A soggy and spluttering Weazel pulled himself out of the river. “I’m starting - cough - to hate - cough - those bears.” Wringing out his shirt, he looked around in trepidation at his surroundings. He had no clue where he was, it was going to be dark in just a few short hours, and he was lost in the Colossal Canyon. He fished his sunglasses from his trousers pocket and put them on, only to have the lenses pop out. That was the proverbial last straw. He fell back flat on his back, moaning, “This is a really, reallybad day.”

End of part 3

A Map Made in Heaven
part 4

Southern Youtah
Twistiturny Scenic Byway
Monday Afternoon
Day 3

Molly listlessly gazed out of the car window at the unvarying landscape. The breathtaking panoramas of redrock towers dotted with scraggly pine trees superimposed against a brilliant blue sky had ceased to amuse her long ago. It felt like they had been traveling down this same winding road for a hundred years. Turning from the window, she went on a quest for a new diversion.

The nine-year-old reached for her book bag that was at her feet, unsnapped the flap, and extracted its contents. First, she pulled out Lucy. She lovingly smoothed the doll’s hair and dress before setting it on the seat. Then came five books. She’d already read all of them during the vacation, a few of them twice. At the bottom of the bag was a box of crayons. The crayons seemed promising, but she didn’t have any paper.

Seeing the diaper bag on the floor beside her bag, she unzipped it and rummaged through it. At last, she found what she was looking for - a map with a nice blank back. She draped the map across her lap and reached for her crayons. However, instead of eight individual colors, she had a box of mushy greyish goo.

Disappointed, Molly wiped her waxy fingers on the map, whining, “Are we there yet?”

“Yeah, are we there yet?” Baloo echoed from the driver’s seat, shooting an impish grin at Rebecca.

“We will get there when we get there,” Rebecca replied, trying to pry Cassie’s arms from her neck. “Don’t strangle Mommy, Cassie. I know you’re hot and tired, baby, but we’ll be there in a little while. How about some water?”

“No!” Cassie shouted. The fractious toddler clung more tightly to her mother.

“Animal crackers?”

The toddler petulantly shook her head with every, “No, no, no!”

“I’ll take ‘em if she don’t want ‘em,” Baloo offered, holding out his palm for the cookies.

“You’re not helping, Baloo.” Rebecca slapped his hand away. “Gah! Not so tight, baby.” She hoarsely choked out, “Tell Mama what you want so she can breathe. What do you want?”

“I know what she wants, Mom.” Molly fished around in the diaper bag until she found a well-loved teddy bear, whose dingy, matted fur had, at one time, been a pristine white. “Lookee here, Cassie. It’s Woobie! Dance, dance, dance. Watch Woobie dance on the back of the seat. Isn’t he funny?”

With a squeal of delight, Cassie lunged over the back of the seat to get the teddy bear.

Kit caught her before she hit the floor. “You shouldn’t jump without a parachute, Cassie.” He turned her right-side up and carefully put her on the seat where the toddler leaned against Molly, holding Woobie and sucking her thumb.

Rebecca massaged her sore throat. She rasped, “Thanks, kids.”

“How much farther, Kit?” Molly asked. She haphazardly wadded up the map and crammed it back in her school bag along with her crayons and books. Lucy she perched on her lap.

While Kit made his calculations, Baloo remarked casually, “Ya know, if we had taken the...”

“Don’tsay it,” Rebecca groaned.

Despite his wife’s protests, Baloo concluded, “Sea Duck, we woulda been there by now.”

“He said it,” Kit muttered, shaking his head ruefully.

“How come we didn’t take the Sea Duck, Mom?” Molly asked, observing how Kit walked the sextant across the map.

“Yeah, I’d like to hear that reason myself,” Baloo said with a smug smile.

“Because then we wouldn’t have all of this wonderful family bonding time,” Rebecca replied through clenched teeth.

“We coulda bonded in the Duck,” Baloo said, “an’ not to these seats.”

Rebecca sighed wearily and shifted in her seat, trying to get some feeling back into her legs. She was beginning to think that he was right about taking the airplane, though she’d never let him know that. “Just drive, flyboy.”

“We’re about three hours away,” Kit told them.

“Three hours!” Molly cried incredulously, slumping in the seat. She planted her knees on the seat in front of her. After a few moments of silence, she asked, “Are we there yet?”

