June has been crazy-nutso for me when it comes to my job. A week of vacation bible school, which involved over 100 kids, leading very aerobic songs, and me with dry ice experiments; kids at camp and getting to visit them with Junior, and our mission/servant trip to Kansas City. Got back last night from that last one. And I'm wiped. But I've got some funny stories, so I've just gotta share!
We left last Saturday at 7am. There were 7 girls on the trip in the 7th-10th grade range (boys were invited, but foolishly they passed up their opportunity to hang out with some awesome girls for the 10+ hour van ride. Which actually made my job easier, now that I think about it.)
Now the 7am was met with a little bit of resistance, but 4 of the girls went on our trip last year to Colorado and we flew (I had gone the summer before on a bus trip to San Antonio with the kids from church and was not subjecting myself to another cross country road trip so soon!). Our flight left at 7am, which meant being to the airport at 5:00am. With that history a 7am departure sounded mighty good.
So we pile into two vehicles so we could drive the 2+ hours to Minneapolis to pick up a 12 passenger van. All the big beast vans in Duluth were rented or could not be driven through Iowa.
Our church is a 1/2 mile off of I-35 and the church we were staying at in Kansas City, MO was about that far off of I-35 too. A straight shot and no maps necessary. And the only thing standing between Minnesota and Missouri was Iowa. That was not a detour I was willing to make. So we had to get our van down by Minneapolis.
On our drive down to Minneapolis,
Avis called. When I saw their number pop up on my cell phone I started to freak. I have a tendency to jump to the worst possible senarios and this one went like this: They've rented our van to someone else.
See, they hadn't instilled much faith in me. I reserved the van back in November. Then in April I called to see if we could leave our 2 personal vehicles at their site for the week. Ends up the Avis location we were renting from had closed and they had transferred my reservation to a different location, about 40 minutes away. AND THEY NEVER TOLD ME!!! That's the kind of information that's kinda nice to know...
So you could imagine my fears when the guy asks me if I'm still coming for the van. "Uh, yeah. I called and confirmed yesterday. It's still a half hour until we're scheduled to pick it up and that's about how far away from your office we are." Ends up we had the last 12 passenger van in Minneapolis and people were on the hunt for it.
Back off people... it's MINE!!!!
Crisis averted. Deep breath.
As we're filling out the paper work, we find out that the Avis guy didn't lock the vehicles up for the overnight and they had a guest that decided to sleep off his inebriated state in the back of a convertible. He was still breathing (I asked) and at one point had taken off his shirt to get more comfortable. Good place to sleep it off.
After checking to see if we had any stowaways in our van (nope), I piled the girls in with ALL their luggage. How many times did we talk about packing light?? I would have hated to see how much stuff they would have brought if I hadn't had that discussion with them! We had stuffed tucked into every nook and cranny of that van.
"If anyone opens the back van door, their punishment will be being tied to the top of the van while said culprit's luggage will reside in their former seat." Got it girls????
And we were off!!
The drive was pretty uneventful until we got south of Minneapolis. The sky got very dark. Like it was night. And it started to get windy (lots of fun in a top heavy huge vehicle). And then it rained. No, make that, it POURED. At one point I looked out to my right and saw fields. And a truck pulling some weird contraption behind it on a dirt road. I looked at the other adult with me and we both said "TWISTER!" at the same time! No, there was not some large funnel cloud getting ready to sweep us away (thank goodness!), but the movie. I was just waiting for a cow to go floating overhead.
After white-knuckling it for awhile, we got out of the storm and it was time for our first potty break. And of course buying things at the truck stop gas station. They're girls - they have to shop. So a stuffed dog was now joining us on the trip - a Boxer who had these eyes that seemed like they were always watching you. It was a tad creepy. Couldn't bring myself to take a picture of it.
(Shopping side note: During the first leg of the trip, 2 of the girls riding with me fell asleep. They were out. As we passed an outlet mall, the two girls sat up from a dead sleep and said, "Outlet Mall". Freaky, weird teenage girls connection to the mall.)
Shooed them out of the truck stop. Back in the van. There was more driving. A game of Apples to Apples happened at some point.
It's lunch time! Wendy's was the popular choice. No pictures of the food, but I'm sure most of you know what a junior bacon cheeseburger and a frosty look like.
And there was more shopping because the Wendy's was attached to a gas station. One pair of flannel pants now joined us in the already crowded van. (although this was a necessity as this girl forgot to pack pj's. Nothin' like some gas station pajamas!)
And then there was more driving. We're in IOWA! Cornfields. A game of Catch Phrase. Giggling. Song requests. Look - MISSOURI! A stop for gas (I have never put so much gas into one vehicle or paid so much) And more driving. A rest area. And more driving.
At this point I'm starting to feel like we'll never get there. Every mile we drive seems to take at least 10 minutes. All I want is to see the Hyatt Place that we'll spend our first night at.
Will we ever get there? Where will we eat supper? Will my trend in weird vehicle occurances while traveling along I-35 for youth trips continue? Have I rambled on and on and on because I'm so exhausted? (Highly probable, especially that last one.)
Oops. Didn't mean it that way!
You're raising that boy RIGHT! 
What the...? 
I woulda flipped!
) I shared my passion/obsession with the youth group. And guess what Missouri has? WAFFLE HOUSEs too!! The closest ones to our Land of 10,000 Lakes and Zero Waffle Houses. And there happened to be one right next to our hotel for the night!
)
TA-DA!! ER visit avoided!
