Photos: Trip to Ord

Today (it's today, until I go to bed and get back up; then it's tomorrow, never mind what the clock says) we took a trip to Ord, delivering a scissor lift to a man who bought it from Larry.  We ate supper at the Sandstone Grill in Burwell.

It was a cold day, with a freezing fog covering the countrysides by the time we were coming home.

We'd no sooner arrived home at about 10:15 p.m., than Larry realized his smartphone was missing.  He looked again in the pickup, but it wasn't there.  He knew then that it was either in the parking lot of the convenience store in the little town of Ericson, some 78 miles to our northwest, or, less likely, in the parking lot of the convenience store in Albion, 36 1/2 miles to the northwest.  

He remembered putting the phone on his seat between his legs as we prepared to drive off in Ericson, and then getting back out for something (namely, to rub my moccasins in the snow after I'd stepped in gas someone had spilt).  We called the convenience store... but there was no answer.  They were already closed.  We called the store in Albion, and the cashier went out and looked in the parking lot, but found nothing.

"Do you want to go get it?" I asked Larry.  "I can drive; you can sleep."  (After all, he'd been up since 6:30 a.m.)

He debated.  Probably the phone had already been driven over.  Probably it had gotten all wet and was ruined.  Insurance would cover part of the cost, but he'd have to fork over $150.  It's an $800 phone.  

He decided to do it.  

So off we went into steadily worsening weather, with the roads getting ever slicker.  We split the driving.

We looked in Albion, just in case.  Nothing.  We found the phone in Ericson, lying right where we'd parked, in the snow and slush.  Wonder of wonders, the screen came to life the moment Larry picked it up.  He dried it off... and it continued to work.

We filled with gas at the automated pumps and headed toward home.  What we wouldn't have given, years ago, when coming through eastern Wyoming, then the Panhandle of Nebraska, and on through the sparsely populated Sandhills in the middle of the night with a Suburban full of kids, to have found one of those automated pumps!  

One time we were out there where the cattle far outnumber the humans, and we didn't have enough gas to get the rest of the way home.  We'd been looking for a motel for a long time, but there'd been no vacancies in those small towns for hundreds of miles, on account of a huge rodeo in Burwell.  It was well past midnight, and all the gas stations were long closed.  A police officer, noticing us circling the block near the little motel in the town, asked if we needed assistance.  We told him our dilemma -- and he called the station owner, who got right out of bed (I don't think he even combed his hair, heh heh), came to his station, and turned on the pumps.  

We tried to give him a tip, but he peered into the Suburban window at the kids, grinned and waved at them, and refused to take the money.  "Just buy the babies some milk!" he told Larry.

So... we appreciate the automated pumps out there in the boonies, these days.  However, there is still a problem:  there is a serious lack of restrooms, especially in the winter.

We managed to find an unlocked restroom at Pibel State Park.  Next problem:  the snow was over a foot deep all around the restroom, and I had forgotten my boots.  Larry scuffled through it with his boots, making a path for me.  Problem #2:  The women's restroom door had no handle.  Problem #3:  The men's door was frozen shut.

Larry pried it open through sheer brute strength and awkwardness.  The cottontail rabbit who was the only other occupant of the park, so far as we could see, didn't seem to care at all that I went in the wrong side of the restroom.

The drive home, version 2.0, wasn't quite as pleasant as version 1.0.  By this time, it was foggier than ever, freezing, drizzling, and the wind had picked up, gusting at about 30 mph.  Larry drove to St. Edward, then pulled off on a residential street to change places with me so I could drive the last 28 miles home, as he was getting sleepy.  The street where he parked was on an incline, and the front end of the Jeep was pointing uphill.

I walked around the front of the Jeep to the driver's door, treading cautiously on that slippery street.  Larry climbed out, and went around the back of the Jeep. 

Or, that is, he tried.

He no sooner cleared the back bumper than he lost traction and slid several feet down the hill.  With a great deal of effort, and some careful stepping, he worked his way back to the Jeep -- and started sliding again.  He grabbed the wheel well and hauled himself forwards.  He made it to the rear door handle, got a grip on it, pulled himself to the front passenger door, opened it, and tumbled in, laughing.  By this time, I was looking in the rear view mirror, wondering what had become of him.  It was too dark to see anything, though.

We finally got back home at 2:45 a.m.