The Worst Part

I love holidays!  Who doesn’t?
One of my favorites has always been Memorial Day.  I’m not sure what we are supposed to celebrate but to me it always meant the beginning of great weather and outside play. 
However, in the past several years, the Saturday of Memorial weekend is NOT one of my favorite days.
I love to play tennis on Saturdays.  Saturday is drop in tennis day and it is exciting to pick up a good match with people I don’t normally play with.  But the peace of the tennis courts is destroyed on this particular weekend. . .

Typically I can park right in front of the tennis courts.  But when there are cars lining the road on the way to the tennis court, it’s not a good sign.

I grabbed a spot so I wouldn’t have to walk too far or drive around looking for an empty spot.

There is a circus atmosphere and it’s loud and noisy even though it’s early in the morning.  There are campers everywhere complete with bbq’s, smoking (all sorts of things), loud conversations, loud music (not of my choosing), and lots of people.  The bathrooms are trashed and there is chaos everywhere. 

It requires the parks department to fence some things off.
Why is it different this weekend?  Because there is a HUGE softball tournament. . . . and it runs Friday night through Monday. . . non stop.  Who needs sleep?

Most of the ball fields are up the hill from the tennis courts. . . .and the players and their stuff are EVERYWHERE.  It’s noisy, smelly, dirty, and downright annoying.  Because some of the people who attend don’t respect the property, the courts are locked. 

It has become my least favorite Saturday to play tennis at the courts I love to play at. . . .(but a close second is the junior baseball tournament run along similar lines.)

And the Woes Continue . . .

The van started acting up on the way to my doctor’s appointment.  Whenever my foot would touch the brake pedal, it would stall.  I found it to be a problem in intersections when I was turning and the steering would out.  It was a bit inconvenient.  Plus I didn’t feel very good.

Paul, because he’s awesome like that, wanted me to be safe so he used his time on a Saturday to try to fix it.  Of course, the van behaved for him.

He took it in to a place that “claimed” it needed a tune up to solve its woes.  So he gave them a thumbs up and waited for hours for them to do it.

When they finished, he was going to run a few errands on the way home, but the van wouldn’t start.  Of course not.  He was then told it needed a new battery which they happened to have . . . at a HUGE price.

He said “no thanks” and headed out (once they got it started for him.)  His plan. . . go buy a new battery and have me meet him armed with the tools to fix it.  However, the van pulls the same trick on him that it had on me.  He had to have the police push him out of traffic and into a parking lot.  My destination became that parking lot. . . .

Remember, I’m sick and I don’t feel good?  Guess who drove all the way out there with NO tools?  That would be me.  *cough cough cough*

I drove Paul to get the new battery at the auto supply store and home for the tools and back to the car.  The weather?  Stinky cold and snowy.  Of course.

That battery did not want to come out.  He worked so hard while I shivered in the car (that I hate driving. . . did I mention how hard it is to drive with a sore arm?)

After frustration followed by prayers, he was able to replace the battery.  He had me drive the van around the parking lot and all seemed well.  Hooray!

So he headed off to do some errands and my plan was to drive home and crash in bed.

However, nothing can be that easy.  The van stalled before I could get out of the parking lot.  It was so frustrating, or somewhere beyond that.

I called Paul on his cell phone and had him come back to me.  We decided to limp down the street and drop it off at an auto repair shop along with a detailed note.

And thus ended the fifth day of the new year.  Awesome.