car trouble

Tonight I left the house to go to work. I was driving along, happy as could be. I had the stereo up, windows down, singing along at the top of my lungs.

So I’m driving on the interstate through the north end of town there, and there’s a big slowdown on the interstate. Some poor driver has had a wreck up ahead and everyone’s slowed down.

So as I am slowing down, my car is acting funny, like I have put it in the wrong gear. I shuffle the gears around a bit, but that doesnt help, and eventually the car goes dead. I try to start it, no deal.

So, dead car, middle of 6 lanes of traffic, Atlanta rush hour. Super.

I push the thing off the road, make a few phone calls, and grab a tire iron out of the back. I pop the hood to wait for my friends to come get me and start banging on the internals of the car.

I hope this will get it started again, but mostly I just want to teach it a lesson.

“Why won’t you start?” I yell into the engine compartment. A guy in a convertible BMW is parked next to me with a cellphone to his head waiting for the wreck to clear.

“I can’t catch a break!” I yell at him.

“One of those days, huh?” he says, moving off with the slow pace of traffic.

So Madison and Alice come pick me up and take me home where I jump into Walter’s Suburban.

“Careful,” he says, “I think the coolant is low.”

So he and I pour some coolant in the thing and I head off to work. A mile or so down the road the coolant light comes on. I pull over for the second time, and call him to tell him what’s happening.

I end up driving his Suburban home and hopping in his Subaru since I will be home from work before he needs it. I pull it out of hte driveway and get 2 blocks down the street before I notice that all his dash indicator lights are on.

I call him and ask him if that’s normal. He says “Well, no that’s not normal, but nothing’s wrong with it. Just drive it. Give it hell.”

So, I head to work for the third time. I am bopping along, windows down, stereo up, when guess what.

THE THIRD CAR IN ONE DAY BREAKS DOWN ON ME.

I call Walter yet again, and he comes to get me with J-rock and Jrock’s car. They drop me off at work, and I call my insurance company through whom I have roadside assistance.

The nice lady at Progressive tells me they can’t send anyone to tow it because I won’t be there with the car when they get there, so they don’t want to move it! Hah!

Jeez. I think I need to get a job closer to home and just bike to it.

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Comments

  1. court/s says:

    My feet have never failed me!

  2. Christopher says:

    Dude, I went flying last Sunday, and on the way back from Peachtree-Dekalb airport, my car just decided to die. I was very low on gas, so I thought I ran out. Had it towed to a gas station and fueled up, but it still wouldn't start.

    The timing chain snapped. JOY!

  3. Nikita says:

    Bikes can be dangerous too though. I once saw a guy riding a bike to school, after his morning paper route. His newspaper-carrying sacks got tangled in the spokes of his front tire. The bike flipped in an impressive arc, but in the end his head still hit the sidewalk.

  4. Fuzzy says:

    Yep. You win.

  5. Lord says:

    Biking can be dangerous, but walking can be even more dangerous.

    One day, I was driving to Taco Bell to grab a burrito or five, and chugged a half-full beer bottle at some old lady walking down the road.

    “Watch where you're walking, grandma!,” I yelled out to her.

    Walking? No thanks. I'll stick to driving, thank you very much.

  6. Nikita says:

    Amen. People driving cars seem to harbor an irrational loathing for people transporting themselves in some other manner. Bike or feet, these non-drivers take their lives in their hands. I've never seen a car run down a man on stilts though, or a pogo stick.

  7. Moo says:

    Haha! -point- Now who's the coolest guy in the world when your Volvo isn't running?!

  8. Kristin says:

    I want to love you. I want to squeeze you. I want to touch you! HA! Gobble!