Wednesday, February 12, 2014

TitIe! have no stinkin' title.



Hello! I'm popping in to say hi. I guess that was redundant. Anyway, I suppose I could tell you a tale of woe but I'll give it the Readers Digest version. Long drives at the worst times of day. Snow. More on Thurs. A friend calls and wants to come by after he picks up a prescription. It's true we haven't seen each other in almost a year. I say, "OK, but you can't stay long. I have get up in about 7 hours." He stayed a bit longer than I would have liked, but that wasn't what really annoyed me. An mythical 15 minute arrival time turns into 45 minutes and even that didn't bother me. What really annoyed the sh*t out of me were the 4 phone calls, not including the initial one. The first one to tell me that he was leaving for the pharmacy. He should be there in about 15 minutes. Call #2, he just got to the pharmacy. Call #3, he's leaving the pharmacy. Should be right there. 10 minutes tops. Call #4. I hear his truck pull in my driveway. He calls to tell me that he's in my driveway. The time he took to call me he could of walked the 20 or so feet to ring my doorbell.

Then Sunday evening, my friend Dave and I are going to see some friends in Lowell. It's about 20-25 mile drive but it's all highway. The highway is very close by and as I merge into traffic, my car starts to hesitate, stutter and buck. Not to be confused with law firm of the same name. We instantly turn back. A little icon of a yellow wrench appears on my dash. I look it up in the manual. It could mean a transmission problem. Transmission! All wheel drive! Mucho $$$$!  I have to work at 11:30 a.m. on Monday. I have to get the car to the dealership, it's still under warranty or else I would go to my regular mechanic, excuse me, technician. I have to get a rental and drive to work 30 miles in a strange car. 

Tuesday. I get home from work at about 6:30. There are four messages on my phone. One from the dealership. One from my sister telling me her husband was in the hospital. Next up was a message beginning in mid sentence. It sounded like an elderly lady saying something like, "...then they got a brown one and a black one..." I think she was talking about mice. It was a bit amusing.  Next one was from Dave telling me a mutual friend's father had died. The last one from Arlene.

Fast forward to today. I had received a couple of calls from the dealership since Monday telling me they couldn't find anything wrong. Truth be told when I took the car in it ran fine but I still wanted it checked out. I got out early because I started early. Fortunately, I rented the car at the same place. They found nothing wrong. It could have been water in the gas, or a sensor glitch and so on. But what about the little yellow wrench on my dashboard? What is it telling me?
"Oh it could mean anything. It's just telling you there's something wrong."
Well I already knew that! What's the point of having these idiot lights? Still they were nice to me. I already knew that if they found nothing I would still be charged $169.00. The fee would be waved if they found a problem and fixed it. It would cost me nothing. They also waived the rental fee. That saved me $120.00. It drove fine. Who knows what happened.

I heard this on radio this morning. There's a proposal to bring the Summer Olympics to Boston. Are you kidding me! This city has strangling traffic to begin with. It sounds nice on paper but where are you going to put all these people? True there are facilities available for the events but it's very crowded here. I'd be OK with it if they gave me two weeks vacation with pay so I could stay home and watch it on TV.

So we have snow coming by morning but I don't have to work. I'm staying put and chillin', at least between laundry loads.

I'm outta here.

6 comments:

  1. Paul, I am very glad that they couldn't find anything wrong with your car! There is so much snow on the ground here that I am sick of looking at it.
    I am typing this on my iPad and having a terrible time with my trifocals .
    Stay safe.

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  2. So they waved the rental charge, yet charged for lookin an you waved some cash good bye.
    Sounds reasonable to me. Those "idiot lights" truly are idiots. High tech phfft.
    You sound like a popular man with all those calls. Tomorrow you can recall all those calls between the loads of wash.
    I would be afraid to have the Olympics where the Boston bomber hit. Just say'in.
    We have a friend who calls saying we will have a visitor in 2 minutes. Another call asking who is in our driveway. Ya, it gets annoying. Once I answered him saying we weren't home. Ya well it is funny sometimes.

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  3. I'm reading you but still on "Time-Out" from blogging. Survived the ice storm down here. Your blog is funny to me and soooo true as for today's silly and sometimes costly, goings on!

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  4. I can see why you where miffed Paul, what a carry on...Lights on the Dash would alarm anyone!
    Sounds like a tiresome time, stay well and enjoy your rest day.
    Best Wishes Sheila

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  5. Man, what a horrible feeling. ANY light on the dashboard brings stark fear to my heart!

    I can't believe anyone could or would entertain the idea of the Summer Olympics there for the very reason you stated.

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  6. Happy Valentine's Day my dear friend.

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