Meerkat into gear and we drove to the gas station and stopped. The psycho meth dealer followed us, and I think after she got a good look at our out of state license plates she sped out of the gas station. Jennifer said she was an older lady with at least half a dozen yappy lap dogs in the car. I could not WAIT to get away from that psycho lady!

No data tonight- sorry. The closest thing I have to data is miles per gallon: the best MPG I observed on the rolling MPG that the cabin instruments report was 31.5. And that's AWD traveling between 75-80 mph  (165-176 kph).

Finally, there may be a part 2 to this story, told from the SUL perspective. It'll be fun- I promise!