"the GWB (gorgeous wife babe) thinks disaster preparedness is just for delusional paranoids."

I had to giggle at that, coming so close to a conversation that took place the other evening. Once in a while, my dog gets a severe case of selective deafness and trots down the street to visit her dog friend, Lucky. I followed her down the street and got engaged in talking to a couple of neighbors. Larry's SIL is one of those gorgeous wife babes, and she's also a salesperson who travels a lot by herself. She thinks her cell phone can get her out of any situation.

She refused to learn how to change a tire.
She refused to keep motor oil, transmission fluid or water/coolant in the vehicle because it "might leak".
She refused to carry a pair of walking shoes in the car.
Etc, etc, etc.

So, she's out in the sticks somewhere on one of those paved shortcuts and noticed a goodly amount of white smoke following her car. She pulled off the road, and found some kind of fluid draining into the ground.

She pulls out her trusty cell phone and.... no signal.

She waits a couple of hours for the State Patrol, but no one comes. A few cars pass, but no one stops. So, before it gets dark, she decides to walk, as what passes for a town should be only about 10 miles ahead. Ten miles in spike heels. (I'm not snickering here, really.... well, not very much... <img src="/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />)

She was about a half-hour from her car when she went to try her cell phone again, and realized that she had left it in the car.

A car with four disreputable-looking guys in it stopped and offered her a car, calling her "sweetie" and leering the whole time. She refused.

An old, decrepit farm truck with several Hispanics aboard stopped and seemed concerned (English was in short supply), two of the men jumped out of the cab and climbed into the bed of the truck, and they offered her the front seat. By now, she was getting pretty desperate, so she accepted.

They took her to the "town" (wide spot in the road), saw her to a pay phone, then waited with her until her DH showed up, as no one seemed to be around. DH showed up about 8:00 pm, an hour later.

I wonder if this little episode will change her mind about carrying a few things with her? Not that anything but maybe a satellite phone would have made too much of a difference... But since she waited a couple of hours, and the white smoke was probably transmission fluid, the tranny had probably cooled down enough to accept and hold some transmission fluid (if it was just a leak). If she had had some replacement fluid with her, she might have been able to put it in and get closer, if not all the way, to the phone.

BTW, the Mexican gentlemen didn't wait for a reward. When DH arrived, he went over to thank them. His Spanish is kind of rudimentary, but he understood from them that a woman had been raped in that immediate area not long ago, and they were worried to leave her by herself. They flatly refused any reward, and he said they all waved cheerfully as they left.

Sue