Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Burning through my Good Karma

Well, this week has barely started and already I'm neck deep in "owing someone a favor."

See, this is the thing... my car is not being happy with the world. Sometimes it doesn't shift. Not all the time, just sometimes. (It's an automatic, not a stick...) The tach thing will rev up and up and nada. No shifting. Now, sometimes when this happens, it'll sort itself out in a few minutes, and sometimes it has to be manually downshifted, and it'll sort itself out, and sometimes you have to turn the car off and back on and it'll be fine. Until it happens the next time.

Now, I took the car up to the Firestone yesterday (and got a ride back to my house from Leslie...) and this morning they called to say they have no clue, couldn't find the problem, but here's another $350 worth of maintenance they recommend we do to the car in the meanwhile.

"Will that fix my problem?" I ask.

"Um, we couldn't find your problem, so I don't know." This is mechanic-speak for "No, it won't. But we'll get more money out of you!"

So, now I have to go get the car, pay them $75 for being annoying and unhelpful, and then take the car down the street to a transmission-specific shop and pay them another $75 to see if they can make heads or tails out of the issue.

Now, on the plus side, the new guy says it sounds like the sensor to him (based on my description) because if it was the actual transmission, it wouldn't be an intermittant problem... but he's not sure and he still needs to do diagnostics on it...

However, we only have one car, so an additional problem is, when there's a mechanical issue, getting from hither to yon is... a real pain in the ass.

Last week, we took the car in for inspection; or more exactly, I did. And I walked out to get the car the next day...

This week, we've had to bum rides from Leslie and Toby... and I had to get Leslie to cart me around yesterday to get this problem taken care of with our bedsheets. (Which is to say, I accidentally bought the wrong sized pillow cases. Standard pillow cases do not fit on King Sized pillows... ) And then there was an issue because I accidentally left my credit card in my other bag, so we had to go back to my place, pick up the card, then back to the store... what a pain...

Thomas is going to have to walk to work tomorrow, since it's unlikely that we'll get the car back today.

Tomorrow or Thursday (if we don't have the car back by then) I'm going to need to bother one of them for a ride to the grocery store. How exciting. Just what I want to do, my grocery shopping while someone else waits around for me.

95% of the time, I don't care that we only have one car.

This... is the other 5%.

Regardless, I'm sure you all didn't come here to listen to me whine about my car trouble.

Yesterday, I was very stressed out (today, I'm still stressed, but there's a limit to how long I can carry around incredible stressyness, so right now I'm in the "sort of resigned" phase of it...) and when I get really stressed out, I tend to scratch my legs. Don't ask me why, it's just a nervous thing. But since I don't really want big gaping holes in my skin, I decided I'd wear a pair of tights, so that I could keep myself from doing too much damage.

So I put together an outfit that I thought looked okay with tights.

And it really, really did.

I think I looked intensely cute yesterday.

And... those pesky 2.6 pounds that showed up last week decided to go away again. And they took with them another 1.4 pounds as insurance.

So, I ended up with a 4 pound loss yesterday, which moves me over 80 pounds total lost. (81.2 pounds lost, to be exact, but who's counting? Oh, right. I am.)

9 comments:

kc said...

You look adorable!

I hope your car gets fixed soon. I know what you mean about having to rely on friends. Even though I am sure they are happy to do it, it's still hard to feel like you have to ask for help. Although they are racking up good karma points for you to do them favors later. :)

Jen said...

ugh I hate dealing with cars!! I hope its gets fixed soon. WTG on the loss! You look cute in your tights!

Dr Wednesday said...

Awesome! Yay losses.

I've now been the proud owner of 2 cars that the O2 sensor has gone out on. It sounds very much like what you are going through. My first car had one bad sensor (~$35 to fix), then my hubby replaced all four in the second car himself because we didn't know which was bad. It was still under $100. I recommend trying it... it will cost much less than some transmission repairs may....

Good luck!

45+ and Aspiring said...

OMG! Haven't been around in a while. You look A-m-a-z-i-n-g!! Love the hair pulled up. Makes you look so young and sassy!

Summer said...

So cute!

A Daunting Tale of Scale Warfare said...

Seriously there should be a code of ethics for mechanics..."though shalt not scam people out of their hard earned money, instead we will fix their problems"-Not likely, but a girl can dream cant she?

Congrats on the 4lbs!!!!!! Amazing!!!!

Journo June aka MamaBear said...

Well, for being so stressed, you are making awesome progress with your loss! Eighty plus pounds - that's AMAZING!
Path to Health

Natalia said...

Good luck with the car troubles. Hopefully they'll be behind you soon. Your outfit was very cute!~ :)

.... said...

So sorry about the car. I hope it is an easy & inexpensive fix!

Congrats on the losses - the 4lbs and the over 80lbs!! That is fabulous & gives me hope that I can someday be there, too.