Ok, so this multipart series has now turned into an epic novel.

For the record I have been getting many anonymous comments, unless I have some way to write you back and thank you for the comment, I will not post it.

I did let one get by but that person and I know why.

So, moving forward with the trip that happened three weeks ago:

Everyone had arrived safely and we were all asleep only to wake at 8:30am to go boating all day. 13 large men on a boat for 4 hours. What could we possibly do?

I think I will start at the beginning when my friend I was riding with pulled into a local store to get his tire fixed because he noticed a nail. He checked the car in and we bought some supplies and were picked up at the front by this amazing TAHOE and headed off to the boat dock. We pull up the establishment and a woman with a baby on her hip was filling out a release form one handed. We assumed the baby was hers but you could not tell that she had recently had a baby. There were 2 teenage boys running around and getting everything ready for us on the boat. That last statement is important, especially for any of you running a business.

The original plan was two boats and 6 people on each. We settled on 1 boat with 13 of us. They hooked up the John Deere and put the boat in the water and told us we would have a life preserver for everyone and an oar. We were thinking why in the world would we need an oar.

So we loaded up and headed out with a day of sun and relaxation.

Goals of the Boat Trip:
1. Find the lake house we were staying at
2. Don't get lost
3. Find a use for the oar

We estimated that this would fill our time.

Everyone applied sunscreen using the new spray on kind. It looked highly fashionable and I felt somewhat feminine applying it. However, I’m secure enough to know that good sunblock appropriately applied can make my skin bronze evenly and stay moisturized at the same time.

We were about half way to somewhere when we realized that we had no gas. Sorry, we had gas but not enough in our estimation to do 4 hours of hardcore boating in the tryphoon. So we did the right thing and called up to the rental place and let them know that we needed gas. The phone was answered by one of the 14yr olds. He let us know that we had plenty of gas for the amount of time we were going to have the boat.

Goals of the Boat Trip:
1. Find the lake house we were staying at
2. Don't get lost
3. Find a use for the oar
4. Run out of gas

So while this conversation is going on we all leisurely get into the water. We decide to wear life preservers because we are lazy and don't want to swim. 13 people, 7 life preservers. So we had to have some people on the boat and some in the water. No problem.

It was a hot day on the lake and everyone was going to need something to drink, we happened to bring plenty of water and those that were in the lake needed some. After several water bottles came through the air, someone put it together that we had a perfectly good oar that needed to be used.

Water Bottle Baseball was born. This was our way of conserving gas while Magellan figured out how to get to the lake house. This game occupied a good amount of our time and was quite pleasing. I say "quite pleasing" because I want to sound like I'm a professional writer but then I do a spell and grammar check and am humbled.

Our boating trip was coming to an end and we needed to get back to the dock.

We then ran out of gas about 1 mile from the dock.

Goals of the Boat Trip:
1. Find the lake house we were staying at - incomplete
2. Don't get lost - completed
3. Find a use for the oar - completed
4. Run out of gas - completed

We made the phone call and expressed our disdain. We were greeted shortly by the owner and three precious little kids. Not a bad way to smooth a situation than bring out 3 cute 3 year olds. He gave us some gas and then proceeds to let us know that this is what happens when you let teenagers do the work. 13 business professional could have easily told him that but we were needing to eat and I was sunburned.

We pulled into the dock and unloaded everything, took everything to the cars and I loaded up in this tricked out TAHOE. The car I came in, but we give him a hard time about it because its too amazing.

We leave to go to lunch at the local KFC/Taco Bell store. We all ordered and began eating when we realized that we had left two guys at the dock. These two were settling up inside and probably missed the exodus. After we realized they were missing, we decided on going back for them after we had finished eating "because they would have wanted it that way"

Someone with a car finished early and went to go pick them up. We finished and proceeded to pick up my friends car that had the nail. My friend hands the lady the slip and shows her his license. No car. Let me say that again, his car was missing. They had a receipt that someone had said they were him and paid cash and walked out with the car.

You might imagine his dismay.

Come to find out. The two friends that we left at the boat dock, hitch-hiked to the store and paid for the tire repair without having any type of ID and drove back to the lake house all within 30 minutes.

We loaded back in the car and proceeded to a gas station to get ice cream because it sounded good. Once we pulled up to the service station, we realized we had left someone else in our party at the store. So we purchased our ice cream and finished it up and went back to get the stranded friend.

We apologized and something was said that I accounted for the size of two humans and so on. He then told us of the aftermath of the stolen auto incident.

Then we all made it safely back home for everyone to have nap time till about 4:30

Stay tuned: GUN BARRELL CITY IV: Fiesta for a King