08/28/2026
Last week we helped move Granddaughter Number Two into her dorm room in Fargo, and then dropped by to see Number One in her new apartment in Moorhead, right across the river. She has kind of a relaxed landlord, so I’d been asked to bring some tools to spiff things up a bit.
I wasn’t sure what I would be fixing, so I took my carpentry toolbox, my plumbing toolbox, and my electrical toolbox. The canvas bag that holds all my power tools was there and also my power washer, because the deck hadn't had any attention in a decade or two.
I hadn’t taken a welder, because I didn't know if the house had a 220 plugin. Although, I could have taken the welder and if I’d discovered that there wasn't a plugin, I could have rented a generator. I guess I didn't think it through enough.
Number One glanced in my pickup box, looked at me and, “Papa, that’s not normal.
Earlier in the week, there’d been some lip from her brother about the back seat in my pickup being not quite right for sitting, because in the tiny tool compartment underneath there were tarp straps, a tow rope and extra-long jumper cables, along with a few tools.
Here's the thing. In March of 1975, about three days before our wedding, my girlfriend and I were in the Twin Cities, cleaning out our apartments, and I lost the keys to my dad's pickup.
Just in case you've noticed the twitchy little routine I have whenever I stand up - patting pockets for wallet/keys/phone, wallet/keys/phone - that's where it started. Anyway, we called a locksmith, he fiddled around for a while and then said, “Yeah, I'm not going to be able to get it.”
We were sleeping on the floor in a bare apartment, all our possessions were in the pickup, there was a blizzard predicted, and there was that wedding coming up in a couple of days, scheduled to be held in a church 200 miles away. I carefully explained that “not going to be able to get it” wasn’t one of the options. Properly motivated, he tried again, and after a few minutes more he was successful, and everything worked out.
But I didn't ever want to go through something like that again. So, after that, whenever we traded vehicles, I'd take a spare set of keys and tape them to the right tie rod. Keep in mind, that was before a spare key cost $300.00 and came with a chip and a battery. This method worked for years, a decade - maybe two. We never misplaced our keys. Then one day I drove to a mall, thinking about twelve other things, climbed out, bumped the door lock button and too late remembered that the keys were still in the ignition.
I had a flash of irritation and then remembered my twenty years of preparation. But, funny story, the week before we ran the car into a hardened snow drift and got a little damage, including bending the right tie rod. Our local mechanic replaced it with a new one but hadn't noticed the lump of electrical tape. If he did, there was no investigation to see what was underneath. The old tie rod was still in the car, along with the key, in the trunk, which, of course, was locked.
There are people who say there is such a thing as too much preparation.
I don't think that's true.
Copyright 2026 Brent Olson
