Stick shifts and safety belts

2 weeks ago in the temple I felt prompted to go to arizona ASAP to visit the school I've been interviewing at, and to move some stuff down. I decided to go the day after school got out, during memorial day weekend.

Everything was crazy though. My options were:
A)ride down with a friend. I had a friend going anyway, but something came up
2)fly. I had sky miles, that ended up not being enough... I wouldn't be able to move anything down though, and I would have to rent a car on top of that
3) rent a car. This one I researched a ton. Budget was cheapest but after I reserved it I saw I had to be 25. Over the phone Avis told me I didn't have to be 25 if I paid with a credit card, but later found out there was a $30/day fee. If I were honest about my age and got insurance it would cost $350 plus gas for a standard size car.... Yuck.
D) pay a friend $150 or so to trade cars with them for the weekend. Some friends did what they could but for some good reason or another couldn't... How nice of them to try. Some people I thought I was close with like that didn't even look into it.
5) buy a car... You could buy a car in an evening, right? Why not?

I went to the temple and did initiatories on Thursday, the day before I left. I went with option seis (not listed), to take my truck. We have all accepted as common knowledge that my truck has a hard time accelerating, and has some other quirks. No one even suggested I drive it, but I received confidence it would make it.

I told noelle my plan, and we decided I really just had to have my trick work on the way there. It would suck if I were stranded with a truck full of teaching stuff and missed my interview. If it broke down after, I could hitchhike/fly/buy a new car.

I prayed super hard and felt like I should go. It must sound crazy to anyone who knows my truck! Noe, my mechanic, said he thought it could make it. My friend Jeremey from my ward helped me top off the fluids beforehand. I have had my truck for a year and a half and never taken it past salt lake, and I've probably only made that trip a handful of times.

I found myself trekking down I-15 during holiday traffic, with a rusty old truck packed with all my teaching stuff. I left right after school on the last day of school and drove nonstop.

My speedometer can't go past 85, which made getting pulled over for speeding less if a concern. My strategy was to pick up speed on downhill sections, set the cruise control, and hope no one cuts me off and made me lose speed. My highway speed ranged from 30-80. The parts under 50mph were rough, but Oscar was a trooper! What a miracle that we made it the 11 hours...