Hail, Oil Light, & No Underwear...

This trip is cursed. That was the thought going through my mind for about the first three hours of our trip to DC this weekend to see my mom.

To begin, Blair and I were on different wavelengths about dinner. Since we didn't leave for DC until almost 6:30 Friday night after Blair got home from work, we decided we'd just grab Wendy's for dinner. Blair pulled into the parking lot and I said, "What are you doing?" His plan was to run inside and eat, mine was to gobble food in the car so as not to waste a moment's time. He won (he had the car keys) but being such a time-oriented individual, it started the trip with a bad taste in my mouth.

Then came the underwear. We were about an hour on the road when for no reason I can pinpoint I suddenly thought of underwear. And realized I had forgotten to pack any bras OR underwear for a 2 day trip. S***. "We'll find a Wal-mart or something," said Blair. Fine, but cheap Wal-mart undies just aren't fun for a vacation get away, you know?

But the underwear didn't matter because soon after that, the oil light came on in the (new/used) Toyota. We found a gas station and added oil. The light went away. For 10 minutes. Then it was back on. We were still a good 4 hours out from DC on rural roads and we just decided the hell with it, we don't want to drive tense with an oil lamp on at midnight, so we turned around and went home. That's right. Three hours on the road Friday night and the only place it got us was home.

We're in bed by 10:30 but at 10:50 I fly upright because someone is dropping small bombs on the house. That's what it sounded like anyway. I look outside and there is hail the size of my fist coming down. I have never seen hail that big. I was worried the skylights were going to crack open from the weight and force of it.  I flipped on the back porch light and all I saw was a swirl of wind and what looked like sand and hail.

"Are we under a tornado watch?" I called to Blair, who, freight train noise or not, hadn't budged from our bed.

"I don't know," came a muffled reply.

I turned on the TV but there was no weather warning and in two minutes, the whole thing was over. Even the rain moved on.

So we got up at 4:30 am on Saturday, showered, packed some underwear, and took a new car and tried again. This time we made it to DC. And were so glad we went. We went to the Spy Museum and took a good 6-7 mile walk around the mall and monuments. I hadn't seen the FDR monument yet, which was incredible. Then we walked and walked and walked looking for an Indian restaurant, because we'd both decided we wanted Indian Food. And when we found it, it looked like a little hole in the wall but upon entering, it was glorious. Small space, great food, attentive staff. Perfect.

We had brunch the next morning with mom and her best friend and then headed home.  And even though we'd had a great trip and had only been gone really about 36 hours, we were so happy to be home. We are the ultimate homebodies. We like our home, our food, our shower, our bed, our stuff.  Love being home.

Now, of course, we've got to get the Toyota into the dealership.  Just praying it's something minor and we didn't just waste $$$ buying a clunker car. We shall see...