Friday, March 12, 2010

One for the Record Books

On the way back home from our weekend trip we took Loveland pass which for those who aren't used to Colorado mountain passes can be a bit of a white knuckled drive. On the way up you first notice all of the snow everywhere and what would normally be the shoulder of the road is now 4 feet deep in snow, then you see signs that read "No Stopping - Avalanche Area." As you begin to wind your way up the switch backs you then realize how high you are getting, how steep the mountain is, immediately followed by a quick realization that there aren't any guard rails along the road. Then come the back country skiers who at about halfway up hitch-hike their way back to the top and ski the day away in the avalanche-prone back country in search of the ultimate powder runs. At the summit are spectacular vistas of the surrounding range if its clear, typically a lot of wind and a lovely sign denoting the elevation - 11,990 ft. My dad just couldn't resist the opportunity to get his picture taken next to the sign with his "Got Oxygen?" t-shirt. Andrew on the other hand decided to forever etch the occasion into our memories commemorating the summiting of the pass with an enormous diaper busting poop avalanche that he had apparently been working on for some time. It was everywhere. So what does one do when you are at 11,990 ft of elevation on a very cold and windy mountain pass with an infant who's diaper is literally overflowing with feces and is crying because while he is revealed to have rid himself of his excrement he doesn't really like the idea of sitting in it for an extended period of time? Putting ourselves in his shoes we of course decided that we had to change the diaper, the only problem was how and where? The car was loaded to the gills after a long weekend in the mountains full of a weekend's worth of warm clothing suitable for any winter alpine adventure for three people as well as food, toys, a bouncy chair, two car seats and a growing family of four. Due to the hostile environment outside and the completely loaded car on the inside the only place left to change Andrew was the front seat of the car - also entirely full. With the utmost care not to further spread the oozing poo throughout the car Kate turnder around in he seat, sitting on her knees she extracted Andrew from the car seat and brought him into the front seat. All the while Andrew continued to protest and Elizabeth alternated between singing, asking questions, wanting to get out of the car to play in the snow, and telling Andrew "its ok."
Kate began the process of changing the diaper which we already knew was going to be one for the record books. With the steering wheel in front of me and the usual road trip junk filling the front seat there wasn't much I could do to help other than pull the wipes out of the box and hand them to Kate like a nurse handing the doctor the instruments for surgery. After about the 10th wipe I was really starting to get nervous because of rate of wipe consumption wasn't slowing down but the box of wipes was one of the smaller sized "travel" sized containers and I knew the end was quickly approaching. Fortunately, with one wipe left Kate declared Andrew to be "clean" which at this point has more of a relative meaning than an absolute one seeing as how he still had a bit of poo on his clothes. Changing his clothes was out of the question now because as it happened, his clothes were in the other car with my parents who were fortunate enough take off immediately after the taking of the lovely summit picture above. On top of that we had an hour and a half to go and he wanted to something to suck on. Typically Andrew will suck on his hands and sometimes he like to suck on mommy or daddy's hands as well but considering the sanitation problem we are now faced with this is out of the question. We used the remaining wipe to clean ourselves up as much as possible, put Andrew back in his car seat and kate did her best to try to feed Andrew, now in the back seat of the car, from the front seat of the car while wearing her seat belt. Eventually we made it off the mountain, down to the interstate, and out of the high country back down into the Denver safely. Andrew was of course taken strait to the bath tub for a proper cleansing with Elizabeth assisting mommy while I unloaded and sterilized the car.

1 comment:

  1. That IS one for the record books! At least everyone's clean now! :-) And you'll never go over Loveland Pass without remembering that day!

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