Planes, Pains, and Automobiles

This week marks another sojurn for the wife back to her company's home office in Chicago. Which marks another opportunity for me to live as Single Dad^tm. It started off well enough - Sunday we finished her packing and laid out the week's clothes for the kids. Monday morning comes and the wife takes the car out for Intercontinental and I take the van to get the kids to school. The deal has always been that, since a vehicle is just going to sit at the airport for a week, she takes the car and I get to use the van. We tried once for us to drop off the kids and then have me drop her off at the airport. But, that proved a major hassle, and she is able to just expense the parking and gas for the car anyway.

But this time decided to be a different adventure altogether. I'm coming up 288, about to exit onto 610 when the phone rings. The wife tells me the car is dead and she's somewhere near downtown off of 45. Great! So, I continue up 288 making my way to 45. I fight through traffic to the exit that she's stuck on. But, I can't get into the correct lane because it's jammed up with traffic....of cars trying to get around her.

Now, downtown Houston is pretty much an island surrounded by freeways and access to those freeways in the downtown area is very limited. I tried a couple of ways zigging and zagging around downtown to see if I could get back to the ramp. No luck. I eventually settled on the only way I was sure - I followed the loop of freeways all the way around downtown. Finally, I managed to get the van in behind the car. She had called for a tow truck and that arrived about 10 minutes after I got to her. We swapped all her luggage to the van, I gave the tow truck driver directions to my one and only trusted mechanic in Pearland, and we headed off to the airport, trying to make up for lost time and not miss her flight.

I got her to the airport about an hour ahead of her scheduled departure time. After I'm on my way to work, I get a text that the flight has been delayed an hour, so no worries about her missing it. The afternoon wears on and I get a call from the mechanic that the car made it and that one of the transmission lines busted and dumped all the fluid, so, no shifting, no power. This turns out to be good news. They replace the lines and tighten up all the connections and fittings. Refill the transmission and it shifts smoothly.

I get back home with the kids, drop the princess off at basketball practice, and the lady from the garage picks me up to get the car. It drives home as good as usual. It's been a long day, so I "celebrate" by going to dinner with the kids at CiCi's and very much enjoying the buffet.

The wife is going OK in Chicago, but the weather is getting worse. Snow started tonight and it's going to be in the negatives tomorrow. There's a good chance her flight home Friday will get delayed or even canceled. Tune in later to see if Momma makes it home!