Older Daughter's wedding -- part 2 -- getting there is no fun at all

I mentioned, last Thursday, that Youngest Son left with his oldest sibling for Indianapolis early, supposedly to help set up the apartment that Older Daughter and her husband-to-be had just rented -- but also (and not coincidentally) to get away from me and Long Suffering Spouse.

We were putting some heat on the boy because of his recent auto accident. We were told that the car was a total loss. I was spending office time looking at Blue Book values and Illinois salvage laws to see if maybe I could persuade the insurer differently. At this point in my life, I can't afford to buy a new car -- I know Detroit needs the money, but I just don't have it!

And I've always felt that buying a used car is just buying someone else's problems.

Anyway, the 'inside adjuster' at the insurance company was very nice -- and tolerant of my windy emails. She wrote me last Thursday that a total loss adjuster was to be assigned. She gave me his name and said I could peddle my fish with him. Only she was nice and didn't say 'peddle my fish'; in fact, she even copied me on the email she sent the total loss adjuster, informing him that I'd be out of the office Friday in anticipation of my daughter's wedding Saturday and asking if he couldn't possibly touch base with me before close of business Thursday.

I sat by the phone expectantly all day Thursday... but there was no call.

Friday morning, though, as we're loading up the family van and the rental with our luggage and other people's too (I'll come to that) the phone rings: It was the total loss adjuster. He'd seen the car and the write-ups and talked to the man running the shop -- and he felt the car could be fixed after all. There were some papers we'd need to sign to get the repairman started.

So the call was not timely, but it was welcome, and we didn't go that far out of our way to get the papers signed -- and the shop owner was only too happy to have everything ready for us to sign right away.

Now I mentioned that we were taking other people's luggage besides our own. We had a bunch of stuff that Older Daughter had left on the premises in her haste to depart on Wednesday -- stuff that she'd need for the wedding. So we had to bring that. And Youngest Son, in his haste to depart, had forgotten to pack a belt. And then my mother-in-law was flying to Indianapolis, so she asked if we'd take her suitcase so she didn't have to check it. Oldest Son's fiancee heard about these arrangements. She chose to fly, too, and left her bag with Oldest Son.

Oldest Son doesn't live with us -- but he found out this past week that (a) he has no insurance when he uses his company car for personal use and (b) he couldn't have it anyway. The person he shares the car with had commandeered the vehicle for the weekend.

Middle Son wanted to get a half day's work in at the baseball camp he'd been helping out at this summer. So we figured he'd drive the van, pick up his brother, and take the bulk of the luggage. Why the dresses alone filled up quite a chunk of the cargo space -- and the wedding dress was not among these; it was waiting for us in Indianapolis.

Meanwhile, Long Suffering Spouse and I and Younger Daughter set out in the rental. We beat the worst of the traffic, slowing through the Loop and the Spaghetti Bowl, but opening up fairly promptly by the time we reached the express lanes on the Dan Ryan. There's a lot of construction on I-65, but this weekend, at least, the lane closures and delays were all on the northbound side. It was while driving north, on Sunday afternoon, that we saw the topless biker chicks. But that's a story for another morning.

If you behave, that is.

Anyway, we left at 10:30am Chicago time and did not dawdle. We did check into the hotel -- five our six rooms were ready when we got there -- and we had to pick up the wedding dress from the local branch of the Somali pirate band to which it had been shipped. And there was about a 20 minute loss of time when I had to run out and buy a dress shirt to wear with my suit for the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. (We all had to manage to forget something, didn't we?) I swear this caused no real loss of time because no one else was dressed before I was.

And yet, somehow, we were a good 30 minutes late for the scheduled 5:30pm rehearsal.

It was an inauspicious beginning to the wedding weekend... or it would have been without the news about the car.

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Programming Note: No wedding stuff tomorrow because I'll be out of town for a deposition. Way out of town. In West Palm Beach, Florida, actually -- which shows you how dumb I am. What kind of lawyer gets backed into coming to Florida for a deposition in July? (Answer: One who's hard up against a discovery cut-off. I wasn't in the case in February... which would have been a much better time to schedule this thing.) I hope Bee won't be mad at me -- but this is truly a flying visit. I hope to be in and out in the course of the day without having to put up for the evening -- but it will, if it works, be a loooooong day.

Programming is in the pipeline for Wednesday morning. I make no promises about Thursday, though.