September 14 – 26, 2025
The end of this leg of our Summer 2025 Escape the Corn Sweat Tour was supposed to see us finish a week in Albuquerque before heading on home for a couple of weeks before our departure for our first international trip, but Brandy had other plans.
I won’t go into too great of detail about our time in Albuquerque. We deviated from our normal routine by getting an AirBnB in Old Town rather than staying with Alan, but I still made the time to get my green chile, have lunch with my boss and go to the movies with Jarrod (we saw The Conjuring: Last Rites and had dinner at Bubba’s 33).
I did take an adventure with Alan as we tested out his new-to-him side-by-side through the desert near his house but otherwise, it was a pretty standard run to The Land of Enchantment.
The Ride Home
After our status quo week, we departed early Saturday morning with the plan to stop in El Dorado, Kansas as our halfway point. The entire ride to our stop, Brandy complained of worsening pain in her gut, a common sign of an impending diverticulitis flare-up. As we arrived at our stop, a Heritage Inn & Suites, her condition deteriorated and she eventually asked at around midnight to be taken to the ER for a round of antibiotics to aid with the diverticulitis.
As she was roomed, we met with the doc who told us they wanted to do a CT and run tests and all that before proceeding, at which point, Brandy sent me back to the hotel to get some rest before her discharge.
I woke up to my phone ringing at about 3:00 am, her telling me that in fact she was experiencing a case of acute appendicitis, not diverticulitis.
Plans were made for her to be transported by ambulance to the west side of Wichita for an emergency appendectomy which meant we were not leaving the city any time soon. She got on AirBnB and made arrangements for a home to stay in for a week for her to be able to have the surgery and recover before heading on home. We were in constant communication with the host begging to let us check in early so I could get to her in the hospital before she was whisked away to the OR.
As the time to check in drew near, I got me and Ash packed up and we made our way across town. I circled around, waiting for the OK to check in and was finally told it was OK to go but the cleaner would still be there.
I arrived and sure enough, the young woman was indeed there finishing up the last of the arrangements for us. The second she left, I hopped back into Clyde and made a beeline to the hospital where Brandy was already in pre-op. She was drugged up pretty good and likely didn’t even realize I was there, but was assured that it would be a quick and easy procedure.
As soon as she was taken, I made my way to the cafeteria for a quick bite to eat then went back to the OR waiting room. I wasn’t there very long before the surgeon came in and told me that everything had gone fine, sure enough, her appendix was inflamed but was removed laparoscopically, leaving only three small scars on her abdomen. I headed up to her room and when she was wheeled in, completely out of it, I kissed her and reminded her that I loved her before heading back to the AirBnB.
I was there for a couple of hours before I got the call that she was being discharged. I herded Ash into the truck and went to the hospital to pick her up (watching her get into the truck after having just gone through all of this trauma was disheartening, but she made it.)
We went back to the house and set up for a week of work at our unplanned stop then Friday, September 26, we were on the road before 10:00 for the last three hours of this leg of the trip.
Conclusion
Our Escape the Corn Sweat Summer Tour of 2025 didn’t end exactly as planned but overall, it was a fantastic trip, filled with adventure. We wound up visiting three National Parks, a National Monument, a couple of state parks, and many, many other fun sights along the way.
As always, I am eternally grateful for the opportunities we have been given to be able to take these crazy adventures and be the absolute nomads that we are. Being with a wife that is just as excited about the trips as I am certainly helps.
This trip was far from the last of our adventures for the year. My next post will outline our first trip out of the country and I will briefly touch on our NEXT trips out of the country. Yes, “trips”. Plural. 😉
Until then!
-Phil