A Long Lost Draft

It's Anniversary Eve at our house. Tomorrow marks three years since we began our great RV escape.  As we're wrapping up our stay here in Gunnison, we've been reflecting on the year just passed, and the two before that. Perhaps some of these thoughts will make their way to a celebratory blog post tomorrow. Or, maybe they won't. Who knows?

While reminiscing over blog posts from our third year, I found one unpublished post from exactly halfway through the year. Reading the words brought the day clearly into my memory. It was a day we'd rather forget, but can't quite seem to. It wasn't funny then. But, with the passage of time, at least one of us can laugh about it now.

With hopes that you will, too, here's the long, lost draft.

January 8, 2012 - Mandeville, Louisiana 

Keyless

Yesterday marked a milestone, of sorts. It was two-and-a-half years ago yesterday that we started on our fulltime RVing adventure. Can you believe that? And, just about the time we thought we might be getting the hang of all this, the RVing gods and goddesses threw us a curveball.

The biggest item on our agenda today was dumping our tanks. And, not being one to dwell on the most mundane of tasks associated with RVing, I thought there was no way that would become the topic of today's blog post. 

I was wrong! 

It's been eight days since we checked into this sewer hookup-free park, so we were definitely ready for a short trip to the dump. After lunch, we readied the moose for travel. All that was left was to start the thing up and pull up the jacks. 

But first, we needed to pull in the slides. 

Our nifty Winnebago is equipped with a keyed Master Slide Room Control Switch. With the key turned to "On" you can open and close the slides. When it's turned to "Off" you can't. Simple as that. Since the day we took delivery of our moose, the key has sat safely in the lock, ready to turn at will. Today, when we got ready to roll, the switch was set to "Off" and the key was missing. 

We were going nowhere. 

In a rapidly escalating panic, we looked for the missing key. It was nowhere to be found. One of the things we've done while we've been parked here is some pretty extensive housecleaning. And, one possibility we considered was that the very small key got knocked out of the lock and swept up by the vacuum. Sure, the possibility was remote. But, we locked in on that scenario and didn't let go. After looking in every nook and cranny for the still missing key, we resigned ourselves to the reality of calling Forest City first thing in the morning and hoping a working key would arrive here before we leave next Saturday. 

But, first things first, we had to dump. 

New friends Tricia and Keith came to the rescue. They offered up their very handy dandy rolling waste tank for our use. As Paul went about the task of dumping the moose, 35 gallons at a time, I searched in vain for the still missing key. Finally, I set about the task of getting the moose out of "travel mode" and putting everything back in its proper place. Just as Paul was finishing up his fourth trip of toting some 300 pounds of fluids, I focused my attention on the keyless lock. It's something I look at every day. I asked myself when was the last time I had seen the key in the lock. 

The answer came to me in a flash. 

I had seen the key in the lock just a few hours earlier! One of the first steps in our pre-travel routine is to lower our TV antenna. As I always do, I had removed our "Antenna Minder" card that is clipped to that key and placed it in a cabinet overhead. I went to the cabinet and pulled out the day-glo orange card on a chain. Attached to the clip was - you guessed it - the key to the master slide control switch. Keep in mind, I've made this same move about 100 times. Never before has the key come out of the lock. Never. 

Argghhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

After my exhausted husband returned the portable tank to our new friends, the four of us gathered outside the moose for a well-deserved happy hour. Over our first drinks, we recounted the events of the day and enjoyed a few laughs. Keith summed it up perfectly when he said, "You know, I was going to ask if after awhile this stuff all becomes routine." We burst into a round of hysterical laughter. 

After two-and-a-half years, we don't think so.

After three years, this ride is anything but routine!