Silver Lining and the horrible, no good, very bad day

(as told by Silver Lining)

The night before last my owner decided to sleep at a Super 8 motel rather than with me. And that decision led to my h-n-g-v-b-day. She had been told that my propane detector would “suck the power” out of the battery if I wasn’t plugged in. Not only did she fail to remember that, she also left the fridge on battery power and left me connected to the car battery. Okay, so maybe she was a little tired and when looking for the RV site in Ellensburg, the GPS had led her to the middle of nowhere and the decision to go to a motel was a good choice but I was tired too and that parking lot was dark and lonely.

All that aside, on Thursday morning (around 11) when she came out to start the car it wouldn’t. She didn’t panic or say any bad words because she knew she had BCAA RV coverage. In the motel office she asked to use their phone to call triple A. I will admit that the decision to get the BCAA Plus RV coverage when she got me was a very good idea. Apparently, and of course I wasn’t in the office to witness this, just as she got through to triple A the office clerk said, “How silly, I have jumper cables in my truck. I’ll ask Dave (another employee) to give you a boost now!” With an apology to triple A she accepted the clerk’s offer and before she even got back to me a big red truck had parked in front of us with its hood up. Wouldn’t I like to be towed by that sweet truck, what an engine! The cables were connected and Linda turned the key and at the same time that the engine started the alarm started. Horrors, what a noise! The car book says it only happens for 30 seconds but that was a mighty long half-minute. And poor girl in her surprise she turned the key off which meant that when Dave gave the engine a second boost the alarm sounded again.

With the car running and the alarm quiet we were ready to leave. The GPS was programmed for Wenatchee and off we went. It seemed to me that we were taking a rather long route to get back on the highway but I just rolled along behind the car without any complaints. And then the car wheels threw brown mucky stuff at me. It was awful and it smelled funny too. Ooh! Ucky!

 As we rounded a corner I caught a glimpse of a sign that said dead end and then another one that said locked gate at end of road. I couldn’t see really well because of all the yucky stuff but it wasn’t looking very good at all. Next thing I know my back end is heading toward a locked gate and the car is turning around. That was a great turn in a small space but wait… oh no we’re going back through the ucky stuff again. The next stop was at a car wash which was nice but the quarters ran out before I was totally clean.  

 Then we found the main street and a really cute little purple-coloured-drive-thru coffee place. The lady there was so nice and she thought I was so cute, even though there was still some yuck on me. She even gave us a map to get back on the highway and eventually we were on the right road after three hours and more than 60 kilometres.

I think the best advice I can give so that you don’t have a horrible no good very bad day is to plan your trip so you don't stop overnight in Ellensburg.