Waiting for Tank

Well, I'm all packed and ready to go. The plan was to sleep in as much as possible (or as much as the excitement would allow for) and then hit the road to Phoenix where my friend Donald graciously offered me and the boys a place to stay. Being the type-A personality that I am, I thought that I'd easily have my car packed, the cats drugged and be on my way no later than 10am, putting me into Phoenix around 4pm. Just in time for a nice relaxing dinner. Beautiful!

Unfortunately, my perfect little plan began to unravel before I even opened my eyes this morning. Instead of sleeping in until 8am, my cats decided to wake me up at 5am. "OK, no problem Amy, just go back to sleep, you've done it before". Well, of course my type-A brain started thinking about packing and driving and schedules, so sleep was out of the question. "OK, just get everything done and start the drive earlier", I decided. Fine! I get the car packed, give Cooper (cat #1) his pill and start calling Tank (cat #2) to come in.

An hour goes by and I still haven't seen Tank, meanwhile Cooper is starting to walk like a drunken sailor. On man, this wasn't in my plans. "OK, calm down Amy" I tell myself, "surely Tank will show up soon and you leave at noon at the latest". No dice. Noon comes and goes, as does 2pm, 3pm...you get the idea.

I'm searching the neighborhood to no avail, I have all my neighbors on "Tank Watch 2010" but the little guy is nowhere to be found. Cooper is in la-la land and I'm starting to feel bad that he has been drugged for no good reason. Why couldn't things just go according to my plan!!!!???? I finally accept potential defeat and tell Donald that if he's not back by 5, my journey will have to wait until tomorrow.

Long story short - Tank made his appearance just before 6pm. Not wanting to admit that a cat could throw such a wrench in my plans, I decided it was full steam ahead to Phoenix. With the driver loaded up on Red Bull, Cliff Bars and peanut butter pretzels - and the cats just plain loaded - we made it just after midnight. So much for that relaxing dinner!