The Forklift Episode

The forklift blocking the gate.

Another day at the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show was winding down, and I decided to take advantage of the break in the chaos to grab a shower and prepare for a dinner meeting later that night. I stepped into the shower and had just started to enjoy the warm water run over my sore, tired shoulders when there was a knock on the door.

“Veronica, your customers are here.”

My nice, hot, relaxing shower quickly turned into the fastest possible shower.  After speaking with a customer from India for three hours it was time to leave for the dinner meeting (hair undone and clothes unchanged).

Later that evening after returning from the dinner meeting, it was time to close and lock the gates. I walked over to the gate and discovered the forklift was in my way of closing the gate. Earlier in the week our propane powered forklift ran out of propane, and the spare tank was put on the machine. At the time, however, our employees had not told us they had changed the tank. We tried to start the forklift with no success. After sever failed attempts we determined both propane tanks were empty and there was no way to close the gate with the forklift parked the way it was. We decided to try and move the forklift out of the way by pulling it with our even older gas powered forklift.

Veronica hooking up the logging chain to the forklift.

We found a logging chain; got the gas powered forklift running, hooked it up to the propane forklift, and started to pull. The forklift started to move, and then, with a sputter, the gas powered forklift ran out of gas. Now, there was one inoperable forklift blocking the gate, and chained to another inoperable forklift blocking the entrance to the property. At this point it was 11:30 at night, and we seriously considered just leaving it and going to bed, but we checked around to see, if maybe, we might have some gas.

The two forklifts chained together (propane forklift on the left).

A majority of the gas can had been emptied into the forklift earlier, but there was still about a half cup left. We poured the remaining gas into the gas tank, started it up, and pulled the powerless propane forklift away from the gate. Then, finally, we closed the gate, pushed the forklifts back to their places, and went to bed.

Gene gassing up the forklift.

The next morning as I was sliding my just made fried eggs and bacon on my plate, a delivery truck drove in with four pallets of rock requiring a forklift to unload them. Our two inoperable forklifts just sat there, and I swear, they were grinning at me and my problem. Since there was nowhere to get propane that early in the morning, I drove to get gas from the gas station, all while thinking about my hot delicious breakfast going cold. I returned back with a full gas can, put some in the forklift, started it up (the ancient gas powered forklift is not a fan of cold mornings), and unloaded the truck. I walked back into the kitchen just in time to settle down to a hot cup of coffee and a plate of cold eggs and bacon.

Just another day in Tucson!