Arizona Manwarings: November 2008

Alright, I'm going to try and tell this story, I wish that I could just tell everyone in person because it really is quite the story and very long. I'm adding all of the details so that we won't forget...although how could we?? The summary is at the bottom if you don't have the time to read through it all...or if you just don't want to you can just read the bottom and get the idea :).

First of all our garage is small (our house is small too...I'll write a post about that later), we can barely fit both cars in it together. But somehow we do. When we do however, there is NO room to get out the passenger door, which makes getting sleeping kids in and out a little difficult. This year I feel full well what mom's mean when they say, "All I do all day is run kids to and from everything!". I feel the same. SOOOOO while Jonathan is at work and I'm making constant trips I park right in the middle of the garage to make it easier. When I make my last trip for the day I squeeze the van as far over to one side of the garage as possible to make room for him to park his car. Well, on Thursdays Ally has piano (which she loves by the way...I'll write a post about that later too) and last Thursday I was planning on taking her so I had parked in the middle of the garage when I got home from getting her at school. Anyway, after we were home, 2 of the 4 kiddos weren't feeling so well so I called and cancelled piano and we stayed put. When Jonathan got home and opened the garage and saw that there wasn't any room, he parked his car in the driveway...not a big deal-it occasionally happens. We went to bed.

The next morning was going to be an early one. Ally had been nominated for "Student of the Month" at her school (also another post I'll do later) and there was an assembly to honor her that I was taking all the kids to. After the assembly I had to take Isaac to school and then go visiting teaching (visit other women in our church). So as I'm getting all the kids ready and feeding them breakfast and feeling quite proud that we were even going to be a little early, Jonathan kissed us all and went out the front door to go to work. As quick as he walked out, he walked back in. "Honey, did you pull my car in the garage?". I knew that I absolutely hadn't but we checked the garage anyway. When it clearly WAS NOT there, all I could do was laugh. Our car had been stolen!! I couldn't believe that someone just took our car...I mean really...just took our car. I couldn't stop laughing but tried really hard because it was very apparent that my other half was not as amused. I guess I just thought that stealing was kind-of "out", like something people did in the "80's" or something. And then all I could think of was how disappointed the thief's would be once they started up our 1995 Honda Civic and realized that it wasn't even in as good of condition as it appeared (which wasn't that good anyway). We called the police to file a report and started thinking about everything that was in the car.
There really wasn't much in there, Jonathan's lab coat and badges, golf clubs in the trunk, a stethoscope and Ally's car seat...good luck with all of that! It was funny to think of them looking through everything and being sorely disappointed. We joked that once they got in they would try to ditch it as quick as possible. By this time Jonathan caught on to the humor and we both were laughing pretty hard.

The ironic thing was that the night before I was preparing the lesson I was going to give when I went visiting teaching. I chose to do it on the talk that Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin gave in this last conference titled, "Come What May, and Love It". I thought of a specific quote he said, "The next time you're tempted to groan, you might try to laugh instead. It will extend your life and make the lives of all those around you more enjoyable". And so I shared that with Jonathan, and we laughed again. I then told Jonathan that I had actually thought as we were going to bed the night before, "I think his car is going to get stolen, maybe then we can get a new one!". His laughter ended and he was so mad at me for thinking that and wondered why I wouldn't have said anything (not really, I don't think he's ever been REALLY mad at anything). I just never REALLY thought it was going to happen, I have weird thoughts like that ALL day long that never happen. It made me laugh even more as I could tell he wanted so bad to blame me...but he obviously couldn't and laughed again.

Back to the story...right.

So I loaded up the kids in the van and the phone rang. It was a young girl calling on her cell phone who was on her way to school and found one of our dogs roaming around and called the number on the tag. So in the madness, Benson apparently had escaped. The only problem was that the girl didn't know the name of the street she was on, only that it was by the school and there were 2 big palm trees she was standing by (UMMMM....we live in Arizona, pretty much palm trees EVERYWHERE!). Normally I would send Jonathan, but he had to stay and talk to the police while I took the kids and roamed the neighborhood in the van (worrying the whole time that Ally was going to be late on her special day). I drove up one street and down the other and saw the girl standing on the corner, almost right in front of our house holding our dog. I yelled and Jonathan to get the dog and was off to the school. We made it just in time!

After I ran all the errands for the day and all the kids were at home, I all of the sudden thought, "THE GARAGE DOOR OPENER!!!". I was totally freaked and wanted to cry at the thought that someone could so easily get into our house. I can tell you...I wasn't laughing. I decided to check the caller ID to see if by chance the police had called with any information while I was gone. I was so thrilled to see that they in fact did...they didn't leave a message, but did call. I called immediately back and left a message with them to call me asap. I hurried and paged Jonathan to see if anyone had called his cell phone. At the time he was with patients so couldn't check...not a good enough excuse if you ask me :). Finally he checked his messages and the police had found our car...not even one street away...the very street I had driven down that morning to find our dog!!! I probably drove right by it without even noticing!! Apparently one of our neighbors came home from work at 2 in the afternoon to find a strange car sitting in his driveway. He called the police and since they couldn't get a hold of us they had the car towed. By the time all of this had been put together and we were in contact with the police, the tow yard was closed. So we had to go to bed that night still now knowing the condition of our car or what had been taken. My main concern was the garage door opener...as you can imagine. We unplugged the garage door, locked up the house and probably woke up throughout the night about 20 times each at EVERY little sound. I was very glad to wake up the next morning.

