Car Demands Christmas Present

Last Saturday I headed up to my parents house to spend Christmas with the family. Left my kitty home by herself-I only planned to be gone two days. I gave Echo a get out of jail free card for this family function. He was celebrating with his roommates on Christmas Eve night. I had two free fruit trees in my car all set to make my parents land their new home. Things were going pretty well…until about a half hour from my parents place, just 5 miles outside of their city. The radio died. Lights began to fade. Then the car slowed. I tried to turn on the four ways but they were out. Pulled over to the side of the country road and the car was dead. Obviously an electrical problem. I don’t have a cell phone (that I use regularly), so I got out and walked to the nearest house. Fortunately someone was home and answered the door. A nice lady let me use her cell phone to call my dad. While I was talking to him someone stopped at my car but they had left by the time I got back to it. Good thing my dad answered the phone because I didn’t have any other numbers memorized to call. I had some stored in a cell phone my dad had given me a while back but it has not minutes on it and the battery was dead. Still is dead in fact. I should find a way to charge it so I can at least see the numbers.

Watched the sun set while I waited for help to arrive. Another nice person stopped to see if I was okay. I told him my dad was on his way and I only had about 10 more minutes to wait. The lady whose phone I used offered to let me stay in her house while I waited but I felt more comfortable waiting in my car with my stuff. Both of my parents ended up coming out in my dad’s truck. I had told my dad I thought it was the battery (really thought it was the alternator, but eliminate the simplest causes first) so he brought along a jump start machine. We jumped my car and made it a little further down the road before we had to jump it again. After going about 2 miles in this fashion he decided it would be a better idea to go to my uncle’s house and pick up the trailer they both share. So we all hope in the truck and go to get it. Made a pit stop at my parents house because he was driving on expired tags and the trailer had the same tags so he grabbed the new sticker to be legal.

Back at my car we jumped it again to get it far enough to pull into a repair shop parking lot. We needed flat ground and enough room for the truck, trailer, and room for me to drive my car up onto the trailer. Jumped the car again to let me drive it up the ramps onto the trailer. Got the car secured and were on our way to my parents house. I joked that my car wanted to make a special entrance to Christmas and demanded a new part as a present this year. Another jump allowed me to drive my car off the trailer and into the pull barn garage.

The next day examination revealed the battery to be fine and the problem was with the alternator. Well actually the problem was corrosion with the alternator but a part was broken in the checking out process so a new alternator was in order anyway. Being Christmas day nothing was open so I was forced to stay longer. Got all the parts the next day but finished repairing late in the day so I stayed over another night. I was getting concerned my cat might run out of food and water by this point. Also had told Echo we could spend my birthday together just the two of us-he had made plans but then the boss man told him he had to work (rained so he didn’t have to work after all). I made it back before my cat ran out of food and water and in time to go and pick up the cake Echo ordered.

Christmas was a little different this year. Mom, Dad, and I all went over to my sister’s house to watch my nephew open up presents. My sister cooked breakfast and it was actually pretty good. Then Mom and I went to pick up Grandma and everyone went to my parents house for more Christmas presents. My crazy dad got my nephew a real gas powered 4-wheeler. Personally I think a 4 year old is way to young to be driving one of those-even if it does have a way to only let him go 5 mph and you have a remote stop just in case. He also bought me a Kindle Fire. My dad goes for the big ticket items. I need to go somewhere with WiFi to register it before I can actually use it. I only wanted the basic Kindle because it is simple. The Fire has so many unnecessary extras but I can still use it for my original purpose of reading books and it will hold more books than the basic Kindle…not that I will ever be able to read that many books. I like it but he didn’t need to spend that much money. I told them they need to limit their gift giving to one gift for me. Well one they buy anyway, they can make me all sorts of things like cookies, or help with my car, or go hiking somewhere, and so on.

The day after my birthday I had planned an event with my friends. We were going to go ice skating then have dinner at the best Mexican food place in town. Most of the people who were going to go ended up bailing on me. No surprise, I don’t rely much on people especially this time of year. A co-worker and her husband did come out with Echo and me. Those two are pretty good about doing things they say the will. She was very good at ice skating. Her husband has a bum knee so he didn’t attempt to skate. Echo had never gone ice skating before and was holding on to the side and my hand. We had almost made it one time around when he fell and took me down with him. I had tried to skate in front of him while holding his hands behind me. He hit his tailbone very hard and was out for the day. He is not eager to try again anytime soon. My co-worker and I did about 20 or so laps and then called it good. It was fun. Had been a long time since I last skated but I fell right back into it-like riding a bike. Felt really bad for Echo though. I broke my boyfriend. 🙁 He said it looked like fun and he wanted to be able to do it but he was hurt. Said the pain was a 6 on a scale of 1-10.

Dinner was nice. Think I have convinced two more people on the food being the best. The husband said it was amazing after taking only one bite!

Echo had to work the next day even though he was on vacation. So that meant I had to take him home. He was suppose to be on vacation all this week but he worked Thursday, Friday, and is working a couple of hours today too. Bites! I hate that they take advantage of him like that. If they can’t get the trees dug in time with the people they have they should not promise them to the folks buying them. Seems every time they get themselves into a pickle my man and his crew have to bail them out. Enough is enough, they need a break too! At least they are paying them vacation pay plus regular per piece pay. Double dipping.

Still no snow.