Letters from Missouri

"Dear Mom,
The transmission went out on the truck about 60 miles from our destination. We've been going 30 mph on the interstate for 3 hours. We plan to limp the rig into the national forest. I think if we cover the truck and trailer with leaves and twigs, we'll be pretty well camouflaged from the authorities. I'm sure we can live comfortably until we can earn enough money to fix the truck. Sarah thinks she can start a fire by rubbing some sticks together. I'm thinking we'll be home about spring. Please feed the animals until we get there..."

"Stop it!" Brian laughed. "You'll make me drive off the road!" Sarah, my neice, couldn't stop giggling in the back seat.

Ok. So it's not a real letter home, but the transmission did go out in the truck on our way to get the pigs in Missouri and we really were going 20 mph down the interstatein the middle of the night. We did manage to limp her into a little mom and pop hotel for the night. In the morning, we limped her on down to Bud Nickol's farm and dropped the trailer. Bud helped us find a garage that had a computer to check out the truck... another 20 mph ride. So they hooked her up to the computer ... and told us they new what was wrong... and they couldn't fix it.

Another 20mph ride to the dealership. Along the way we passed an abandoned farm...

"Honey, look there's our new house! We can squat there until we can get the truck fixed!"

"Cut that out!" Brian laughed.

You know if you can't laugh at yourselves who can you laugh at?

At the dealership, they said, we can fix it, but it will take 4-5 days.

Time for plan C. We were supposed to be in Jacksonville TX the next day and I was supposed to be at work on Saturday. Enter the "Enterprise" rent a car. ( They really will pick you up!)
Safely ensconced in a rental car we were off to TX. The next morning we called the gentleman we were to interview and found to our dismay that he had been ill and would not be available....
On to plan D: We consulted our Red Wattle Hog raisers list and called the closest ones. So we didn't get our interview but we did manage to visit a couple of TX Red Wattle hog farmers. We met some real nice folks. That was a good thing. And on the way back up to Missouri, my niece managed to pick some mistletoe to take back to her boyfriend. Brian tossed her up into the tree and she climbed up the rest of the way. She managed to get down with only minor scrapes. Another good thing. Oh and on the way back north we got an unexpected phone call.... the garage had our truck done on Thursday.

WHOOPEE!! Who says god doesn't answer prayers.

So $2100 dollars poorer we pulled out of the dealership. The truck runs GREAT!
Now all we needed to do was pick up the "Great Hogs" and get our butts back to Indiana.
More about hogs loading coming up next. ;)