It's all a lot to process

Greetings, fellow bloggers.

That's a picture of a very tired and cranky (and slightly sunburned) Anna Marie, who exited the bus from camp on Thursday night wearing a coonskin cap she'd bought in the camp store.

(There was also an Indian feathered headdress in her bag, and she'd bought a water bottle that never made it home.)

The two redheads flew the coop again about 5:30 a.m. on Friday, and I've been on my own ever since.

Well, as "on my own" as I can be, with two prone-to-run-off dogs in my backyard.

Friday night, after I drug both of them back home by their collars following one of their "exploring" sessions (we'd been playing fetch in the backyard, and Lucky got distracted) I watched Taken.

Let me just say, without spoiling it for those who haven't seen it - Liam Neeson has no reservations in this movie. None. You already know from the trailers that his daughter is kidnapped in Paris, and this guy stops at nothing - and I mean NOTHING - to get her back.

I actually lost count of how many laws he broke during his search for her.

Saturday, Amanda asked that mom and I come to her job and help her return the car the insurance company had rented after their client had totaled her car a few weeks ago.

(Yes, she's been in another wreck, with another totaled car. Both times, it's been the other driver's fault. Both times, she's gotten more from the insurance company than she had paid for the car in the first place, and more than it was probably worth at that point. SHHH - don't tell anyone!)

She'd finally gotten herself a vehicle, so mom and I headed to her place of business to return the rental while she worked. We only had a short window of opportunity, because the location she was supposed to return at closed at noon, and it was 11:15 when we were about to leave.

It would've been perfect, since the rental place was only 10 miles from her job, except for the part where I locked the keys in the car.

In the ignition, with the radio on because she'd asked me to retrieve a CD out of the player.

Mom and I tried to fix it without interrupting Amanda's work, but 45 minutes later she discovered that we were still there and hadn't fixed the problem yet.

(Note to self: Hertz Rent-A-Car's roadside assistance will charge you out the wazoo to unlock a car, and not every small town police department will do it for you.)

(Also: if your sister has locked her keys in her car every other week for about a month, go ahead an tell her so she can call her "people.")

And that's exactly what happened - Amanda was on her lunch break, so she called "her" locksmith and mom stayed with the car while she and I ate lunch. (Don't worry - she was inside Amanda's air conditioned job, and mom got something to eat when we got back.)

I was so befuddled by everything that was going on - and a touch of ADD, to boot - that Amanda had to write a memo on my phone with the directions home, because I couldn't concentrate enough to process them.

The guy at Hertz who we'd talked to when the whole thing began told us we could take the car back to the Airport location, so we did - except the folks at the airport didn't want to take it! We had to explain to them, twice, why we were returning it to them and not to the original rental place.

After that harrowing experience, and since it was my anniversary to boot, mom and I stopped at Baskin Robbins where I treated myself to a kiddie cone of no-sugar-added, low-fat caramel turtle ice cream.

MMMMM!

After dinner last night, I watched Doubt. I haven't had my head spin so much after a movie since my dad took me to see JFK when I was 15. It was an excellent film, but the ending really made me question what I thought I knew - which I guess is kind of the point.

And now - I'm getting ready for church, and then I have to do some auction shopping for Jason, and we have small groups tonight. And at some point, I really need to walk the dogs, since it was raining this morning and I couldn't.

It's going to be a long day, I'm afraid.