This is Raegan. She is one of my best friends and she came to visit me this week. I only wish it had been under better circumstances. Let me elaborate.
She came down on Tuesday night (12 hours post car accident-another post for another day) and she had every intention of being home by Wednesday afternoon/evening at the very latest. Hah...if only we had known the week that was in store for us.
Background: Her family goes to Lake Powell every year for a week or so, and Raegan and Jeff (her husband) were headed down from Rexburg to meet up in Powell with her family. Long story VERY short, her car broke down in Beaver, UT. Not exactly the middle of nowhere, but basically as close as you can get to hillbilly land and still be right off the freeway. Her car had to get towed to the auto repair shop a mile down the road, got a rental car, and headed off to Powell. Fast forward one month, and Raegan stayed at our house and I was going to go down with her to pick up her car from the auto shop and drop off the rental car in Cedar City. Now, if everything had gone according to plan, we would have left Wednesday early morning, picked up her car from the shop, dropped off the rental in Cedar, and been home by 2 in the afternoon, and Raegan would have been home in Rexburg by that evening. Simple enough, right?
Tuesday night: call the auto shop, car is still not done. The mechanic said it would hopefully be done by Wednesday afternoon. Okay, not ideal in the least, but we could deal with it.
Wednesday morning: car definitely won't be done today. Raegan has to figure out how to reschedule some assignments with her teachers.
Wednesday night: car may be done by tomorrow morning, the mechanic said he would stay late that night and work on it, but he is the only one who can drive the tow truck to pick up stranded cars
Since we weren't leaving on Wednesday, Raegan and I went to DI to look for some colored suspenders for the colored run that she and Jeff are supposed to run in at midnight tonight. No such luck, unfortunately. We got some Little Caesar's Pizza for dinner, and just prayed that the car would be done on Thursday. Raegan had to be back, there was absolutely no way she could miss all of Friday too. Frustrated is a good word for Wednesday.
Thursday morning: called the mechanic, and he said he could maybe have it done today. She basically told him (in really the NICEST way possible) that she had to pick up the car today and could not pick it up any other time for another 2-3 weeks. We left on a whim and serious act of faith.
We got to Beaver around 2:30 on Thursday afternoon and the car wasn't done. No surprise there, but the mechanic gave us a car that he had just rebuilt the engine on. He needed miles on it, and we needed to return the rental car. So we headed off to Cedar City. *Side note: we couldn't let the rpm's on the new engine go over 3000. We drove SLOW the entire way to Cedar City. Longest 50 miles of my life.
We stopped and got some lunch/dinner before we headed back to Beaver. We stopped at McD's for old times sake and ordered hot n' spicy's. So good and gross at the same time.
We turned around and made the long 50 mile drive back to Beaver. So it's been probably 2 hours now, and the car still isn't done. Oh my gosh. The mechanic told us to go drive around Beaver, see the town, and he would call us when the car was done. We saw the great town of Beaver...it took all of about 5 minutes. There were some pretty sights though.
This was a little ways up the canyon in Beaver. A rain storm was moving in, and it made the views pretty breath-taking.
I love love love the American flag. I always feel so much pride and gratitude and joy in my country whenever I see it. I loved the look of it blowing in the wind and the storm clouds moving in overhead. This was in the parking lot at the National Guard building in Beaver.
This statue was in front of the post office and is a memorial that's dedicated to all the people from Beaver that served in WWII.
2 hours of meandering through Beaver, we head back to auto shop and we were both basically at a loss for what to do. It's probably 7:30 by this time, and we had both planned on being home by now. There is a bench that sits in front of the auto shop and Raegan and I sat on that bench for probably 3 hours waiting for her car. The storm clouds (I really was obsessed with the clouds yesterday) were beautiful though, especially with the sunlight breaking through them.
We talked about everything, literally everything. You name a topic, we talked about it at some point during the day. Finally, our butts were so numb from sitting on the bench for so long, we got up and walked around for a few minutes. I made Raegan stand next to the tow truck and take a picture to commemorate this lovely adventure we were on.
So it's 11:30 now. We are exhausted, bordering on slap happy. The car is finally down from the rafters, and they are getting ready to turn the car on. Moment of truth... and it starts. Halle{freaking}lujah. Now it was a matter of loading the old engine into her car. She needed to take it back to the yard she bought the new engine from to get $150 back. It was an entertaining experience to say the least, and we really almost just left without the dang engine.
Her car was weighed down so much by that old engine. Oh man Izzy was a LOW RIDER that evening. The mechanic had to go pick up a stranded car about a mile up the highway, and then he would be back and we would get the paperwork done and we'd be off on our merry way. We drove her car around to make sure the engine was working, and came back to the shop, filled up with gas, and washed the windshield. This was probably the icing on the cake. One of her dang windshield wipers broke.
Okay, so it didn't exactly break, but I could not figure out how to clip it back onto the wiper. So annoying!
We were finally on our merry way home by 12:30. Longest 2 hours of my life. Raegan and I were both so tired and we talked to keep each other awake, but holy cow it was almost exhausting to keep conversation going. We really ran out of things to talk about. Probably never happened in our lives, and I'm sure it was mostly to do with the lack of sleep and frustration from the days events.
We finally made it home at an exhausting hour: 2:30 am, and we rolled into bed. I was so tired that it was almost difficult to fall asleep. Raegan left this morning and finally made it back to Rexburg by 4 ish this afternoon. So much for a quick trip, but thankfully, Izzy made it back to Rexburg in one piece.
The next time I see Beaver, UT again...it will be too soon.
Lessons learned from this lovely experience:
1. Interference engines need to have their timing belts replaced
2. Auto mechanics are always running late
3. Driving home at 2 am is rough...
4. If you're going to be stuck in Beaver at a gas station for 6+ hours, you might as well be stuck with your best friend.
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