Key Eating Shop Vac

We decided to go to Southern Indiana on Saturday to go to a fireworks show put on by the guy Brian buys all of his pyro stuff from. Instead of driving the gas guzzling Expedition, we chose to take the very gas friendly (like, free) Taurus. It's one of the major perks of having a company car. Anyway, due to the fact that we anticipated being in the car for extended periods of time and being in the car way past bedtime, we decided it would probably be in our best interest to install the DVD player into the Taurus, from the truck. No problem. I also had to clean out the trunk to make space to carry home a few goodies from our trip. Again, no problem. When I was at it, I thought if we were going to be in the car for a long time, it would probably be a nice idea to vacuum it out before we set off. Ya know, to make room for new french fries on the floor, cheerios in between the seats, and so on.

I was vigorously vacuuming and finished in no time at all. We packed up the kids, packed up the car, and were finally ready to leave. Brian asks, "Where are the keys so I can put some stuff in the trunk?" Me, in my smart ass fashion reply, "It stands to reason that since I just backed the car out that they'd be in the car."

And so the hunt began. We looked everywhere for the damn keys. I'm talking even in the laundry baskets. Jade has this big fascination for my keys, so I figured they could potentially be anywhere she could have been in the past 15 minutes or so. Great. That included the neighbor's house, too.

So now we're running late, and I have no idea where the keys are. Not only that, but it was parked behind the truck, so if we just gave up and took the truck, we couldn't get it out of the garage anyway. It became plainly clear that we were just going to have to keep looking. Or drive the truck straight through the living room and out the back side of the house. And yes, I have a spare, but the keys on this car are those new kind that have the little receiver in them. My spare is just a key, no receiver, hence, it will unlock the doors quite nicely, but it will in no way shape or form start the car. And I'm not about to pay $100 for a key for a car that isn't mine.

I just needed my keys, damn it. We got so desperate that Brian had the sense to look INSIDE THE SHOP VAC. You know, a perfectly natural place for a set of keys. Not only that, but I actually thought of that possibility, and thought, "No, they're on a lanyard. That would have made a hell of a racket going thorough a shop vac. Plus, I'm not that dunderheaded that I would have sucked up the keys without noticing it."

Nonetheless, the keys were inside the G.D. shop vac. And we were exactly 50 blood pressure points and 1 hour late in leaving. Now that's what I call suction.