Jonathan had to work (Saturday...yeah the life of a resident is not the greatest!) but luckily he was able to leave for a little while to try and get the car before the tow yard closed. So, we loaded everyone up and drove to a not so lovely part of town. I was very scared for our well being when we got to the 'yard'...and I'm still not convinced that the people working there weren't the ones who stole it in the first place. Especially seeing as how the manager had the EXACT same car that we did...hummmmm. We paid the $86 to get our car back (I still can't believe we had to pay!) and Jonathan went to claim his prize, the kids and I waited in the van in the front. It was taking a while and the next thing I see is some fork lift bringing our car out with Dr. Manwaring riding on the side-it was very funny at the time. The car wouldn't start, meanwhile about 6 "choppers" were staring us down and I wanted to get out of there as quick as possible-although I did shoot them a few mean glares back their way-just in case they were the guilty ones. The car was missing it's 2 mirrors (or ears as Ally calls them), the face plate to the stereo (but didn't take the stereo), a speaker cover, the bra on the front, Jonathan's "doctor" bag (that really didn't have anything too valuable in it) and come to find out the "computer" that makes the car actually run had been ripped out. Very strange that the golf clubs, stereo and passports/social security cards were untouched. And best of all....the garage door opener was just where it should be.

We had to find a "computer" as soon as possible so that the car would actually run. So we were sent on a wild goose chase to find the part and ended up in South Phoenix in a place that was described as the "Las Vegas of auto body shops". I guess I had a different idea of what this was going to be like, but when we got there it literally felt like another country...I think a better description would be like the "Tijuana of auto body shops"-it was horrible, yucky and scary. We had been in the car for about 3 hours by this time and I still can't believe how nice our kids were-I think they were also in a little shock. The worse part was that they kept having to go to the bathroom and I was NOT about to let them go in ANY of the places we were at, so the day entailed a lot of "holding it" until we could get to a nice gas station or something. We got the part...only $65 plus they had the 2 mirrors we needed at $40 a piece. So on back to the tow yard we went. The manager came out and helped Jonathan install the computer and in the process let quite a few expletives fly-why does it not seem as bad when a mechanic swears??. It wasn't too long and the car started right up. Without hesitation the guy offered a good, old, sincere "fist bump" and Jonathan went right along with it. At that point I had to turn my head because I was visibly laughing and if I would have made eye contact with Jonathan, it would have been very uncomfortable. I was just releived that the whole thing didn't end in a chest bump. So home we went. And now here it sits, about $300 later, almost just as before...except now braless and no stereo face plate. I guess this makes me glad that we don't have "nice" cars however, I would like to now convince him to get rid of the thing!

And I'm also happy to report that we are having an alarm installed in our house tomorrow :)! It will be a good night!

SUMMARY
Car stolen from driveway. Car located just one street over. Car towed. Car missing mirrors, stereo face plate, speaker cover, bra and "computer". Found parts, fixed car. Fist bump. Car safe and sound (but still braless). Home alarm to be installed tomorrow.

We voted!! It has been quite the election season...it seems like for months it occupied our thoughts and words-whew are we glad it's over. And although the person we voted for may not have won, we are excited for the next 4 years!

Ally got to go with both Jonathan and I to vote which was pretty exciting for her. We had fun teaching her about the process and the importance of voting. She was very anxious to find out when she will be able to vote herself...only 12 years :). For a long time Ally was the only one in our family who knew who she wanted to win. Both Jonathan and I were raised in predominately "conservative" homes but really found ourselves wondering who we wanted to vote for. We followed Mitt Romney forever in the primaries and when he lost, so were we. There were a lot of things we liked about both of the candidates. Ally was not confused whatsoever. If you would ask her who she was voting for her response was always, "I'm voting for John McCain because he's Republican and that is Mitt Romney's team, and I want Mitt Romney's team to win!" It was always so cute and she was %100 convinced. The boys would always answer, "Obama"-I think they mostly just liked saying his name. Jonathan took her with him to go and vote first. After they got back it was my turn to take her with me. I should say that she took me with her because right as we got there she showed me right where to go. She greeted all the little old ladies working and took me to my booth-it was all I could do not to laugh out loud, she thought she was "hot stuff". As I was quietly filling out my ballot, looking over all of the items to vote on, Ally said, "Mom, all you have to do is mark the ones with the 'R' on them because that means 'Republican'". I shhhhed her and thought to myself how proud her Manwaring grandparents and Meigs great-grandparents would be! I was proud that when she woke up in the morning and found out that her candidate didn't win, she was still excited to have a bran new President and to have been a part of it!

....I forgot to add that when Jonathan took her, she really thought that John McCain and Barak Obama would be there...kind of funny!