Murphy: More than a law, its a way of life
After last night sitting in a parking lot removing my left front tire, again, to put the belt back on, again, I decided that today would be the day I took the car in to be fixed. I never like taking the car in when I don't know exactly what's wrong, because I like to know the difficulty level and ball park cost before putting it in. However, I'm sick and darned tired of the belt popping off because one of the pulleys occasionally freezing up just long enough to put tension on the belt, tug the tensioner, and free up suddenly causing a a pop and off with the belt.
So today is the day! Transfer some of the tools etc over to the truck. Now we'll take the truck to the gas station to get the in bad need of being replaced tires filled with air. The truck doesn't start....damn. Acts like the battery, pop the hood, oh look, corrosion on the battery. Brush off the terminals and jump start. OK, we should be good now. Off to get air.
We leave the truck running, turn the car off, put air in the truck tires. Go to restart car. Guess what jumps off. My blood pressure can now be measured in PSI. Screw this noise, call AAA. We have an hour wait, so we turn the truck off. On a whim we check the truck again. Yup. Didn't start. So now we are at a convenience store with two non-working vehicles. I go inside and buy Murphy a 40.
I am pretty sure the battery is good but the terminals could use some cleaning. Cleaning the terminals I am shocked to find that the stock terminal clamps are pretty crappy and in this case completely worn out. On the negative post, it is even broken. I go back into the convenience store and buy a package of hose clamps. Once the post and wires were clean of corrosion, I used the hose clamps to tighten the wires on the battery terminals. Worked like a charm. Who's the man? McGuiver for teaching me to think outside of the box.
AAA shows up, and tows the car in a large spiral to the AAA service center. They can get to the Saturn today, cool. Now to go get the terminals fixed, and buy a set of tires, and check to see if the wheels are safe and sound. (They are rusted enough that I think the previous owner drove it on the beach.) The man at the AAA desk says, "Hey, you know we do that too."
So I'm sitting in the waiting room right now of the AAA service center in the most comfortable waiting room chairs ever created. I have wireless access, I'm walking distance from a Starbucks. This ain't a bad way to spend a really crappy morning.
Course.....I haven't paid the bill yet...
Mental note, the Fairlane now has a greatly boosted priority level. Sure it gets 16 stylish miles to the gallon, but two working vehicles are clearly not enough for the two of us when both end up in the shop at once. Hey, it will cost less than a replacement vehicle, and way more styling than an econo-box.
