The Events of Thursday, February 24, 2011

                CRUNCH! My ribs cracked under a weight as if someone were sitting on me. Wait a minute. There is someone sitting on me and that person is saying over and over in a scared, whispering voice, “Lindsey, someone just opened the front door!” I peeked through the crack between my bed and the curtain to peer into the cab to see if Abby’s nightmare of attacking illegal Mexican immigrants was coming true. “Abby, it’s just Daddy. He’s working on the computer finding lodging in Europe, go back to sleep.” Abby slid under the covers shaking. I laughed softly to myself thinking about how I had assured her that if any illegal Mexican immigrants broke into our RV, I would bonk him on the head with our heavy frozen honey bottle. (Our honey has been frozen since Maryland). In the back of my mind I thought about how much trouble I would be in if I did that to Daddy and then I was asleep. But, not for long. “Lindsey, what’s that beeping noise?” “Abby, it’s the Mega Connie, go back to sleep.” Last night our converter completely fried and so we bought a new one at Walmart. The problem with this one is that it is enormous and beeps approximately every 5 seconds to tell you that it is working with a low battery. If it detects that the battery is extremely low, or Mega Connie thinks it is, it will whine like a starving dog. This constant beeping and whining made sleeping quite difficult and despite Daddy’s efforts to muffle it, I eventually got up.

                Our last night of boondocking finally over, we started talking over a breakfast of dog food, gravel with animal scat, and tumbleweeds covered in snow, (aka Cocoa Puffs, Grape Nuts with raisins, and Frosted Mini Wheat), about all the things that we won’t have to do after we leave the RV. So, I decided to incorporate some of the things we discussed into our day. For example, we have to completely strip our beds every morning and neatly fold all materials and carefully place the sheets and blankets so that they are secure for driving. Oh, there’s another thing, every time we start driving, we have to make sure everything is secure, so it doesn’t go flying when we turn a corner. Both of these nuisances will no longer bother us in exactly two days! So, after we swept the floor, (hey there’s another thing; we sweep after every meal), we pulled in the slide-outs (there’s another one) and Mom directed Daddy back out of our slot (another one) and started out of the Walmart parking lot.

                New Mexico wins the number one prize for most beautiful highways. The highway sound walls and overpasses are an adobe pink with a bright, sparkly turquoise stripe as décor. Separating the east and west lanes is a tall adobe wall with mountains embedded into the rock. On some of the walls a sun sinks behind the mountains. The columns holding up the overpasses are adorned with the colorful swirls and patterns found throughout Mexican and Indian artwork in the Southwest. Even the passenger walk next to the highway was full of color and décor. The desert scenery flowed smoothly along our windows and ranches and adobe styled houses dotted the hills. On one side of the RV, the windows were steamed where the sun had not yet dried the condensation. (There’s another one. After Saturday, we won’t have to worry about the condensation on the inside of our windows that freezes into ice when the weather is cold). We drove along with the same desert scenery on replay. Soon, we were busy with writing, reading books, blogs, and quiet times. Pictures were edited and lists were formed in preparation for Europe.

                Around lunchtime, we arrived at Petrified Forest National Monument. We had already visited this park when we were younger and did a trip around the Four Corner States: New Mexico, Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. But, it was on our route and so we stopped in to see it again. We ate lunch in the Visitor Center parking lot after heading in to use the restroom. (Another one is that we won’t have to worry about how much we use the RV toilet and watch the level of ‘black water’). On the way out of my stall, I found myself knocking on the stall door. (That’s another one. Because the RV hallway is narrow, we have to knock before opening the bathroom door into the hallway to make sure no one gets hit by the opening door). After lunch, we headed into the Visitor Center.

                The ranger who greeted us talked very softly and as a result I found myself whispering when I talked. Caitlin was the only one of us who remembered the visitor center, but none of us remembered the park video, which like all park videos first trys to impress you with the beauty of the park and then tell you what you can and cannot do. Mom’s favorite part of this movie was about how you shouldn’t take the petrified wood. There was a guy who got arrested for stealing a piece of wood, but Mom thought he should have been arrested for wearing awful rust brown, and orange striped short shorts. After the movie, we decided that since it would be very much out of our way to explore the park any further, and we had already been in the park, we would move on to Flagstaff, Arizona.

                Flagstaff is the point in the trip that we all looked forward to; first, because it meant that we were very close to the end of the trip, and second because we had also been to Flagstaff, Arizona before on our Southwestern trip. It was then that we found a restaurant there called Beaver Street Brewery that we went to for Ben and Daddy’s birthday two days in a row because we liked it so much. There was a waiter that was really friendly and we got him for our waiter both times. We wanted to go to the restaurant again for Mom’s birthday, so when we drove up to the Flagstaff KOA, we were pretty excited.

                The campground was covered in a thick blanket of snow, a couple inches thick and icy. This is quite a temperature difference from our 100°F Texas hikes. Mom heated up a leftover dinner of sun-dried tomato dressing chicken and rice. We threw together a HUGE salad, trying to finish off our vegetables before we get home and we had a $2.99 chocolate cake for dessert. After cleaning up, we got ready for bed, remaking all of the beds (there’s another one), hanging up towels to block out the cold, light, and noise (there’s another one), and taking turns brushing our teeth in our teeny tiny bathroom. (Hey, look another one). Then, by most popular vote, we chose to watch Phantom of the Opera and eventually went to bed and fell asleep to the Music of the Night.