Fumes

Let's start at the end of the day and work our way backwards. This might be interesting. SO. I'm currently sitting in my hotel room, in Yuma. The past hour has given me an ulcer, but I think that I might live.

This is what happened. I'm driving down I-10, it's dark, & I notice that my gas was going down, getting close to empty. It doesn't look like I'll make it to Yuma, so I need to gas up. As I'm contemplating getting off at the next exit, where I can clearly see a gas station, my phone rings, it's Eric, and I'd much rather pass the time driving and talking to him, than fueling up. Not a good decision on my behalf. I wont be doing that again. As we are talking my 'Low Fuel' light comes on,

"Oh shit."

I'm never sure what that means.... Is this a warning? Or are you being serious? I've always figured it was just a warning, right? You have a while, no biggie, besides there are gas stations like every 5 miles..... WRONG. LOL I don't really worry about it until I'm off the phone, I'm sure I have Eric thinking that I'm probably stranded, in the dark, on the interstate, and some hillbilly trucker is going to come and kidnap me. That's my guess at least...... I finally get smart and get out my handy GPS to see exactly how far the next gas station is. 9 miles. I can make it. My car is telling me that I have 20 miles left, what I didn't realize at the moment was that I was climbing over some sort of Mtn pass type thing and the miles were dropping off faster than I was driving. All of a sudden I was down to 11 miles until empty. WHAT? EEEEEEEKKKKKK. Deep breath, deep breath. This isn't the end of the world. Everything will be okay. I came down the other side in neutral. That conserves gas, right? Or am I just making that up?

I pull of on the exit, take a right at the light, pull into the 'gas station', according to the gps. It's an effing water station. WHAT? Okay, next closest gas station, just a mile down the road. By now my car says I have 3 miles until empty. Shit Shit Shit. I get to the second gas station, YES. VICTORY. Pull up, get it all ready, put my card in.... it doesn't work. Okay, so I have to go inside. I've got this. The door to this mini mart is locked and there are people inside.

Let's just say, these weren't the friendliest of folks. They came to the door and told me that sorry, the pumps had been turned off for the night and there was nothing they could do. When I asked for a phone number for a local tow company to bring me gas they informed me that would be expensive. Really? I had no idea. ( that's me being sarcastic). I'm in tears by this point and asked if I could at least use their restroom, I had to pee and their response was to make it quick. Real A holios. Not a good experience. Somehow, my car made it five more miles down to the next gas station, where I realized that I must have left the gas cap off at the last place a fueled up, because it was gone. Just my luck. Really.

I decided after that, it was time to stop for the night. Screw any idea of getting to the place in Yuma that my father suggested. I was telling the girl at the Comfort Inn about what I had gone through and she asked where I was headed to. I responded by saying I was heading to california but trying to get to Yuma, but gave up.

Her response.....

"You are in Yuma."

Of course I am. This wasn't the first time during this trip that I had absolutely no idea where I was.....

I'll write about my last day of visitation soon. I need some time to really talk about it..... Maybe tonight or tomorrow...

I'm currently in sunny San Marcos, California :)

K