Amazingly no mishaps or bizarre radio programing comes up, so we make it to SNL in record time without using the speed force or bending light or anything. We follow the GPS to the West gate and pull up to the gate guard.
The gate guard says,”Bob, what are you doing here on Sunday, I don’t think I have ever seen you here outside of normal working hours and what is Nancy doing with you? Is it bring your daughter to work day?”
In my head, I begin to cluck like a chicken, apparently I know the gate guard and by his name tag, his name is actually Steve. My name is also Bob and Not Sally, I mean Nancy has some real explaining to do. Are you kidding me, what kind of teenage nonsense is Nancy trying to pull. Amazingly I recover quickly from the shock.
“Hi Steve, just bringing Nancy to see the public exhibits, she has a paper due in Chemistry on Radioactive Isotopes and I thought the information here really brings it to light.”
“Bob, that’s great, my teenage daughter barely speaks to me let alone letting me take her to work on a Sunday in the summer.”
Good thing I remembered we have year round school in California and it was not weird that Nancy would have a paper due in the middle of summer. Apparently, I am quite good at making stuff up as I go along. Enough with mentally patting myself on the back, we need to get past the gate and onto the Tuba building.
“Good seeing you Steve, see you at the company picnic next week.”
“You too Bob, always fun to catch up with the family.”
Steve raises the gate and I inch what I assume is actually my SUV forward until we see the turn off for parking lot Z-7 and the Tuba building. A sign out front says “SNL: Cryptozoology Field Study Building.”
I make the right turn and a quick left pulling into the Z-7 parking lot. Nancy apparently thinks this is funny as she is almost unable to control herself and is just about laughing hysterically.
“Nancy, what, cluck, cluck, cluck.” Apparently I am no longer just clucking in my inner monologue it has spilled over into my speech.
“Dad, I can explain. This weekend was our Girl Scout Daughter Dad camp out, but when we stopped for gas in Oakland, someone must have snuck up on us and knocked me on the head and drugged you so that you can’t remember anything. I was just playing along since you did not remember anything and I had always heard you did not want to shock someone out of amnesia or there is no telling what they might do.”
“Nancy, nice story, so what really is going on?”
“Dad, really no kidding it all happened like I said. I’m not sure where all our camping stuff went to, but I have no idea what we were doing in that building with the really nice chessboard tiled floor.”
Either I am gullible or I instinctually knew Nancy was telling the truth. “Nancy, I believe you, let’s see what the map and key are all about. “
“Yes, and let’s not forget about Stan Stan the Tuba Man, I mean the notation T-UBA on the map.”
“Good idea, I will figure out what to do about you not telling me who you were until now when we get home. We do have a home don’t we?”
“Yes dad.”
With the car parked, we sneak around to the back of the building avoiding surveillance video cameras along the way and arrive at what looks to be the correct door. Unfortunately it looks like the door is an exit only as there is no door knob on the outside, just a card swipe. Conveniently we do have a key card.
“Nancy, let’s try the key card on the card swipe and see what happens.”
Nancy swipes the card across the card swipe and we hear a reassuring duck quack and no there are no actual ducks around, so I am pretty sure it is directly correlated to the swiping of the card. In addition to the duck sound, the door has opened about an inch and I can just get enough of my fingers on it to tease open the door.