Boy Did I Eff Up

 What happened was...

As you may know, I'm traveling in Mexico for several months with my son and a good friend of mine. I'm towing my travel trailer with my Ford F350 Super Duty pickup. The truck is an important part of this story.  

I have a special binder that has been on many big road trips. It contains all of my relevant documents, often five or six copies, along with a memory stick with backup files. I take some pride in my organizational skills. It's my core competency, or was until today.

My biggest concern was getting a Temporary Import Permit from the Mexican authorities for the truck. There had been some one ton truck confusion in past years, and people were denied entry from around 2015-2017. The likelihood of confusion was high and it was a big anxiety point for me. I had all my relevant documents in order, except.

When it came time to provide copies of my truck registration, my registration was expired. I didn't forget the paperwork, or screw up documents, the registration has been expired since October. I didn't get a notification, which can happen with my screwy mail service, but it's on me to remember those things. I can't tell you how disappointed I am with myself, with so many months of planning. I screwed up pretty bad, and my companions are along for the ride.

The solution is to provide the original vehicle title, which unfortunately was in my safe back home, 1,200 miles away. While driving back to Puerto Peñasco, 100 miles through the scorching desert, I went back and forth with my wife. She found the title in the safe where I left it, along with a credit card. She went to Fedex, who wanted a week to deliver it. Then UPS, where the credit card was declined (it's old, but not expired). 

Finally I sent her to my store to talk to my manager and pick up cash. There's a UPS store next door. That worked. Oh, and she got a tank of premium gas out of it as some compensation. That's a lot of yuppie food coupons on the counter. She deserves it though, thank you!

So now we're back in the RV park where we started this morning, after driving 150 miles today. We'll be here for three days at least, waiting for the UPS delivery of the vehicle title. Then it's back to the middle of the desert where the very kind (and cute) customs agent will hopefully approve my vehicle import permits.