Sunday, April 3, 2011

Hiding in a ditch on the side of the road

A bit has happened since the last post. I'm not too happy about it.

I left off where we dropped our beloved car off at Gill's Automotive. The next day we called them up to see what the damage was. We were told that the engine was blown, they had no idea how it happened, and they were 100% sure it was not their fault. A new engine would be $5000.

I'm pretty sure that was a lie on their part, but I'll never know. I replied saying that wasn't going to happen, at which point they said their insurance would be calling us.

Long story short, Gill's insurance paid for a new Jasper engine. For insurance purposes they accepted the blame. They had replaced the timing belt, clutch, and a couple other things. It doesn't really matter whose fault it is as long as I've got a new engine.

I drove the fixed car out of the shop last Tuesday, and was so relieved that it felt the same. Then today we drove the car to the Cherry Blossom Festival. It was nice.

In happier times.
On the way back there was a pretty good traffic jam on the freeway due to an accident. It was stop-and-go for about 20 minutes. We passed by the accident (didn't look too bad) and I switched to fifth gear, excited to be cruising again.. But the car wouldn't speed up. In fact, it was slowing down. We lurched a little and my power steering gave out, then the car just stalled. All the lights on my dashboard shined at me with enthusiasm. I rolled to the left shoulder.

GIIIIIIILLLLLLLLLLLLL!!!!!

I didn't actually say that. But I should have. It was more like "GRAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!"

It was able to start again several times, but each time it would stall once I brought it down to idle. So we called AAA again. They said we can only call them one more time this year. Mr. Tow came right after it got dark - only a few minutes after my battery died so all my lights went off. In the dark. On the side of a busy freeway. I tried to light my emergency roadside flares, but we couldn't read the dark-blue-on-red instructions.

We didn't walk home from Gill's this time. We had the tow truck guy drive us over.

We'll see what Gill's says in the morning. Again, I'm not paying for it.
Posted by Sean Hayes
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2 comments:

  1. StephanieApril 3, 2011 at 8:34 PM

    Sean and Heidi,

    I have been following your blog (I actually am unsure of how I got a hold of the link, but I saved it in a folder of blog bookmarks I have) and I just had to let you know how captivating your car story has been. Although I know that no part of this ordeal has been humourous to you in any way, your writing makes it almost impossible not to let a chortle slip here and there. You get 10 extra points for making me laugh after I clicked into your actual blog (I get the "feed" version so I don't see the extra stuff like tags, etc) and saw that one of the tags was "Unbelievable Rage." I could hear your voice in your writing! That is when you know you have great writing. :)

    I hope you guys are doing well! Blessings from Loma Linda (where, I almost wrote that it's been uncomfortably hot, but realized that today was in the balmy 60s... it's supposed to be 80-something tomorrow though).

    -stephanie

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  2. RobertMay 2, 2011 at 12:52 PM

    Was the dark blue on red for the flares like the tan on orange above?

    "GRAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!" is right. That really blows. I had a car fixed up in Colorado before we drove it to Maryland. It was misfiring the whole way, but we made it safely.

    So, I'm stoked you're way out here too! Let's hang out!

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