First, let's go back a bit. Our oldest son, James, has been away at Azusa Pacific University for the last 8 months. About 5 weeks ago, Lynette and I were talking about how James would be getting home for the summer and how he would be getting his stuff home. We were trying to balance the cost of going to California, hotels, food, along with wear & tear on the car with a one-way airfare and shipping all of his stuff home. We figured if we got a good fare on Southwest, he could check 2 bags, carry on his guitar, get a fellow student from Colorado to take a few bulky items, and then ship 3 or 4 boxes home. That would probably end up being about $500 - $600 cheaper than driving out there. Additionally, because of a live radio show I engineer Monday through Thursday AND a freelance project I do every Thursday night for Family Research Council (FRC), we wouldn't be able to leave until Friday morning. That would have made for a miserable trip for Lynette and I, along with Julianna, Justin and JoLayne. We decided to have James fly home and make arrangements for the transportation of his stuff.
Sensing the direction things could likely go, I decided to have Julianna do a little investigating on the ride home at lunch. I had her look up hotel costs in Richfield, UT and Flagstaff, AZ. These were the two most likely places we would stop and spend the night on the way to California, if we decided to go.
When we arrived at home, Lynette and I started talking about what James would be facing following his last final, which he was scheduled to begin at 1:15 pm MDT. One of the details that I was unaware of was that there person that had volunteered to take a few of his bulky items home was not going to be coming home immediately after school was finished. She planned on visiting several of her friends in the Greater Los Angeles area for two weeks after school ended. That meant that James's amp, mixing components, and television would be hanging out in the back of her car for the next couple of weeks. Still, I was balking at the idea of changing our plans. James knew the plan and seemed ready to tackle it. I was concerned, however, about the number of boxes he would be shipping. That's a huge factor when considering costs. Lynette suggested I text James (he was cramming for his final and a phone call would be a big disruption) and ask him how many boxes he thought he might need to ship. His reply caught me off-guard - "8 to 10". Eight to ten??? Umm, that's a lot of boxes!
At this point my brain is trying to refigure the cost difference between the two options. Would there be a change fee on the flight? Would we need a hotel going and coming? What would we do with the dog? And the kids? What about the radio show I need to produce?
By 12:30 pm MDT we decided we would drive out. I told everyone, "You get 2 shirts, 2 underwear, 2 pairs of socks and a pair of shorts." We had to pack light to fit all of James's things in our car. All I needed to produce FRC's radio program were the ins and outs for the segments, commercials, and music. I could download those at a wifi hotspot, like at McDonald's, Burger King, or Starbucks. I just needed to pack up the essentials of my studio and throw my clothes in a bag. Lynette had the more difficult job of packing herself, the kids, the dog and getting the house ready for small group on Sunday evening. Julie Lovisone came by and picked up Ziva (Thank you, thank you, thank you). By 2:30 we were on the road.
"Lynette, can you check road conditions?" In Colorado, spring means days in the 70's, followed by snow and 20's, followed by days in the 70's. After a hard freeze on Tuesday and winter conditions in the high country, I thought it best to make sure we could get over the Continental Divide on Interstate 70 (my California peeps and I call it "the 70"). Conditions in the mountains were dry, but they were doing blasting in one of the "Twin Tunnels" and beginning at 4:00 there would be delays of thirty minutes, every hour! Lynette asks me, "What time will we get to the tunnels?" "If everything goes right, 3:45", I reply. We needed to get going!
Thankfully, there were no delays, traffic problems or overly-aggressive police officers on the road, so we made pretty good time. We got to the Twin Tunnels at 3:58! As we were driving into and out of the tunnels, we could see workers preparing for the closures. Whew! That was a close one!
Next stop: Dinner and wifi! We had a gift card for Taco Bell and there was a Starbucks nearby! Perfect! We grabbed our Taco Bell to go and headed to Starbucks. Unfortunately, the Starbucks was in a grocery store and they don't have wifi! On to the next town, I guess. We found a McDonalds a few miles down the road and were able to hook up to their wifi! I had to download about 10 files, so I started up the ftp program and got an error when trying to hook up to the appropriate server. I contacted my client and they started looking into it. They had a server issue, but were able to resolve it fairly quickly. Finally - good news. And that was followed by some relatively bad news. The download speed at the McDonald's was a mere 40 - 60 bytes per seconds. Took us about an hour and a half to download the files I needed. Only one more piece to the puzzle: I left my headphone adapter at home. Just needed to track one down. We tried a local convenience store, as well as a grocery store, but no luck. Fortunately, the store manager at the grocery store was able to direct me to a Walmart.
So 20 minutes down the road we were able to locate the Walmart and the 1/4" adapter. The only one they had came in a variety pack of adapters. So I ended up spending $10 for a $1.50 adapter. Now, to set up my "studio".
Our minivan has a 110v outlet in it, so through the use of bus-powered technology I was able to run my computer and the audio interface via the battery on the laptop. I plugged my external hard drive into the outlet and connected everything together. Voila - a studio in a car! Have you ever tried to do something requiring fine-motor skills while riding in a car? Needlepoint, removing a splinter, or soldering a circuit board? Yeah, it was tough.
I rarely looked up from my work. It's a miracle I didn't get car sick. I would semi-frequently ask Lynette if she was doing okay driving. I really needed her to stay awake. When we left Walmart we were about an hour east of Grand Junction, Colorado. By the time I was finished with the editing part of my work, we were just south of the I-70 / I-15 intersection! My wife was a trooper! We ended up driving all the way to St. George, Utah before she decided it was time to stop. Besides, all the places with free wifi had long since closed! It was 3:00 am!
You can find out what happens next…in my next post!
Summary: An hour before James's last final Lynette and I find a way to change all of the plans of the last 5 weeks and overcame several setbacks along the way, in order to go back to California to help him pack!
