Dude, Where's My Car?

This whole car thing is getting really comical. I mean really comical.

When Brad called today to give me the update from the auto body place I was almost crying with laughter thinking how absurd this whole thing is.

So first of all, if I had a milk carton, I would put this picture on the side:

That's the only shot I could find while flipping through my digital pictures, but it will have to suffice when I contact the authorities in Mexico to see if anyone is tooling around in my Suburban south of the border.

It's not that I'm in love with this car (I leave that type of vehicular attraction to Brad), but we have certainly been through a lot together. We've watched my kids move from infant carriers to 5-point harness carseats to boosters.

Our most tender moments together were probably last spring while our house was on the market. Multiply over 70 showings IN ONE MONTH FOR THE LOVE by 2 hours per showing and it was pretty much my full-time job to raise two small children and cook dinner in the car.

So there we were...DVD players permanently hooked up, enough books to supply a rural library, and pre-packaged snacks in wholesale club quantities.

Which leads me to Costco.

I believe it was a Saturday last March when we had to be out of the house from something like 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. At this point, all of our friends had more than opened their homes to us so we couldn't continue to abuse them and I couldn't face even the mall anymore.

Not to mention the fact that shopping in all forms was out of the question because we had made a rule that NOTHING SO SMALL AS A GRAHAM CRACKER CRUMB was to enter the house. Because then it had to be cleaned. Or put away. Or thrown away. Or dealt with. None of which I could do.

Exhaustion had set in, so Brad suggested that we take advantage of the Suburban's size and take some power naps in the Costco parking lot.

Perfect! And classy!

We laid the kid's seats down, covered them with blankets, and snuggled them in the warmth of their carseats. I laid on the back row under a plush Tinkerbell fleece and Brad was back with the cargo and the Batman blanket.

All went well until I awoke to a conversation I overheard outside.

"Should we call the police?"

"I guess their parents just left them here while they're shopping!"

"CAN YOU BELIEVE SOME PEOPLE?!?!?!?!?!"

Clearly, Brad and I were out of view behind the tinted windows and we were moments away from being turned in to Child Protective Services by some conscientious Costco shoppers.

Although glad to avoid jail time, it was still quite the scene to crawl forward and present my disheveled self as the "responsible" parent of the two sleeping angels in the middle seats.

I'm sure that was so comforting to those two ladies just knowing that I wouldn't leave my kids to sleep in the car alone. Instead, I was right on board.

So other than the fact that the Suburban is our main mode of transportation, and the Suburban is worth MONEY, and the Suburban is OURS, I don't really need it back.

So rewind to Brad's conversation with the Body Shop today.

The part we need, which is not so much a "part" but an entirely new left side of the vehicle, should be in this Friday.

To complicate things, this Friday is also super duper lucky because it's when the body shop has chosen to move locations. Across town. WITH MY CAR.

So the Suburban, which has apparently been up on blocks for over a month now, is going to be (Lord willing) towed to an entirely new location. Hopefully this is somewhere in Denver that is an actual body shop, not a chop shop where they'll sell the parts off to what is apparently the incredibly lucrative Suburban black market.

My other favorite quote that the body shop used when describing the speed of GM's shipment of these panels was, "It's kind of like a slow boat to China."

Um....I am starting to sense that.

In the meanwhile, the Chevy Malibu is a totally rockin' rental car that reminds me why I drive an SUV. The kids feel like we are in a space shuttle driving "so close" to the ground. And I have knocked Lilly's head every time I try to help her get in.

"Jackson," I questioned on the way to school, "What do you love so much about the Malibu?"

"The music, mom!"

Even though we were listening to the SAME ol' radio station we always do...