Breaking the Ice
It has been so long since my last post that I thought I would just break the ice with a short narrative about a funny happening that occurred last week when Kim's parents came to visit for Thanksgiving.
The plan was simple. With Kim's parents coming to visit we were going to be a well oiled, well trained wood cutting, splitting, and stacking machine. We would spend the whole day Wednesday and part of Thursday and Friday out in the woods filling our stores to last us all winter. Long story short we really only worked half a day Wednesday due to weather and other extenuating circumstances. I really appreciated there help though and we did get quite a bit of wood put up for only half a days work. The short narrative is about what happened Wednesday during our endeavors.
Dawn found us all enthusiastic and ready to....who am I kidding we were still snoring soundly at that point. It was round about 11:00 when we finally got moving (of course this was due in large part to her parents not getting in till 3:00 am from Michigan). So we fired up the little 4 wheel drive Mitsubishi, our 1/4 ton pickup that has no working alternator, brakes, or bumper. Well, we fired it up after we pumped up the flat tire with a bicycle pump. We then gingerly drove it out to the woods to begin cutting. All was going smoothly and we were on our way back with a full load only a couple hours later. Upon coming down the hill and making the turn for home I saw that there was a van parked in our driveway. I remembered then that we had scheduled a follow up visit for our new furnace. I began wondering how long the poor guys had been waiting, however I only had a few moments to contemplate that before I realized that we were not slowing to a stop like we normally do. At this point my brain had to kick into high gear. With my wife next to me frozen with fear eyes squeezed tightly shut ("eeeeeeeee"), my mother-in-law on the other side giving running commentary ("Andrew we're not stopping, Andrew why won't it stop, Andrew look out for the Jetta, Andrew why aren't we stopping?"), and my father-in-law perched precariously on top of the wood with a birds eye view of the whole situation trumpeting a warning to the furnace people ("look out we don't have brakes"). I quickly did the only thing I really could think of. I dropped the plow and began grading our driveway. I then maneuvered the truck to pass ever so closely between my car and the garage (at which point my mother-in-law for some unknown reason says she reached out and touched the car). We took out a wheel barrel and two tires that were inconveniently blocking our way, they all went flying into the front yard and we kept on going. As we started into the front yard with the plow doing some unnecessary landscaping we began to go up hill again and the truck engine started to die. It was at this moment that it finally dawned on me why we hadn't stopped. The truck was still in gear and the engine had been propelling us forward the whole time. I took it out of gear and we came to an immediate halt directly in front of our spruce trees that line our driveway. At which point one of the furnace guys (who had leapt out of the way) commented....."perfect".
Thankfully no one was hurt and nothing was damaged (well except for my pride). The next time we came down the hill however my in-laws AND my wife decided to get out at the top. The second parking job was much better, and I came to a perfect stop precisely where I wanted to. Well before the garage, car, and front yard.
The plan was simple. With Kim's parents coming to visit we were going to be a well oiled, well trained wood cutting, splitting, and stacking machine. We would spend the whole day Wednesday and part of Thursday and Friday out in the woods filling our stores to last us all winter. Long story short we really only worked half a day Wednesday due to weather and other extenuating circumstances. I really appreciated there help though and we did get quite a bit of wood put up for only half a days work. The short narrative is about what happened Wednesday during our endeavors.
Dawn found us all enthusiastic and ready to....who am I kidding we were still snoring soundly at that point. It was round about 11:00 when we finally got moving (of course this was due in large part to her parents not getting in till 3:00 am from Michigan). So we fired up the little 4 wheel drive Mitsubishi, our 1/4 ton pickup that has no working alternator, brakes, or bumper. Well, we fired it up after we pumped up the flat tire with a bicycle pump. We then gingerly drove it out to the woods to begin cutting. All was going smoothly and we were on our way back with a full load only a couple hours later. Upon coming down the hill and making the turn for home I saw that there was a van parked in our driveway. I remembered then that we had scheduled a follow up visit for our new furnace. I began wondering how long the poor guys had been waiting, however I only had a few moments to contemplate that before I realized that we were not slowing to a stop like we normally do. At this point my brain had to kick into high gear. With my wife next to me frozen with fear eyes squeezed tightly shut ("eeeeeeeee"), my mother-in-law on the other side giving running commentary ("Andrew we're not stopping, Andrew why won't it stop, Andrew look out for the Jetta, Andrew why aren't we stopping?"), and my father-in-law perched precariously on top of the wood with a birds eye view of the whole situation trumpeting a warning to the furnace people ("look out we don't have brakes"). I quickly did the only thing I really could think of. I dropped the plow and began grading our driveway. I then maneuvered the truck to pass ever so closely between my car and the garage (at which point my mother-in-law for some unknown reason says she reached out and touched the car). We took out a wheel barrel and two tires that were inconveniently blocking our way, they all went flying into the front yard and we kept on going. As we started into the front yard with the plow doing some unnecessary landscaping we began to go up hill again and the truck engine started to die. It was at this moment that it finally dawned on me why we hadn't stopped. The truck was still in gear and the engine had been propelling us forward the whole time. I took it out of gear and we came to an immediate halt directly in front of our spruce trees that line our driveway. At which point one of the furnace guys (who had leapt out of the way) commented....."perfect".
Thankfully no one was hurt and nothing was damaged (well except for my pride). The next time we came down the hill however my in-laws AND my wife decided to get out at the top. The second parking job was much better, and I came to a perfect stop precisely where I wanted to. Well before the garage, car, and front yard.
posted by Andrew @ 6:42 AM
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