well, that sucked

this week has been…well…not good…

…the run down:

monday – i took “quinn” (named after the comic character “harley quinn” due to her white exterior, black trim, and red leather interior) to get some work done at german auto center, picking up a rental nissan along the way. we had the price for the repairs already, and had just enough left in my budget to do the rental, which worked out great because they were short on loaners. by the time the sun went down i’d gotten the call that additional repairs were needed, more than doubling the price. nik’s been dealing with this for FAR too long, so i gave the nod effectively stifling any other home repairs we were gonna do.

tuesday – did the route, ran a lil late, and on the way home was diverted a different route which ended up in me hitting a pot hole (ironically in front of the warehouse where the county has the equipment to fix such things), and instantly the front tire went flat. it was almost 10pm, i was tired as fuck, and seven miles from the house. i drove home on the tire, destroying it, but i got home.

wednesday – pulled the wheel off m, bagged it, and put it in mr. grey’s back seat. checked his fluids and had to add oil and coolant. knowing he wouldn’t start i hooked up my jump box, at 71% battery, and but no luck – it kept showing green (good to start), but then clicked over to red (not good) by the time i got to the key to start him. eventually i had to pull the rental nissan around, and jump start with good ol’ fashioned jumper cables. off i went, but the ride to san marcos didn’t charge him up enough as i had to flag down some college kid and repeat the process in san marcos a bit later. while driving around trying to let it charge it occurred to me that the battery was from wal-mart and should still be under warranty. i went, it was, and got a free replacement (which was good because just prior the gas light came on). i went and filled him up and got the wheel looked at, only to be told we wouldn’t really know without a tire we could inflate, which that one was too destroyed and they didn’t have one. i had to get home to get the kid to work, so i bailed to do that, then had to wait for nik to bring the rental back (she’d gone to take her mom to the doctor’s, which was the whole reason we got the rental) so i could take david grocery shopping that afternoon as i do every other wednesday.

thursday – transferred the wheel to the nissan so i could take it back (the rental, that is), transferring it again to quinn’s cargo hold until after work, which i cut short (taking $ off my check in the process), and proceeded to check seven tire spots in three different towns to no avail. ordered the tire online ($115) and settled in on the couch. probably the best day of the week, in hindsight.

friday – went to check gray as he was my transport to work. check all the fluids, and all was well. went to check tires and the schrader valve broke and started leaching air. i swapped it (i just so happened to have another valve and the tool handy) and all was good, but the tire got down to 13psi in the process. getting it back to 34psi almost killed my pump battery, but the back two tires were almost perfect, pressure-wise. the fourth one, however, was totally flat. as their run-flats, it didn’t LOOK flat. but it was. i had to use nik’s pump to get it up to 34psi, which it did, showing it didn’t have any significant damage. but the fear of a repeat of me getting stuck in lakeway was enough for her to want us to do another rental, which she took, and i went to work in quinn.

saturday, fortunately, was without incident. but the second rental is due back tuesday, and the tire is due in monday evening, so i’ll be at the tire spot first thing tuesday morning to get it mounted and HOPEFULLY no real surprises, so i can finally get one of my three cars back on the fucking road. stay tuned.