The beginning of the annual girls' get together

Once again our "girls'" (I use that word loosely) annual "get together" arrived. It is always during Halloween weekend. We have had it at daughter Susie's cottage on Lake Sherwood several times, but we all decided to have it down at Susie's home in Middleton, Wisc., this year. Again there were three of us around the Pittsville area, myself, Renn and her mom Joyce and we all rode down together.

Renn drove her car, so Joyce and I got to sit back and enjoy the scenery and visit. Renn has an electric car which on our trip got 50 miles to the gallon. She picked me up about 8:30 a.m. on a Thursday, we had originally planned on leaving at 8 a.m., but she called and said she would be a wee bit late.

After getting all of my "stuff" loaded into the car, we took off. About five miles down the road, I was having second thoughts and thought maybe I had forgotten my pills and asked her to pull over so I could check my suitcase. As my mama always said "better safe than sorry" but to my delight they were all snuggled down into my suitcase.

But then Renn said she had forgotten a couple of sacks and Joyce said she too had forgotten some things. So we turned around and back tracked to both of their houses, got the forgotten items loaded them into the car and again took off on our weekend adventure.

On our way we went through Wisconsin Rapids and Renn made a quick trip to Home Depot, then as we traveled through Rapids, she also made a stop at Walgreens to pick up a prescription for Joyce. We went through the drive-through lane, as Renn put the check in the automatic box, the latch on the box didn't catch and the wind was blowing like crazy, we were afraid it would blow the check out of the box and into the next county, but thankfully it didn't, and we were finally on our way. Renn called Susie on her cell phone to tell her we would be a wee bit later than we thought.

About 15 miles south of Rapids, we stopped at a place called Pritzels for a cup of cappuccino and a sweet roll. That gave us a burst of energy and kept us going for a while. We went through Wisconsin Dells which is a big tourist place in the summer, they are known for their water parks, and in the summer it is hard to get through the town. After Labor Day it almost becomes a ghost town, so we had no problem with traffic. From there, we would be driving on I90-94 for most of the way.

The exit where we would be getting off had lots of fast food places and by then it was almost noon and time to stop and refresh ourselves with some nourishing food. They asked for suggestions and I saw that they had an Arby's which as I mentioned in a previous column they have a great value meal menu. So off we trooped into Arby's. When we finally got up to the counter to give our order, Joyce said, "What is a good value meal?"

So I proceeded to tell them my favorite was a beef sandwich, curly fries and they even had chocolate shakes on the value meal, well ... their ears perked up and they said that was exactly what they wanted too.

So Joyce was first and when she got to the part about the chocolate shake, the clerk said their malt machine wasn't up and working yet, would she like something else?

Joyce's face dropped and she said to the clerk that we were just a travelin' through and she was so disappointed 'cause she had her heart set on a malt, and she just might have to go somewhere else for her meal.

About that time, the manager came up and was listening to the conversation and said how sorry they were and she could just have her meal free. You can't beat free.

So I piped up and said golly, that is what I was going to order too, and he said "yours is free too."

Well ... by this time Renn knew she couldn't push her luck, but the clerk looked at her and gave her a senior discount. Sounds good doesn't it? Except she is a long way from being a senior citizen. So she didn't know whether to be happy or upset.

Again we were finally on our way, and with no more problems we finally arrived at Susie's about 1:30 p.m., just a couple of hours late. I can see this is going to be a two or three parter, so will continue this next week.