How many of you have done this…?

You think the ground is fine – or the ground was fine earlier but then it … wasn’t.

Ugh.

I got my truck mired in mud on my own front lawn.  So embarrassing.

THE STORY

OK, well, I have no excuse really… But I will say that previous to this day, I had always been able to drive on my front lawn to maneuver my truck and trailer.

However, I kinda knew that the lawn was saturated because of a new trench that had been dug to accommodate our solar system…

But, I forgot this little piece of pertinent information.

AFTER THE RIDE

I pulled up my driveway as I always do after a ride and made the split second decision to park in front of the pony pasture on the concrete slab there.

I do this sometimes because if I am pulling a larger load, it is easier to offload the horses there than up around the top of the circle driveway.

Anyway, as I was doing this – pulling onto the concrete in front of the pony pasture – I made another split decision.  I thought, “Hey, I only have Finn in here, I think I’ll pull up to the top of the circle instead.”

That thought was my mistake.

Mid concrete I accelerated enough to make a wide sweeping turn to get back onto the driveway.

Except it didn’t work.  I had forgotten about the newly dug (and then covered up) trench.

I pulled forward and suddenly, I couldn’t go anymore.

MY BEST PLAN

Immediately I knew that this wasn’t good.

I got out of my truck to survey the situation.  If I had 4-wheel drive, all would be fine.

(Do you know how many times I’ve said that to myself?…)

But, I didn’t.

The rear tires were now a bit sunken into the trench so I had no pulling power.

I decided to let Finn out and think for a bit.

MEAGER THOUGHTS

Aha!  I know!  I’ll put a board under the front tires for traction!

…Well, this is why Hubby is the engineer and I’m not.

Whatever I did wasn’t engineered correctly and the truck, trailer and their inept driver (me) slipped helplessly backwards in an erratic, muddy backslide.

As I saw the fence drawing near, I panicked!  I threw on every brake possible and ended up stopping about a foot from crashing through the pony fence and releasing the little devils ala Ghostbusters.

CRAP!

Now I’d done it.  Here I was, sitting on my front lawn with my truck and trailer stuck in an obvious (now) trench.

I decided to detach my truck thinking it could make it out on its own, but of course I was wrong.  That idea just sent my truck in a slippy-slidey fishdance on my lawn.

At the same time, I was creating a mess, as you can imagine.

At least all the horses were wildly entertained.

Tess (seeing me backslide with the trailer):  “What is she doing now?”

Remi (watching me unhitch the trailer):  “Oh, I see… well that will never work. ”

Finn (jumping at the opportunity):  “Who wants to take odds?”

Dodger (always sweet):  “Hey, give her a break.  She means well…”

Finn (knowing I was done for):  “Aha!  See, that was a horrible plan!  Everyone owes me all of their grain!”

I GAVE UP

Obviously, I was not going to get out of this on my own.  I could call all of my friends and see who was available to come over with their truck and potentially get us all stuck…

Or I could call in a professional.

I like all of my friends so I decided to save them this mess.

THE PROFESSIONAL

I actually opened the local phone book and dust came out.  I don’t think I’d ever opened it before.

Anyway, I saw an ad that pledged that they could pull out anything that was stuck.   Sounded good so I called.

And I waited for the professional to arrive…

And then I heard it.

OMG.

I heard it rumbling down the street about an hour before I could see it.

I swear to horsegod, I had no idea trucks came that large.

Behemoth.  Huge.  Incredible.

As it tanked up to my tiny self standing there trembling, I realized that I didn’t even come up to the middle of the front grill.  Wow.  I felt like an ant.

However, the good news was that I was pretty sure he could pull me out…

TOW COWBOY

The driver was about as close to a cowboy as you could get without actually knowing anything about a horse.

This tall, lean drink o’ water stepped out of the cab and jumped the 40′ to the ground where I stood craning my neck to see up against the sunlight.  He kinda looked like a tattooed and pierced angel with all that backlight.

Anyway, without a word, he surveyed the situation.  Then, after a long pause and some chaw spit, he uttered almost inaudibly, “I can fix that…”

I jumped up with glee and started clapping my hands like a little monkey.  He looked at me… and I stopped.

THE PROCEDURE

He motioned that I should get my truck hooked back up to the trailer.  I felt foolish for having unhooked them and even more foolish because I had no way of controlling my truck to reconnect them.

So, he sighed and told me that he would lift my truck into position and then I could steer as he gently let me slide into position.

“LIFT me?”

Yup.

“OK, you’re the boss.”

So, he literally tied a huge cable onto my hood and lifted me skyward towards the skyscraper crane contraption he had on the back of his monster.

I felt like I was in Disneyland.

Eventually, after much bumper car action, we got the truck reattached to the trailer and it was time for the big move…

THE BIG MOVE

This cracked me up because I had to sit and steer in the cab of my tiny Dodge 3500 dually while the humungo truck pulled my dinky truck and dinkier trailer out of our predicament.

I’m sure he could have pulled us up completely vertical like a fish on a line.

But, he didn’t.  He placed us nicely down on the driveway and I was able to re-park like a normal person.

All that fun for a mere $250.

Sheesh.

What I coulda done with $250…

HUBBY

When Hubby returned home that evening, I knew I had to tell him.  I figured he’d  notice the huge divots in the lawn.  But he didn’t!

I told him anyway…  I told him that I got stuck on the lawn but that I got unstuck, too.

He didn’t ask any questions and we moved on with our normal evening conversations.

…  I guess TOWCOWBOY and I will keep this as our own little adventure…!

Somewhere, I hear the theme to THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY whispering in the background…  ;)

 

 

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JULY BUCKET FUND

ITSUKO, ADMIRALTY and BHFER

Please help rehab Itsuko, a great granddaughter of Native Dancer who had 99 starts, won 100K, had several foals and then was … forgotten and starved.  And, Admiralty who was winched to a trailer.  Click here to learn more.

 

 

 

 

Copyright

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