Attila the Hyudai

Friday night Marco, Katie, Liz and Andrew played at the DC temple visitor center. They left early and I headed out with the kids and our good friends Ben and Kristen Bahlman. Little did we know we would never make it to the gig. Attila our Hyundai died last night just off the Baltimore Washington Parkway at Kenilworth and Benning. (If you know the city, you know this is not were you want your car carrying your two babies to stop working on a Friday night.) Here are a few details...

First, if you are going to break down in the 'hood, be sure to remember to have the Bahlmans in your car with the rest of your emergency road-side essentials for several important reasons. First, it means that not ALL of your friends who's phone numbers you can remember are already at the concert innocently listening to uplifting music ... 40 miles away. Second, the Bahlmans know Melvin who will come and help you get your invited guests and small children to a safer location. Ben left us on Gilligan's Island while he went to pick up his Kung-Fu-Subaru. Mean while, Kristen and I kept two small children safe and happy on an on-ramp in the DC summer.

Kristen checks the map to determine our exact location and determines it is, in fact, a really bad place to break down.

Luckily, I came prepared for car trouble and dressed my girl in "road hazard" orange for the occasion. Now that is planning ahead. Xanny thought we had just stopped at a new playground on the way to the gig. Mean while, Ben came back and loaded up Kristen and the little people while I waited for the tow truck. He assured me he would be back ASAP to pick me up and together we would follow the tow-truck to the shop. The whole evening's logistics were like living a real life story problem from 8th grade. "If the red car breaks down and the blue truck can only carry one person at a time, how many trips with a subaru will it take to get the tow truck driver to join the church?"


This is my face from the perspective of my four year old. What else am I going to go to keep the kid busy while we are stranded literally on an island of the on-ramp to the Baltimore Washington Parkway but hand the kid a camera and tell him to push the button. Interesting to see what you look like to your small children. This is my "Do I get into the tow truck with a strange man or wait for Ben to get back?" face.

The tow truck showed up long before Ben made it back. Above is a shot of Keith, our knight in not-so-shining armor who rescued me from impending doom. Can you tell that it is now very dark outside? I told him someone was on their way to pick me up and he could take the car to the garage without me. He told me there was no way he was going to wait around in that intersection and if he ain't waiting -- I sure as hell better not either. He was convincing and I hopped in the truck.

He chatted all the way back to the garage about how DC was turning into San Diego. Of course he looked at my Utah driver's license when he was filling out paper work and asked if I was a Mormon. I related how I was on my way to the Mormon temple when my car died. Turns out that Keith used to drive a big rig through Utah where he fell for a Mormon waitress in Ogden. While he realised nothing grand would come of relationship, there and then he vowed to help Mormons for the rest of his life. He told me was glad he was the one who got the call to pick up my car. BUT OF COURSE !