The Dark Cloud

This past week has been filled with just about the worst luck ever! It seems as if it could go wrong, it has.

Last weekend, Joe decided that he wanted me to ride to Maryland with him to drop off a load of light poles. He said that we would leave out Sunday after church, go up to MD, drop off our load Monday morning, stop and have lunch on the Chesapeake Bay for my birthday, and be back home in time to tuck the kids into bed Monday night. I rushed around getting everything ready and arrangements made for the kids. They were to spend Sunday with my Dad and Linnie, Sunday night with my Mom and Pa, and Monday with a combination of my Mom, Grandmother, and a sitter.

We left out on Sunday and had a blast up until it got dark. The truck started running hot because something in the something else had sprung a leak and was doing something that was not supposed to happen. Anyway, to make a long story short, the (very expensive) part to fix the truck was only available in Atlanta and at this point we were in DE. We got the load off Monday morning as scheduled, but only made it back to the south side of DC before the truck got so bad that it was impossible to continue. Joe called one of our other truck drivers (Ronnie) and arranged for him to drive up and get us. Unfortunately our truck that he needed to drive was with another of our drivers (Dianne) in Savannah, GA waiting for a load to be unloaded. It took until 8:00 Monday night before Dianne was able to get the truck to Ronnie so he could head out on the nearly five hundred mile trek to get us. He drove through the night and finally got to us Tuesday morning. We loaded the broken truck onto the empty trailer that we had been pulling and hooked it behind the other truck. Then the fun part came. I got to spend the rest of my birthday trip riding home in a two seater truck, perched on a lunch box cooler, sandwiched between two truck drivers. NOT. FUN. AT. ALL!!!

We finally got home sometime Tuesday evening and I was never before so happy to be there! Thanks to great parents and grandparents who took care of my kids while I was away for a full 24 hours longer than planned!

We ordered the part that we needed and it was to come in on Thursday morning. Wednesday, the truck the Dianne was driving broke down and had to be towed home. Luckily it was not too far from home and was a relatively easy fix. Maybe Joe fixed it too well, because her first day back in it she got a speeding ticket.

We had the opportunity to get a great load going back up north with a back haul, (lots of money) but we HAD to load Thursday evening or we would miss our deadline. Since our part was supposed to be in Thursday morning, we figured it would be no problem. Who would have guessed that in an entire truckload of parts being delivered Thursday morning, our part would have been the only one mistakenly left on the loading dock and not put on the truck? Ugh. We had to forfeit the great load and have a truck drive from Atlanta to bring us the part Friday morning.

I went to town Friday morning to do my usual banking and errands. I have to pick up our paychecks from the different suppliers that we haul from. When I went to the Pole Yard to get our check, it was not in the box where it usually is. The office was locked up, but I peeked in the window and saw our check sitting on the desk. Of course, the one check that the secretary had forgotten to put in the box was ours.

The boys and I finished all of the errands that we could complete and went to see how Joe was coming along getting the part on the truck. He got the truck running and things were starting to look up when Noah told me he was not feeling well. He had a temperature over 102 and said his throat was hurting. When I looked in I saw white puss oozing from both side of his throat. YUCK!!! It freaked me out, so I paged the Dr. who called in a prescription. Micah is going for his 15 month checkup on Monday, so I will take Noah in then as well. I started him on the antibiotic last night, and I am hoping he will feel better soon.

The trucks are all running and are getting loaded this morning. Hopefully the dark cloud is departing. We sure are ready for some bright cheerful days around here.