This is the way we go to town

On Monday, I decided to dash to Jordan to visit the new greenhouse and get some milk at the grocery store. And I made the mistake of telling my husband the plan. He promptly turned around and informed his dad, who called and asked if I could pick up branding supplies. It was an evil intervention, and I'm sure Wayland knew EXACTLY what he was doing, thinking he could save me from sure verdant destruction, and preserve his checkbook.

Here's the deal: if a rancher finds out ANYONE is going to town, for ANY reason, they have a list of parts and cogs and gears and vaccine and other sundry items as long as your arm. And all of them are most urgently needed, within the next 10 hours, or the place will fall to pieces. Even though, 10 minutes ago, before they knew you were going to town, they were going to make it work, somehow. It's true. And every ranch wife reading this is nodding her head, laughing and saying, "Amen, sister! Preach on!".

So, back to the branding supplies. It sounded innocent enough. "They are all ready to go," says he. "Just pick them up...you don't have to worry about a list," says he. "But could you also get another 25 red Z eartags for calves? " Sure! No problem! (He lulled me with that whole no-list-to-keep-track-of thing.)

So I get to town with two crabby kids who fell asleep on the way and had 15 minutes of nap. Just enough to turn them into badgers with a toothache. There's no reasoning with them. So as long as they are strapped into the carseats, all they can do is snarl and chew on their paws. Good enough.

First stop, the feed store, to pick up milk replacer. So far, so good...I put it on the floor of the front seat. PLENTY of room for plants.

Next stop, Main Hardware, for the branding supplies. (I thought I was being so clever, getting them before flowers, so I could just have a nice, level bed of supplies on which to put the darling geraniums...) My first mistake was in not taking a cooler to put the vaccine in. So we had to pack it all in an insulated box with ice packs. A BIG insulated box with icepacks. But now, I'm on the clock. I have approximately 30 minutes to shop, and 30 minutes to drive home in. Then Leslie tells me the pour-on is in the shed around back. Pour-on! I forgot all about THAT branding supply! Mistake #2.

So I pull the Trailblazer around back, to load the last of the branding supplies, and we completely and totally fill the back end of that outfit up with boxes of pour-on. Completely. Totally. There's about 6 inches of room on top of them to put boxes of plants. Short plants. Maybe 4 short plants.

And we haven't even gone to the grocery store yet! But that's next on the list, because we have to get water and milk. So 5 gallons of water, 2 gallons of milk, 2 lollipops later, we are back in the car, going to the greenhouse. The badgers have been appeased with sugar, because I'm thinking they may have to hold plants, and I want them to do as little damage as possible.

So we get to the greenhouse, finally, and explode into the place. Yes, that's right, we had 15 minutes to do our stuff. It reminded me of one of those shopping shows, where the contestants get a cart and 6 minutes to fill it. Only I had sticky badger speed bumps.

AMAZINGLY, I had made a list of what I needed for my pots, three days ago, and even more astoundingly, had remembered to bring the list!!! (Those who know me, are picking their jaws up out of their cold coffee, after reading that...) So I blew through that greenhouse, in 15 minutes, gathering 5 boxes of plants and leaving petunias bending from the force of the trip! Got the kids loaded, and had plants stuck in every open 4 inch space. All I could do, backing out of there, was pray that we didn't have a flat tire on the way home. That would've been ugly.

But we made it, intact, sticky and filthy; plants, kids, branding supplies, milk and milk replacer. In 2 hours,counting travel time.

Today, I'm going to Miles City, with my husband...the BIG town....and he has another list. I wanted to go to the greenhouse there, but it's not looking good. We ARE taking a trailer, though, so if I get creative, I might get another geranium or two home...