Not a problem, An adventure

One of our customers, Tina, is a transplant here from England via Virginia. She is a very interesting woman with a 12 year old son. She has met some folks here whose parents planted a great orchard while they were alive, but the kids want nothing to do with it. She is so excited about all the fruit growing there. She brought us a big box of apples a few days ago that I made into cinnamon apples which tasted exactly like the ones Boston Market makes. Her son thought he could become addicted to them. Apparently she is starting to tire of picking the fruit because she decided it was time to show us where the orchard was located. In Virginia they don't have "minimum maintenance roads" like we have here. We had gotten just a light sprinkling of rain at our house. We know Bird City usually gets more rain than we do, but in a moment of insanity we said we would go help her pick fruit. She lives close to Bird City and it didn't make sense for her to have to come all the way back to Prairie House, so we followed her 4 wheel drive truck (which did not have the hubs engaged even though they should have been). She started down a road which she has taken many times, but not after a rain storm. In all fairness, the road was not marked as one of the minimum maintenance roads. Most of the people who live in the area just know that. The further we went, the more slick the road got. Eventually we were past a point of being able to turn around, and she was stuck in the mud in front of us in her pick up. Rick is stressed to the max--he doesn't do well with unplanned adventures. Evelyne said she was reminded of those days long ago when we were kids and went to Grandma's house in the winter. It seems we ALWAYS had muddy roads and often got stuck and needed to have a tractor pull us out. Tina called her boyfriend to come and help us, but he only has a 2 wheel drive pick up which won't be much help, and he lives quite a distance away. Evelyne, Tina, James (her son) and I started walking in the rain toward a farm house we can see about a 3/4 of a mile away hoping to find someone with a tractor. The road was slippery even on foot and our shoes, all caked with mud, made that squish-plop-squish-plop sound as we walked...except for Tina's. She was wearing sandals and had mud squishing between her toes. She probably should have just gone barefoot. We nearly got to the farmhouse when there were lights by the car where Rick was waiting. Help had arrived! Good thing, as it was well past dusk by now. The boyfriend is a farmer and has hands much like Dad's were--strong enough to be able to put the truck into 4 wheel drive without tools. He got into the truck and slithered it along the road for about a half mile to a graveled, maintained road. With a clear shot ahead, Rick also managed to maneuver the car to the top of the hill and across the gravel road. Both of the men were more than a little unhappy about the whole situation. On the other hand, the rest of us were still jovial and just considered it a new adventure. No one was injured and there wasn't even any property damage. Just a break in a boring, routine, Friday night. We never did make it to the orchard. That adventure awaits us on another day.