What Stinks in Here?

RVing is humbling.

There are two kinds of basic humbling aspects of RV life - one involves wielding a large vehicle poorly, and other, frankly, has to do with the toilet.

In the first instance, I am reminded of the time I gassed up in the presence of a large contingent of biker dudes, only to drive away from the station with the gas nozzle still attached to the RV. This was supremely embarrassing.

This morning, when we returned from breakfast, we opened the door to the RV, only to be hit broadside by what smelled like every rotten egg in the county. We lurched for the RV troubleshooting guide, convinced that there was some sort of exotic battery acid leak, or some such. Janine had remembered that in the RV guide, there was something about sulfer smells and problems with the battery. I was convinced that we were sitting on a powder keg that would make the USS Cole bombing look like a firecracker.

Turns out the problem was a bit simpler, but way more humiliating. I called the RV emergency number and explained that their forty thousand dollar vehicle was about to blow sky high, and the bored woman on the other end of the line asked, "Did you put the packet of deodorizer in the toilet?" Ouch. Won't be making that mistake again.

There may be nothing worse than an RV tenderfoot, loosed on an innocent nation with several tons of unwieldy rolling steel and sloshing about with gallons upon of gallons of untreated raw sewage. There oughta be a law against menaces like me.

Thing is, we've done this before, but apparently I forgot a few key bits of useful information in the interim. I will endeavor to file this imporant piece of infrmation away into the long term memory this time.

The day started somewhat inauspiciously - my mother's husband Ray, eager to maximize his time with us, implored us to come right in for coffee in the morning. Later in the day, with a raging headache, I figured out that he'd made decaf. Next time I'll dose up on the strong stuff first, no matter what. So much for my self satisfied rant about drinking one's own coffee.

We finally took off at about noonish. My mother was obviously sad to see us go, but we did get the chance to tuck into a large box of old photos, and I raided the book shelf in the garage, where my mother had spirited piles and piles of books I had as a kid. Next time you see your mother, ask her to pull out the box of photos. She'll know who's in the pictures, and you'll feel like a kid again.

We were off to northern Arizona, where Janine's mother's first husband (oh, it's complicated) has seven acres. This was a family union (one would have had to have gathered together once before to call it a reunion, I'd say), with a good sized pile of Janine's family - half brother, half sister, birth mother (she was adopted, but was reunited with the family in adulthood) among others.

So I write this post to the tune of the crickets and an occasional yelp of a distant coyote, on an incredibly dark night, somewhere near Prescott, Arizona. I think it's Tuesday, but on the other hand, I'm not exactly sure.

That's an excellent sign.