We have returned!
This morning we set off at 8am to leave Missorui and boom! Josh hits the panic alarm on his keychain and our Honda began honking in loud succession that rang throughout the sleepy neighborhood of Grain Valley. Now as anyone who’s dealt with a faulty car alarm can attest, the result was the three of us (Josh, his sister, and I) flying all over the car trying to get it to stop. With the help of Pops we tore apart the car remote with no result, so we ended up disconnecting the entire car battery. Turns out Josh’s remote is on the fritz, and after much hemming and hawwing and calling up a closed Car Toys, flipping in vain through the Honda manuel, and living in fear that the second we fired up the battery the car would start screaming again, we used the remote on my keys (which thankfully we had packed) and the car went silent. Such a simple solution to a very stressful (and loud) ordeal.
Off we went, across the plains and valleys of Kansas…no, we did not go to the Oz Museum, but we did visit an obscure winery and the Russell Stover Chocolate Factory…so I was appeased. Let me tell you, I enjoyed my time at Josh’s parents but I endured one of the worst caffeine withdrawels EVER. I didn’t realize how thoroughly addicted to that ONE cup of coffee I had become. The first day out there I woke up with that horrible feeling of: “Craaaap, there’s no coffee in the house.” I glugged down advil and dark chocolate in the hopes of warding the headache off, but it still kicked my ass. I suffered in silence the first day, and finally on the second day, Josh blew my cover and confided to his Mom that yes, I am a caffeine addict and this was the reason why I kept sneaking ibuprofen out of her medicine cabinet. She was very gracious and eager to please and it suddenly became a BIG DEAL that I needed coffee. Seriously, here I was totally embarressed that Josh confessed to my puritanical Mormon in-laws that I suffer this ridiculous addiction and they were spearheading for me the entire trip to the mall. Not kidding, here’s how the car trip went:
Josh’s Mom: “And here’s the post office on the left, and oh, there’s the little flower shop that sells sunflowers, oh, and there’s a COFFEE SHOP, STOP! Wait, stop the car, Roger, Mara needs coffee!” Now imagine the car swerving across several lanes of traffic and into the parking lot of a strip mall. And there I am shouting, “No! NO, really I’m fine!”
The mall was a wonderful four story metropolis, such that I hadn’t seen before, but being as this was the legendary day after Thanksgiving we were bumper to bumper with eager shoppers. We couldn’t even mingle inside Bath and Body Works there were so many people hounding out the best soap deals and snatching up the discounted Christmas balls. Josh bought some fabulous business attire at Men’s Warehouse for his upcoming interviews. I hunted down a cup of Seattle’s Best with much cheering and fanfare coming from Josh’s Mom (”Yay! You finally found some coffee!”) And Josh’s sister hazed through the day on generic anti-nausea medicine that resulted in a slightly drugged appearance and eventual collapse later in the afternoon. (She switched back to the tried and true Dramamene after realizing what happened to her).
Eventually my slow withdrawel from coffee caught up with me and I went ballistic on the way home when I saw a highway Starbucks sign. It was horrible, I became one of those people, the kind that are like: “Is that a Starbucks? Pull over, for the love of God, PULL OVER.” I have deep knowledge of this type of person because I catered to them for two years when I worked for Starbucks. It wasn’t until this trip that I truly understood that need for familiarity, that comforting knowledge about the menu and the product that you only get from a large corporation that caters to your caffeine addiction…and it’s not just coffee that soothes you, no, you’ve cultivated a taste for espresso, something that is hard to come by deep in the midwest. Of course by the time we had pulled over and I had waited in line I totally bumbled my order and forgot to say “iced” and ended up with something I didn’t really want but didn’t want to be one of those annoying customers that’s like, “Oh, did I forget to say nonfat?” AFTER the drink is made. So, I sucked it up, and it made my Starbucks experience bittersweet.
The best part about the ride home (and something I’m going to miss when we leave the Rockies) is that we barely out-raced an incoming snow storm. We were about three miles ahead of it the whole time before it finally caught up with us outside of Denver. Cars were sliding all over the road, accidents began piling up, and yet the great leg of our vast 10 hour journey was almost finished, despite the last twenty miles spent in the snow traveling at twenty mph. I gorged on typical car food: Crackers, beef jerky, Russell Stover’s candy, and gum. We returned home after a trecherous drive through Fort Collins after returning Josh’s sister safely to her front door in South F.C. Hobbes was very happy and vocal and was obviously trying to hide her latest weight gain as a result of an open food bowl for three days. There were no messages or serious emails which is always nice to come home to, (no disasters to immediately jolt you out of your vacation). We took a walk in the snow to unwind from the drive. Now I’m sipping a Maker’s Mark on the rocks and thinking I’m probably over-doing it but I’ve been deprived of coffee and alcohal for several days and it just tastes so damn good…