Road Trip Adventure

Christie's family moved from Dallas to Hewitt Texas for a new teaching job, so we set off to visit them. Ally and I made our first day trip/ mini road trip to visit our very best friends Christie and her daughter Lucy. The drive should only take an hour and a half. Plus it is straight freeway and a pretty relaxing drive.

As long as you don't have to stop for gas... or in my case diesel.

I get in the car to leave Wednesday morning and the car states I have 115 miles before my next fill up. I think to myself "Self, let's just get on the road and then we can stop after we have left the city. Easy on, easy off the freeway. Life is good"

So, I don't make a liar out of myself, I head on my way. Now we make it all the way to Hillsboro, before I decide to pull over.. or rather Alyson does because she decides that I'm taking too long to get her to Lucy and starts to scream. So we stop at a gas station in hillsboro, except there is only one diesel pump and the screen for the credit card machine is broken and I can't enter information to pay. So, no biggie I think. There is another gas station across the street. I drive over there. And there is one diesel pump.... and 15 (no lie) trucks waiting in line.

Well, the kid is still crying and I still have 50 miles until fill up according to the car, so I decide that we will not wait in line, we will just drive ahead some.

So we drive ahead. A few exits down we try again. Only one diesel pump and it's broken. We head back for the freeway. A few exits down, only one diesel pump and they are out of diesel. No signs on the pump of course, I have to try it first then go inside and look dumb. So back to the freeway. We try a few more exits down. They only have diesel pumps for 18 wheelers and try as I might, the nossel of the pump won't fit into a car gas tank. By now, the car is lovingly telling me we have 10 miles before we run out of gas. I offer up a prayer that I won't be stranded with Ally on the side of the road- who is still crying in the backseat because each time I stop, she thinks we are getting out. So the next stop is the winner and with 8 miles until empty, I pull into an Exxon.

It has a normal pump, it has a screen that I can read, it takes my debit card. There is diesel. Score! I stand there pumping. The handle is broken, so I have to hold it instead of using the nifty pump itself feature. That's fine, I talk to Ally through the window. THEN- I feel something crawl across my foot. I look down. The ground is covered in black beetles. And the gas side of the pump is trickling gas down to the ground. And the bugs are crawling in the gas and on my foot( I was wearing sandals) . And if I move I will crush them and then I will have dead bugs on my shoes. So I stand there, pumping the diesel I have to have or be stranded, while bugs are crawling on me and ....I'm... dying!! I finish pumping, run for the driver's side of the car, manage to knock off all the bugs and then grab the wipes to clean my feet and shoes, because they smell like gas and have bug germs.

I recovered. It took a few minutes. But I recovered. I drove the rest of the way. Ally seemed to sense that I had just be attacked by bugs and stopped crying. And we had a great time with Christie and Lucy, when we finally got there 2 hours after we had left, because of all the gas stopping!!

Lesson learned: Make sure you have a full tank before you head off for the day or you will be attacked by beetles.

Consider yourself warned.