My Family Gets Misplaced A Lot of the Time

So, you remember last February when American Airlines misplaced my dog Faith - sending her to Chicago I believe, rather than to our actual destination of Orlando, Florida. It was a newsworthy event. CNN picked up on it - the world, you know - a few interested millions called or e-mailed to say they were praying for us. We love and we thank them. Well, it's happened again.

This time, Laura and Faith are traveling with the Ozzfest group on their way through the U.S. to entertain the masses - they're traveling on the biggest, most sleek looking tour bus I've ever seen - and the driver (a fantastic woman) has left my daughter and my dog at a Shell gas station in Donald, Washington. According to Mapquest they're 154 miles away from their destination of Seattle - where the Ozzfest will begin in earnest tomorrow at noon. Can you imagine that? Can you imagine being 18, needing to poo, getting off the bus when it stops to refuel, but not telling anyone that you left - and then getting left?

Laura called me this morning at 7:40 a.m. my time, 5:40 a.m. her time, to tell me she was stranded, and that she was wearing a Lolita skirt on top of everything else. She and her new friend Stitch, a performer, were showing off their clothes and wearing various outfits which showed off various body parts when they both fell asleep in the early hours - and then it stopped and Laura left the bus with Faith without telling anyone...she won't do that again.

"Mom, the bus left me!" Immediately I went into crisis mode - which means I remained calm and made the appropriate calls. Not that calling anyone helped, no one answered their cells, but I made the calls. I texted, I called again, I even mentioned I would be calling the police soon - you know, if they didn't pick her back up, or if I hadn't heard from her. I got on Mapquest and looked up the reverse phone number option for the phone number that came over my cell - but oddly enough, it was a 702 exchange, which is Las Vegas, and it stated it was a land line. That wasn't possible. They were suppose to be in Washington state - nevertheless, I called the Las Vegas police just in case the bus had taken the wrong turn in Oklahoma.

While talking with Candance of the Las Vegas police, I got a call from Lucas, the manager of the Ozzfest and hey, he had just realized that my daughter and my dog weren't on the bus. Did I mention that it was a HUGE bus? You could misplace an elephant and no one would know for a while. Lucas' voice was groggy, sleepy, a little confused - but he assured me that he would have the driver turn the bus around and pick up my kid and my doggy. What a great man. He went on to say that Laura needed to tell someone she was leaving every time, and of course I agreed with him. When she called me back from another land line it registered as being in Washington state with a 509 area code - much better. I called her back on that line, as my phone wasn't accepting credit calls, and she informed me that she was not only wearing a completely inappropriate skirt at a truck stop in southern Washington, but that she was silly enough not to have dressed Faith properly in her therapy vest - so she couldn't go into the building to wait - she had to wait by the phones outside. Apparently, no one in the Shell station recognized Faith. (Too many OTHER two-legged yellow dogs running around I suppose.)

Anyway - the end is here. She was picked up by the monster bus, and scolded properly not only by Lucas, but by Stitch, and every other performer who had to be inconvenienced by turning around and losing about an hour's time this morning - aaaahhh, the joys of being on the road and needing to poo, but being too shy to tell the bus driver - now the world knows. (Hey World, my daughter Laura poos from time to time. If she's on YOUR bus, you may want to know that before you pull out and go on to your eventual destination.) Look for her - she may be the one inappropriately dressed and dragging a two-legged K-9 behind her.