A Chilliwack Tractor (ok mini-Tractor)
Mama and D-Y decide to take a "quick" trip out to Chilliwack to pick up a Lawn Tractor (Kinda like a John Deere Mower without the mower blades underneath). We get out the usual GPS app on the iphone and truck off to Chilliwack. Mama's phone ... like much her world is not updated so it takes us along a back route and away we go. We brought our "trusty ... new" trailer to pick it up. We pull up to a spotless clean driveway with our "hunk-a-junk" converted tent trailer and dump out our old rusty 8 foot ramps (we sure could've used those ramps when we picked up the JD). The rusty old ramps scatter bugs and bits of wood all over the "way-too-clean" driveway. D-Y and Mama amble up to the front door and a nice 30 ish year old guy tells us to wait by the garage door. We step back down the stairs and stand in front of the garage doors. When this garage door opens ... We gotta say ... it was so clean in there ... everything was in it's place and there was a place for everything. You really could've eaten off of this floor. The guy takes a tiny screwdriver out of the drink holder on a little orange tractor. That alone should have set off bells, but Mama just made a little joke about it being "stolen if you have to start it with a screwdriver". The guy tells us that he has called the company and they no longer make keys for this model. "I was just kidding" Mama says and the guy wheels it out of his pristine garage onto the once pristine driveway (remember we have just dumped rust, dirt, bugs and wood chips onto it). He shows us how to start it ... with the mini screwdriver ... how the gears work etc. We listen intently (NOT) ... and he helps us load it up onto the trailer. Afterwards he runs into the garage ... takes a broom and dustpan from their forever homes, and cleans up the big mess we have just made with our ramps. Mama offers to sweep up while DY straps the tractor onto the trailer with bungees. The guy just waves her off and tidies up quickly. Mama and D-Y drive off knowing that he is going to run out 2 mins after we are gone with his power washer to clean up after "those hick suckers" who bought his re-built tractor without a key.
Chickens, Signs and a Horse gate (much too small)
Never wanting to waste a trip to Chilliwack ... Mama has one more pick-up planned. Onto the trusty GPS and we turn around and head off to the next stop. We arrive down a cul-de-sac where people wave at you from their front stairs and chickens pretty much run loose in the neighbourhood. We go around back of a lovely house, surrounded by friendly dogs and chickens. We hear a saw at work and hope we are heading in the right direction. We meet up with a friendly guy (of whose nationality we will later ponder), who is refinishing an old oak barrel ... the kind that whiskey or wine used to come in. He greets us with a big smile and shows us the "horse gate". Mama can see it is much too small for the pasture, but since she has already talked him down $15 in price ... we take the gate anyway ... maybe we can use it somewhere else. He walks us back out and I ask him about the "free range chickens" in the hood. He happily explains that he has chickens and so does the guy across the street. As long as they each have the right amount of chickens when they close their coops at night everyone gets along. What a contrast to the too clean ... don't talk to your neighbours yard we had just been in. Well D-Y is hungry, but Mama is nervous to leave the little orange tractor in the hunk-a-junk trailer. We pull up to a Tim Horton's where Mama can still see the trailer from the window. Mama checks her email on her phone with Tim's free wifi, and she has 2 more responses to emails. She calls one back and it is just down the road. Off we go and pick up a sign from a lady. The sign says what most women's hearts say "Chocolate doesn't ask silly Questions: Chocolate Understands" ... Am I right ladies or am I right ?? Mama is actually getting pretty good at handling the trailer, because of a trick that a guy taught her at the dump. "Watch your mirrors and whichever way the trailer turns ... turn your wheels the same way". It isn't fool proof but it works a lot of the time. So backwards and forwards a few times and we are out of there ... just one more quick check of the email and off to Yarrow we go. "Wait what ??? I thought this was just a quick trip to pick up a tractor?" asks D-Y as we pass the same Canadian Tire for the 2nd time. Nothing is ever quick with Mama at the wheel.
A Flat Tire and a Corn Field
Mama and D-Y eat some more of their Timmie's and down the road we go. After driving for about 10 mins, crossing a little bridge and stopping at a stop sign ... Mama notices the people in the car behind us are waving at us. They yell something about the trailer and Mama pulls off into the next field at the side of the road. They pull up next to us and yell "You have a flat tire on your trailer". Of course we do ... everything had gone too smoothly until then. D-Y looks up the nearest gas station on the GPS and we dump the trailer in the field and away we go. Not sure what we were going to get at the gas station ... maybe "canned air or sealant". We get to the station 10mins later and realise that it is a holiday Monday. Back to the trailer we go. We decide to go back to Canadian Tire that we had passed once or twice along the journey. We go back to the trailer, re-park it, farther into the field, out of view (like anyone would steal it, but Mama is from East Vancouver). While D-Y writes down the info from the tire, Mama drives down the road to the house that she assumes belongs to that field. She parks the truck, and knocks on the front door. As the dogs inside the house start barking .. Mama thinks OMG ... "what if this is a grow-op and they come out and shoot me just for being on their land". (Again ... remember ... Mama grew up in East Vancouver). No one answers the door and Mama waddles back to the truck and drives back to pick up D-Y. Back up the same road for about the third time .. do all roads lead back to Canadian Tire in Chilliwack? Mama comments that she is soo lucky that she brought D-Y on this adventure, cause all of the corn fields were starting to look alike and she never would have found the flat-tired trailer again. D-Y explains that all the corn fields do not look alike and the one beside us looked shorter because it was in a "ditch". So the Curse Word "Ditch" was born ... apparently "Ditch" is the Male version of a "B*tch", and D-Y and Mama got a whole lot of crazy giggles out of it being said. It couldn't have been that they were overtired and silly ... No ... it was just funny. We arrive at Canadian Tire at 5:50 pm and it closes at 6:00. Mama sends D-Y off on a wild goose chase for a "Tire Jack thingy", while she lines up to buy the tire. The three people in front of Mama are arguing about whether or not they should buy this part that the shop guy has taken about 15 mins to find for them. They find out that the piece is $13.00 and now we have to learn that the guy's car is a POS and probably not worth the money. They take the part anyway and wander slowly towards the cashier. The part's guy finds the right tire and then explains that the other "thingy" I am looking for is called a lug-wrench. As we wander off to find the lug-wrench and D-Y, Mama sees the guy put the $13.00 part back on the parts counter. (What a waste of space they were ... really). D-Y arrives back in time to find the lug wrench and off to the cashier we go. Buying a few pop, a pair of Sunglasses for Mama, a new trailer tire and oh yeah ... a lug wrench ... has just turned Mama's trailer into not quite as good a deal as it was before. When we get in the car, D-Y says "How did you explain the Tire Jack to the part's guy?". Did you say ? "Tire Jack Thingy that is shaped like an X to take off bolts?" I couldn't believe that he had explained almost word for word what I had said. Mama asked D-Y if he was "standing right behind me" when I said it. He said "I was on the other side of the store looking for the Tire-Jack" Giggling and calling each other ditches ... we drove past Canadian Tire for the 4th or was it 5th time that day. Hopefully D-Y's GPS pin would lead us back to the Flat-Tired Trailer ....
Thanks for reading and welcome to our barns,
The Lims
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