My Vacation from the Twilight Zone

I can only tell you about it. For the first time ever, my pictures, most of the good ones anyway, came out blurry.

The afternoon before we were to leave, I received a very interesting phone call.
Remember now, reservations were made back in late January but that doesn't stop Murphy's Law.

First foreshadowing: "We're sorry to inform you that you will have to make other arrangements as our gas line has been disconnected and there is no hot water."

"HUH?"

Less than 20 hours before our scheduled arrival and we can't go?

We scramble and manage to find another motel. When we arrive, the mold and mustiness nearly knock me over, but since I'm the only one with the sensitve schnoze, and everyone else is usually unaffected, I just gritted my teeth and bore it with a little help from Loratadine. Right before turning in, my little one complained of a sore throat.

"What?"

He had just came off of a 2 week regime of Amoxicillan, what now?

Took his temperature . (now WHAT made me bring a thermometer on vacation?)
Temp was 102.3

Woke up the next morning. Everyone and I do mean everyone - was stuffed up congested and had the whole sneezing and post nasal drip going on. Seems my schnoze was not the only one affected by the cave-like atmosphere after all. AND, my little guy proceeded to assure us that every swallow was painful and he could not eat anything, including water - it hurt that much.

Next stop, the E R !!!
(very nice people in the ER)

Now, we have a regimine of Augmentin plus Tylenol with Codeine. Returned to the motel and requested a new room.
We got one.
For those of you who know, Augentin needs to be refridgerated.

I open the refrigerator in this new room and huge gobs of black mold say HI!
Complain again to the manager - who ends up being the owner.
She cleans it ASAP. Apologizes profusely.
We spend the night. No sneezing, kid's temp stays normal and the throat pain starts to dissapate. (Yeah!)

We call our original place. Was told that the gas line should be reconnected by the next morning. Do we want to go there and rough it for one night and be charged a MUCH reduced rate?

SURE! (at least I KNOW this place is clean)

We arrive. No one else is there. The place is gutted! Did I tell you our favorite motel - once family owned - was sold to a Time Share Shark? They had a few rooms avaliable for the sales reps. Ours was one. I wonder who we put out?

We not only spent our last 2 nights at this place - the driving acceptance behind our stubborness was that this was to be the last time we'd ever be able to enjoy the sounds of the ocean while we sleep. This place is THAT close to the ocean. How lulling, beatiful and soothing.
Believe me, we needed the soothing.

We took sponge baths in water that was heated by a stovette.

What is a stovette?

Oh, well, it's this little efficiency type stove wannabe that takes 10 - 15 minutes to heat an average pot of water to almost - hinting here- boiling. Try dumping that into a thick antigue porceline tub and you see that not much happens. By the time you put more "hot" water in, the original has cooled to the temperatures of the last Ice Age.

I discovered something about myself. When I get in water with a cold temperature and have said cold water dumped over my head - my reaction everytime is to SCREECH and giggle uncontrollably. Once started, I can't stop laughing until I'm out of the water.
I'd be a hit a parties.

HOW'D THE HECK DID THE PIONEERS DO IT?

We braved this for two nights.
The kids thought it was fun.
The little one has had no repercussions of any sort. He is a right as rain and had a great time. He thought Mommy was funny. (ha)
The good thing about our vacation.
The sun was out.
We took the family to see Ice Age 2 -The Melt Down. Very cute. Love that squirrel.
There's hot water in the rest rooms, amazing !

We did the usual - Go-Karts, trampolines and braved a walk on the wild and wooley National Seashore plus played miniature golf.

All and all, it was a good vacation. But not one any of us will forget soon.

Oh, and that gas line? The day we left, a guy told us that they actually don't expect it to be reconnected for another

THREE WEEKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

On a better aside;
we scoped out the other shoreline motels. We found a replacement. Yeah! The best part about this new location? Separate bedrooms! Two!! Woohoo! With doors that LOCK!!
For you Moms and Dads out there , this is a BIG plus - Oooh La la!!

Can't wait until our NEXT vacation.
**grin**