Huntington Beach Mishaps...

A series of unfortunate events... If it can go wrong....The Holsonbake curse... get my point? Well first I am grateful we made it home with no accident or harm, I'm supposed to be soaking in a hot bath but I must blog before I forget it all, unlikely though... We were unable to rent a tow dolley so had to get the vehicle transport, a trailer that the car rides on. We went to Walmart and bought an electric wench to help pull the car up because it won't start and just Blaine and I were able to go and knew we couldn't push it up those ramps alone. We got the trailer and off we went, smooth sailing only took less than 2 1/2 hours to get there, so far so good. Quinn was working and left the key under the mat. I got in the car and attempted to put it in neutral. We turned the key on and still no luck, then Blaine tried, no luck, figures, so I called pep boys to ask if there was a secret, (I have the number memorized, sad huh) They said there is a small hole at the base of the gear shift thingy and to put a pin in it to manually release it, we tried and tried, no luck so Blaine just broke the plastic around the hole, yes it now looks ghetto, but it worked. We got it lined up and he tried to hook up the wench, unfortunately you are supposed to hook it to the trailer hitch which the trailer was on so he tried to rig it, meanwhile Quinn's roommate Zander came out and two other guys and asked if we wanted them to just push it up. I got inside to steer and brake at the top and all four guys pushed and up it went. Then a problem, my door would not open because of the trailer wheel well cover, the window would not roll down because it is electric, luckily I steered more to my right and had about a foot opening on the passenger side, I crawled over to the passenger side and barely managed to squeeze out one inch at a time and one leg at a time. Oh no another problem, we forgot to pull the wheel straps out of the way and the car was now resting on top of them, we had about 2 feet of ramp behind the car before it would roll down, but the guys had all left, I had to get back into the car, a site to see but I made it and straddling the parking break in the middle and reaching another leg over to the brake , because I am too fat to get all the way back into the driver's seat, he tried to push, but couldn't do it himself, he thought about jacking it up but that would be dangerous, so I cracked the door as a car pulled in and a nice young man hopped out, I asked him to help push and he agreed and they pushed it back a foot, yeah! Now he could get the straps up, another problem Blaine didn't know they were supposed to work, Quinn and I had figured it out on the tow dolly, so I tried to yell to him what to do, he couldn't hear me and was getting frustrated, he said I was just going to have to get back out and show him, ugh, so here I am squeezing my way out again. I showed him how and we loosened them into position, back in the car I climbed this time I had my rhythm all figured out. Blaine told me to straighten the wheel to pull it a little more centered we got into position and he tried but could not push it back up the foot or two, the other guy had left by now. So he hooked up his electric wench and put his come along in between, I don't know exactly what he did but it pulled the car forward and I stepped on the brake, perfect! Oh no now that the car is more centered my escape route just got smaller by a few inches, I tried but got stuck, now what, I started pushing my self up higher with one leg and finally unwedged my butt and squeezed probably breaking a few ribs (not really) but made it. And finally we were off, only to hit bumper to bumper traffic all the way down the 405, it took two hours on that one stretch, but we figured that we could make it to the 5 things would be better, no so, a horrific accident involving a runaway big rig and 11 car pile up closed I 5 for 3 hours, we inched along all the way by the time we got down the grapevine going about 10 miles per hours, pep boys was going to close at 6:00 pm. We started to wonder who we could get that was skinny to get through the car when we took it off the ramp if pep boys was closed and no one there to help us, we called all around, finally got a hold of Rick Mayberry, they were on 178 heading west so they stopped by, we got to pep boys with 3 minutes to spare and Rick got out and I opened the passenger door to the 7 to 8 inch crack and his jaw dropped, "you want me to get through there, how on earth did you get out" I smiled as I limped and said you wouldn't believe it. Then the pep boys guy came out and said oh all you have to do it pull back the wheel well on the drivers side, like this, he unlatched it and pulled it down, allowing the drivers side door to open. UGH!!!! Why didn't they tell us that when we rented it!!!!! I was so stressed out and sore that Rick hopped up in and as all the pep boys guys and dad pushed it off the ramp and into the bay where they could lock it up for the night. We took the trailer back and came home by 7:30 pm. I can barely turn by body, after being a contortionist not once but a total of 6 times, now I will go soak in the tub.