Friday, January 16, 2009

TGIF

I’m ready for it to be Friday. The past week has been defined by the following events:

Saturday 1PM lock keys in car while at Sears (after which, Ali wrote Craig a note that said “DONT FERGIT TO PUT QES IN YOUR POCKIT” because, you know, wow, if only we had a note to remind us, we would have remembered. :-)
Saturday 8PM Lady dies in drive through (as described below)
Saturday 9PM we discover that Penny’s clutch is out
Saturday 10PM Our good friend Rob helps us tow Lady to the mechanic
Wednesday 12PM I walk to the mechanic and pick up Lady, pay $177
Wednesday 6PM We use Lady (the bug) to tow Penny (the bus) to the mechanic. I really really wish we had pictures of this. Craig says we got some really funny looks. I did not notice as I was too concerned about not crashing our cars into each other.
Thursday 6PM Lady dies (again) on the way to pick up dinner. We push her onto a side street and decide that there’s no use wasting pizza, so we walk to the pizza place. We walk back to Lady, and proceed to push her half of a mile (no exaggeration here—I looked on google maps) back to our house.
Thursday 9PM we acquire my grandparent’s truck (thanks Mom and Dad!) and tow Lady to the mechanic

It has been an all too eventful week. In the interest of not sounding like a whiner—I do love our cars, and this chaos is just part of the game when your newest car is older than you.


Other significant events during the week: we received a very helpful and generous check in the mail (thank you!); Charlie turned four and we bought chicken nuggets at his request of which he ate none; we almost finished our bedroom floor; and became seasoned experts at administering banana flavored oral medication to our cat.

I’m desperately hoping for an un-eventful weekend...after the Pepper concert.

Monday, January 12, 2009

A little TOO Coincidental

Last Friday I posted on this blog saying that our cars have been running great and that some shop time should be coming up soon. The following dialogue serves as evidence of my telepathic abilities.

Here’s the scene: Saturday night—Garden City Dairy Queen drive through.

Lady in the speaker: That will be $6.37 at the window

We pull forward—there are two cars in front of us.

Maryn: Doesn’t Lady (the bug) sound weird?
Craig: (revs engine) yeah

Bug Dies
Craig tries to start bug


Maryn: *%&#
Craig: *$&#
Maryn: Do you want me to get out and push?
Craig: yes

Maryn gets out and pushes car

Lady at the window: That will be $6.37
Craig: thank you

Maryn pushes bug past drive through window and into adjacent alley

Onlookers: ha ha ha ha ha

I’ll spare you some unnecessary details here: We sit for about 10 minutes, and after several failed attempts to start Lady, we call my grandparents who pick us up, take us to my parent’s house and we borrow their car (luckily, they’re in Florida). We decide that we don’t want leave Lady in a parking lot over night so, when we get home, we decide to take the bus down and tow Lady to the mechanic. We get in the bus. Resume scene.

Craig: There’s no clutch.
Maryn: What?!
Craig: the clutch is gone—there’s no clutch
Maryn (laughs hysterically): you are joking.
Craig: “no—there’s no clutch ^*&%”
Maryn (still laughing hysterically): “$*%&”
Craig: Let me see if it is the cable. (Craig looks at undercarriage) There’s oil all over the slave cylinder.
Maryn: Hooray.

Again, I’ll spare you the unnecessary details: our friend Rob saved the day by meeting us at Dairy Queen and towing the bug to our mechanic. (Thank you Rob!)

Sigh. All we can really do is 1) laugh, and 2) be grateful for the six months we went without visiting the mechanic (we love you Mike!)

Friday, January 9, 2009

Splitting from the Splitty

This blog has long been neglected and I became embarrassingly emotional when I visited it this morning and realized that I need to simultaneously update the blog and eulogize Aunt Tranny. Well, maybe eulogize isn’t the right word, but it feels right. A couple of months ago, we sold Tranny. I’ve attempted on several occasions to explain this decision to people, but words don’t exist that make it okay.
We sold her to a man named Dan who was absolutely ecstatic to have her and he plans to return her to original condition. I feel like the mother in India who sells her son to the trader so that he can have opportunities that she can’t provide him. Tranny deserved a lot more care (read—financial investment) than we could give her and for that reason we are really happy that Dan has her. What lessens the sting is what we gained by selling her—financial peace of mind.
Sigh. The good news is that we still have Penny and Lady and they kick ass. I’m sure we are going to have some serious shop time coming up because they haven’t given us an ounce of trouble in…SIX MONTHS! This is an astonishingly long time for us to have not visited our mechanic.
We’ll see how long I can keep Craig from shopping for new a new bus. I’m guessing I’ve got another…three hours.