Full Moons and Motherhood

You know it's going to be a whopper of a full moon when....

Thursday night I headed down to pick up my daughter from work at the usual 10P.M.. When I looked in the store window and saw all the stuff still waiting to be put away, I decided I had enough time to head over to the gas station on the corner and run the car through the touch-less car wash. The bays were still open so I drove in. Since I had a coupon for the extended wash, I turned the engine off to save gas. Gas jumped from 2.05 to 2.19 this week! The dryer was on it's final pass when.....the bay doors shut. Both of them. The machine was still going and the doors shut!!  What the....I started honking the horn in case someone was close enough to hear. Nada. Luckily I had my cell phone. I pulled the receipt from my purse and dialed the gas station number and received the infamous fax screech on the other end. OK....they're doing nightly reports. I'll wait a minute. The dryer had stopped now but it was still kinda hot in there. I dialed again. No answer. If I hadn't known the station stays open until the wee hours I might have panicked. I tried calling again and was greeted with the fax screech. I decided it was too warm in there and could feel my hair frizzing and kinking. I got out and managed to get over to the front bay door without tripping over any of the conglomeration of tracks and rails. The 3 buttons over the bright red emergency sign were not operational. I tried pulling on the chain pulley attached to the door but it just went around in circles. Must not be attached to the door anymore, although I thought they were there just in case of power failures or someone inside needed to get out. I tried the back bay door. Same outcome. By now it was definitely too hot in there and my hair was definitely a couple inches shorter due to the frizz. Shorter, but big. My hands were covered in dirt and probably rust. OK...sit back down and think. My daughter is probably wondering at this point. I'm always there early. I called 911. The dispatcher was in disbelief.

"You're where? Wait...what??!!"  The dispatcher was incredulous.

I explained I couldn't get through to the station by phone and really didn't want to spend the night in there. She said she would send a unit out right away.

In the meantime I called my daughter's work, hoping they hadn't shut the phones off yet. I was in luck. I spoke with the manager and told her what happened and that I might be a little late. Her reaction was the same as the dispatcher's. She said they would come over to the station if I wasn't there when they closed.

The dispatcher called me back. She was able to get through to the night clerk. As she was talking the doors started creeping up. She was asking if I was alright. I assured her I was just a tad warm but OK. I didn't mention my hair...figured that wasn't part of the need to know info. She said she would cancel the call.

Too late. As I pulled out of the bay and stopped to put on my seat belt, I glanced over to my right and saw 2 police units at the traffic light. I was pretty sure they saw me so I circled around the pumps and looked in the windows at the night clerk. He's a big guy and looked for all the world like he was trying to make himself as small as possible. I'll let him deal with the cops. I left and got to my daughter's work just as they were walking out the door. The manager walked her to the car and asked if I was OK. Sure. Just peachy. Pardon my hair. I had to explain the whole thing all over again. My daughter was in fits of giggles in the passenger seat.

Ahhh.... motherhood and full moons. They just kinda go together.