Epilogue: Warning the Neighbors, the Battle of the Irish, and the Sunseeker is Put Out of Its Misery
I woke up at 7am yesterday in the Sand Hollow RV Park andstarting forcing everyone into action. After a quick pit stop for coffee (sinceall of the RV mugs have long since exploded) we drove back to Vegas faster thanI thought possible. Air conditioning cover banging above us, cabinets flyingopen and closed, and with screens flapping in the wind Zack took that Sunseekerto its limits. Evan passed out face down on the bench for one last RV snooze.
We rolled into our neighborhood and left the RV running atthe end of the driveway while we shuttled things out of it with the sameurgency and efficiency as hurricane evacuees. We decided to burn all of thebedding later on. With the RV empty, Zack took it to the cul de sac one houseover to leave it for the night. Then, like a registered sex offender, heknocked on all of the nearby neighbor’s doors to warn them of the Sunseeker’s presenceand promise to have it gone in the morning.
We spent the night rehearsing how we were going to handlethe Irishman in the morning. Here is the big problem with the two of us as acouple: we are rarely angry and very rarely angry at the same time about thesame things. Zack exists in a tightly wound state, but when angered becomeseerily calm and rational. I tend to roll through life finding the funny and notbeing too bothered by much. However, when I’m truly mad the dam holding back all41 years of repressed emotions breaks and I get blackout angry. The trick isfor us to find the right balance. Zackneeds to be appropriately wound in order for me to lose it, because if hepushes through to eerily calm and rational he will turn all of that “just calmdown now” nonsense at me instead of at our target. If I don’t properlyescalate, I will get really tired and bored with the conflict and just checkout, leaving him to flounder.
We needed to make sure that we found the sweet spot indealing with the Irishman and his broken jalopy.
Last fall I was in the Dominican Republic with some of myfavorite people in the world and we made friends with a guy who claimed that hehad come with his wife and best friend and when they got to the resort thosetwo announced they were in love and left him sitting alone in the room for awhole week of running into them all over the resort. We vowed to take him todinner with us to make her jealous. Zack was not amused by any of it; pointingout that this is plot to Forgetting Sarah Marshall and we should be moreoriginal. Over dinner, our new friend announced that his family is all Mexicancartel and told us all about the stores they own that aren’t real stores, juststructures that look like stores to lull tourists into feeling safe. I don’tknow if any of his story was true, but it was interesting.
Pulling back into that Boulder City parking lot today, Icouldn’t help but reflect on that. This trailer, with its sad screen printedflag, did little to make the surroundings feel any better OR to create anysense of security that this was indeed a real and functioning business.
***Sidebar Nation - Ourhardy Bay City genetics protected us in the DR. Being raised on Saginaw Bay water and coneysauce has mutated us and made us immune to whatever mystery poisoning iskilling people there. We are also collectively too obnoxious to try to kidnap,so the DR was perfectly safe for us. We Frank the Tank’d our way all over thatplace.
Anyway, we walked past the woman screaming at her boyfriendon the sidewalk outside (unrelated to the RV place), stepped over the unraveledhoses snaking all over the parking lot, and went inside to confront thesalesman. The trailer was filled with even more trash than last time and thesalesman had definite Hobbit vibe going as his black brim hat and red beard pokedout from the mess. It should be noted that this place owns three RVs. We leftwith one of them 10 days ago. I’ve been feverishly blogging and arguing withthis guy in my head ever since.
He had no idea who we were. Even when Zack jangled the keysat him.
So, we took it from the top. Zack hit his stride, calmly listing all of the things that were wrong in careful order and then explaining the steps we had to take to fix them. When the guy would get defensive my wall-eye vision would kick in and I would try to rub his nose in the original rental posting that I pulled up on my phone.
“IT’S FALSE ADVERTISING. DON’T YOU DARE TELL ME YOU DIDN’TADVERTISE THESE THINGS I HAVE IT RIGHT HERE JUST LOOK AT IT. LOOOOOKKKKKKAAAATTTT ITTTT.”
When that shock and awe campaign wore off Zack calmly pickedup where he left off, escorting the guy out to the RV to show him the murderboard we’d discovered in the loft bed (Literally a board of nails. Super exciting.The threat of which probably explained why the kids were so pleasant.) alongwith all of the other things that were broken, dangerous, or just plainmissing.
He even included the filthy vents and announced that we areall waiting to see If we have Legionnaires Disease (bonus points forcreativity).
The guy’s shoulders slumped. “I can’t take anything off. Ijust can’t.”
My wall-eye vision returned, this time red around the edges.Zack spoke before I did, still calm.
“Look, I know you’re in a bad spot. I get it. But you’re anew business here and the last thing you need is my wife taking this to yelp,RVShare, and Better Business Bureau, especially since we’ve taken pictures ofeverything AND we have the original posting you made which was false.”
Good. He was doing really well. And then this:
“And so if you just forgive the mileage overage, we can callit good. We shouldn’t have to pay a cent more for this thing.”
But. But, no Zack. The mileage over? That’s only two hundredmiles. We had bigger plans and I had the general rage to back them up.
The Irishman agreed to have the “big boss” call us within 48hours. Zack’s parting shot was great, about just disputing the charges with ourcredit card company. We high fived back in the Jeep and then I dropped him offat his secret bunker to pick up his work truck.
On my way home, alone, the “big boss” called. If the Irishman was a formidable character, with his gun and his vagrant fights, then the big boss was literally the tiny man pedaling furiously behind the curtain. He stuttered all over himself as he apologized and said that they were pulling the Sunseeker permanently from the rental line and forgiving our mileage overage charges.
Still hot under the collar, I yelled at him about scammingus. He squeaked back that it would never happen to anyone again, and then toldme that the Irishman told him what my husband had said about just being happywith the mileage forgiven.
Well. Shoot. Deflated, I listened to him talk about how hewants to get a general manager for his Missouri operations and move to Vegas. Ioffered him the advice that he probably shouldn’t do that because the marketout here is too competitive for shady businessmen like him to stay afloat. Ihung up while he was still squeaking about promising to remove it from the “rentalfleet”.
So what have we learned here?
- Pack Styrofoam coffee mugs for the safety ofeveryone.
- Really carefully read the RV Park reviews andmake sure your windows lock before venturing somewhere shady.
- Turn off the water while brushing your teeth anddoing dishes, FOR CRYING OUT LOUD.
- Also carefully read what you need to do whentrying to see Mesa Verde.
- My kids can eat sandwiches for lunch for 9 soliddays and enjoy apples with peanut butter as a snack in the RV, but since beingback have acted like they are being poisoned every time I try to feed them.Apparently food tastes better on the road.
- Zack has the fortitude to take on anything but awind storm in a broken RV. And an unexplained mustard stain.
- DO NOT SPILL THE SEWER HOSE. Bring extra latexgloves.
- Figure out how many trash bags you think youneed. Now multiply that by a thousand.
- Do not trust a guy who works from under a pileof garbage in a trailer and throat punches people.
- I really do love blogging. I’ll probably keep itup. If you enjoy this nonsense, hit the subscribe button to be notified whenthere is more so that I can quit flooding everyone’s Facebook feed.