Rebecca spun in her seat to give her daughter a stern look. “Molly Elizabeth von Bruinwald, for the last time, and I do mean the last, we will get there when we get there! And if you say that again, I’ll...”

Chuckling, Baloo whined like a little boy, “Are we there yet?”

First Molly, then Kit dissolved into spasms of laughter. Rebecca tried in vain to keep a straight face, but she finally joined in on the infectious laughter. Cassie, not understanding the joke, looked at them all questioningly with her big brown eyes, sucking her thumb.

A Hundred Miles Behind Them

Weazel, the pedal to the metal, zoomed up on a dark blue car going the speed limit. “C’mon, hurry it up, ya slowpoke! Some people’s got a schedule to keep!” he yelled, irately blasting the horn. Without further ado, he whipped his car into the left-hand lane and into the path of an oncoming truck.

“Aaaaaahhhhh!” Weazel screamed, jerking the car to the right where he swiped the back bumper of the blue car, sending sparks flying.

The blue-haired driver of the blue car shouted out of her window, “This is no time to be playing bumper cars, sonny!”

“I ain’t playin’, lady! Whoa-oh-oh!” Weazel went careening out of control off the road, into the ditch where his battered black Fjord finally rolled to a stop. Steam billowed from under its hood.

“No, no, no, no, no!” Weazel got out of the car, opened the hood, and promptly was hit in the face with scalding-hot steam. Red in the face with anger and a steam burn, he jumped up and down in despair. Then, he gave the car a good, solid kick in the radiator, which promptly sent him hopping up and down in pain. “Gah!”

“What am I s’posed ta do now?” he wondered aloud, hobbling back to the driver’s seat.

He didn’t have to wait long.

A tow truck with “Bob Precision’s Collision Repair” stenciled on the side pulled up beside Weazel’s Fjord.

With a cry of delight, Weazel rushed over to welcome the repairman. “Thanks for stoppin’ by, mister. My car broke down, and I’m s’posed ta be somewheres at a certain time, and I’m running late and...”

A beige sloth clad in greasy overalls slowly climbed down from the truck. Languidly, he drawled, “Well...if ya want something done the right way, ya gotta do it the Bob Precision way; that’s what I always say. We’ll get ya fixed up and on the road in no time.”

“Great! Great!” Weazel said, glancing at his watch.

“Now, where’s my toolbox?” Bob drawled, scratching his bristly chin. “Oops. Musta left it back in the truck.”

Finally, after five long minutes, Bob lumbered over to the Fjord and looked under the hood. His beady eyes narrowed into a squint. “Where’s my glasses? Can’t see a thing without my glasses.” He began to pat his pockets in search of his spectacles.

Exasperated, Weazel took the glasses from atop the sloth’s head and shoved them on his nose.

“There they are!” Bob cried. “Everything’s crystal-clear again, not blurry like they was. Did I ever tell ya about the time when...?”

“Yeah, yeah, old man,” Weazel interrupted. He jumped up and down with impatience. “What about my car?”

“Now, don’t get in an all-fire hurry, young whippersnapper. I’m a-gettin’ to your car. These things take time, ya know.”

“I ain’t got no time!” Weazel shouted.

“Sure, ya do. We’ve got plenty of time. Won’t get dark for hours. Hmm...let’s see what the trouble is.” Bob peered under the hood and clicked his tongue. “Well...looks like your sparks are firin’.”

“That’s bad?” Weazel said nervously, wringing his hands.

“That’s good, but your radiator’s overheated.”

“That’s good?”

Bob shook his greying head. “That’s bad.”

“Can you fix it?”

“Well...” the mechanic pondered, rubbing his bristly chin. He might have been a blind old coot, but one shrewd look told him that Weazel was a naive city slicker. “Yup.”

After a long silence, during which Bob stared at the Fjord’s innards, Weazel asked, “Today? Can you fix it today?”

Bob considered that for a long time. Finally, he drawled, “I dunno. Depends.”

“Onwhat?” Weazel screamed, his face red with fury.

“On how much your willin’ ta pay me.”

Weazel got out his wallet. “How much will it cost?”

Bob grinned, exposing a shining gold incisor. “How much ya got?”

Ten Minutes Later

“Thanks for the business, sonny,” Bob said, thumbing through his wad of bills.

Weazel got in his car and slammed the door,

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