There's No Place like Kansas....thank goodness

I never know where my job is going to take me next. And today it took me to Deliverance. Otherwise known as 30 miles north of Coffeyville, KS. We went to see a remodeled restaurant there, then the franchise owner took me and the girls to see his new log cabin. He and his wife gave us the grand, muddy tour of their very cool house in the middle of nowhere. Then, we headed over to the barn, where I almost ran over their free-roaming horse and dodged turkeys, guineas, and ducks. Couple of cows and lots of dogs, too....there's a reason I live in the city. Sigh....despite what I say, I would never have made it in FFA.

I hate Kansas for several reasons. In 2002, before we were even married, we went to New York City to visit some friends. We were broke, and the cheapest flights out there were on an airline called Airtran. But Airtran only flies out of Wichita or DFW Airport, and we all know how crazy DFW can be. So we decided to fly out of Wichita.

We arrived in Wichita with no trouble, headed off the NYC and spent 4 glorious, cheap days in the Big Apple. We, of course, hit several delays on the way home and ended up arriving in Wichita around 1:00 a.m. Sigh...we still had a 2 1/2 hour drive.

When we arrived at our car, we realized we'd left an unopened can of Coke in the car. In the middle of the summer. In the heat. It exploded all over the car, leaving a syrupy residue across the windshield. My genius really shines in the middle of the night after hours in the air, and I got the great idea to use the Ponds face wipes to clean off the windshield. So, we added a nice layer of soapy residue to the syrupy mess.

Again, it's the middle of a very humid night. And we're trying to find a gas station so we can wipe down the windshield but there are NO gas stations by the stupid Wichita airport. Finally, we see a Wal-Mart Supercenter in the distance. We exit our slow, dangerous highway escapade and head to the store. But we couldn't see the dark median through the soapy mess and BAM! John hits the median going about 40 mph. Our tire bursts and strips there on the spot....about 300 feet from Wal-Mart.

We run inside Wal-Mart to buy a tire and get on our way. Only they won't sell one to us until the auto shop opens the next morning. So we have to stay in the seediest, grossest, nastiest motel I've ever seen. Remember....we were broke BEFORE the NYC vacation. You can only imagine how little we had at that point. We rented a room at the Knight's Inn for $19.95. I made John promise not to turn the lights on. I didn't want to see where we were staying. I didn't even turn the lights on in the bathroom, it was that gross.

Finally the next morning we got up, got our tire, and headed back to OKC. And my hatred for all things Kansas began.

It was reiterated a few years later. Remember this little adventure?

Today, I was caked in mud, but that was about the only thing that went wrong. I guess I have to start my reintroduction to Kansas in small steps.