I've been told that I need to update the story...so sorry for leaving you all hanging with us in the Tin Box. It is Tuesday morning, July 1st, and we remain in Springfield.
As for our Cozy Den, she has had a variety of folks looking under her skirt and here's the report. The Brake Guys on Monday concluded in mid afternoon that the brakes were fine, but that the rear transmission needed work and that we should take it to the Ford Dealer in town. Bob then had a rather funny (Bob may only find the humor sometime next year I think...) conversation with a Cruise America guy with whom he had not yet had any dialogue. This rather myopic fellow--who evidently could only focus on the possibility of being screeched at by the next family in line for The Cozy Den--informed Bob in no uncertain terms that we were violating our lease because we did not have the RV back in Milwaukee on Monday, as agreed. I didn't actually hear the conversation myself, but Bob indicated that it included something to the effect that if you want your *&!!@# RV, then come get it and us too. Somewhere along the way during the conversation, this chap realized the error of his ways and decided that the best way to get this RV back to Milwaukee was to actually help us. So Mr. Myopic called the Ford Dealer.
Upon our arrival at the Ford dealer (which services RVs as well as regular cars) a very nice fellow named Ron told us he'd look at it right away to determine what we were dealing with...thank you Mr Myopic! After about 2 hours, Ron informed us that the transmission is fine, but that the emergency brake had siezed up and was causing the problem. (Kind of goofy that the Brake guy didn't figure this out....) As of this morning, Bob has just gotten off of the phone with Ron again who confirmed his absolute certainty that it is a brake problem. The latest estimate for completion of the under-Cozy's-skirt-work is tomorrow perhaps as early as 1 pm, but not later than the end of the day. What I can tell you is that Bob is itching to get home so badly that when Cozy's work is complete, we will be blasting off like a rocket ship. I expect we will be doing a drive similar to the one we did across The Loneliest Road in America...not stopping, except for gas!!
So that's the update on Cozy, as for the rest of us, here's the report. While Cozy has had men looking up her skirts, we've been finding fun. On Saturday, we rented a car (which Bob replaced on Sunday with an SUV--deduct the smoke smell...add space for Daisy) so that we'd have some wheels to go exploring. Sunday afternoon the Tenges clan, Tanya and her two boys (Sasha, 7, and Andrew, 4) drove to Branson so that the kiddos could play at a go-cart place. They all had a blast and we had fun watching them play. Sveta and Nadya even did a 'rock-shot-from-a-slingshot' immitation when they (twice) went on a ride that let them drop suspended from a cable from a 100 foot crane. They LOVED it!!!! Check out these video clips....
Yesterday we met Tanya, Andrew and the little boy, Tyler, for whom she has been a nanny, at a local park that has a very fun water 'river' with sprays that spike up in the air that the kids can play in. Daisy even joined in the fun. While Bob and Daisy were sitting at the Ford dealer, I took the kids to a book store. Bribery is always useful.
As for today, once I finish this post, I will be taking the kids to Springfield's Discovery Center and then back to the water river. Bob will be holding down the post here with Daisy...and waiting.
So that's about it for now. I keep intending to update the blog about the parts of the trip that we did before we broke down...perhaps on our marathon drive back home....
Bye for now,
Becky
Happy Fourth of July!! 
or in a direct path between the garage and the RV. One thing was certain though: if that thing pulled out, she was going to be in it!!
