Christmas misgivings

Our day started out like any typical heartland American Christmas. Kids get up early, we have a meal of waffles that no one really bothers to taste due to excitement, then everyone piles around the Christmas tree to begin shredding layers of paper from much desired objects. The resemblance ends there. Last night while Jason was at work his childhood friend, Casey, came in on the last flight. Casey is a flight attendant with the same airline Jason works for. (it's actually a really interesting story how we found out about this....ask me sometime) Casey's flight out wasn't until this afternoon at four, so Jason suggested we get together for lunch since we don't have any family close by to go to. Fast forward to today. We pile in Jason's 4 wheel drive vehicle and head into the mounting piles of snow. We made it all the way to the airport Hilton just fine, met up with Casey, and had a delicious meal. We said our goodbyes and called ahead to our next destination, Dustin and Alanna's. While standing by the glass doors in the lobby, Jason takes note of the visibly cruel weather and offers to bring the car around, which I readily agree to. The girls and I stand in the lobby and wait......and wait........five minutes go by and I get a text that says, "Having an issue, it'll be a minute." Okay then. We wait another five minutes. I take the girls to the bathroom and we come back...no Jason. We sit down in the lobby and begin watching 'A Christmas Story' on TBS. Another fifteen minutes go by. Ralphie looks about how I feel at this point, except I don't have a bar of soap in my mouth. Finally I call Jason. "Uh....what's going on?" "Erm......my key doesn't work......" Buh buh wha? "What?" "My key doesn't work. It won't turn." "Did you try moving the steering wheel?" I ask, painfully cognizant that I'm talking to an AIRCRAFT mechanic. "Yeah. I've already taken apart part of the cylinder but I can't seem to get it to go. I might need a new key or I may need a new key cylinder." Yup. Aircraft mechanic. Realizing that we're not going anywhere in our own vehicle for the foreseeable future, we call Dustin again to see if he can give us a ride to a place that makes keys. Oh yeah, did I mention it's Christmas day? 'Cause it totally is. We managed to find a CVS that was open, but the only triumph there is that Dustin and Alanna were out of milk and they sell milk at CVS. Score. We decided to just cut our losses and head back to their place. Fortunately they live North of the river so it wasn't too far. We arrived at about five (having left Casey around three) and had an amazing dinner of mashed potatoes, ham, applesauce, and baby Jesus birthday cake. We hung out, talked, laughed, and watched a Christmas special on TV. About an hour before Jason had to be at work we headed out into the blizzardy night again. The van got stuck trying to get out of their driveway...not a good sign. Fortunately we made it to the airport without a hitch and dropped Jason off, then Dustin began the trek back to my place. It took a good hour to get there, but we made it unscathed. I told him to not bother trying to get in the driveway for fear of getting stuck again, so the girls and I giggled as we bounded our way across the lawn to the front door, mid-shin deep snow for me, knee deep for Brianna. We peeled off our snow encrusted footwear and jammied up, safe at home at last.

Dustin, Alanna, I can't possibly thank you enough for your hospitality and willingness to help us out today!