The My Car Still Hates Me Post

So after the car issues I had had yesterday, and getting our battery handiwork approved by the guys at Jiffy Lube I headed off to the car dealership to get a new key. During all the hubbub with the car alarm system the key-ring portion of the key has snapped off, so that I can’t fit it on my lanyard anymore. Nothing major- but very annoying considering all the car-crap I was dealing with at the time. Plus I don’t want to get it lost or locked in the car. I show up at the garage to find that it’s not open on Sunday. Defeated I head down to the comic shop on the Trail to sort out my subscriptions, determined to be at least quasi-productive now that I had wheels that worked. I get there and the place wasn’t open yet either. DAMN YOU SUNDAY!

Ticked off I retreat to the Celica to head home and the damn thing wouldn’t start again. I called up the guys at Jiffy Lube who remembered me from earlier and told them my issue. They asked me where I was and offered to send a guy out to jump me. Now this is where my stupidity comes in; I thought the plaza was on the corner of OBT and Michigan, when in fact it was OBT and Holden. So they head off to the wrong plaza, can’t find me and head back to the shop. After waiting in the rain for an hour I call back to find out they had come back to the shop. I asked them to try again, and while giving them the address the guy who ran the comic book store (which had opened by this point and provided much needed air conditioning) overhead me and correct my incorrect street names. Thank god for eavesdroppers eh? Anyway the guys come by and pop the hood, clean off some of the connectors and the car starts up fine. Turns out that in cleaning the connectors they had loosened one of them slightly so that some of the scummy acid flakes from the old battery where in the way of the juice. Those guys where really helpful and more than willing to go out of their way to help me out, which was very cool. The manager there thought I was Guy Ritche because my name is Guy and I have a British accent. He took some convincing that I didn’t actually know Madonna but was still nice to me despite not being famous. He called me Mr. Ritche from then on out still. After they got me rolling again I headed straight down to Pep Boys to get new connectors installed, which was a relatively inexpensive operation. Somehow though it took them 3 hours to do it though, which wasn’t very pleasant a wait. Least everything is on the up and up now, and I shouldn’t have any more problems. Right Celica? Right!?!?

The My Car Hates Me Post

Yesterday I try and start my car to no avail. Instead of a throaty engine grumbling to life, I get a lovely ticking sound when the key is turned in the ignition. Looks like the battery is a goner- so I call up Sarah, Jen and Neil (whom I was going to go meet up with if my car wasn’t dead) to let them know I was going to have to pass on the movie (we where going to see Get Smart at Downtown Disney). They kindly offered to come and pick me up and see the movie closer to me, which was very appreciated. Even further appreciated was that after the movie Jen to us to WalMart got a new battery, which Neil then installed for me. Problem solved! Well no. Turns out my aftermarket security system likes to reset itself every time the battery is disconnected and blare obnoxiously as soon as a new one is installed. Not being able to find the security-manual I was forced to leave the battery partially installed while I try to tack down the instructions on how to bypass the alarm. By this point it was getting dark and the guys had to go. I resolved to call AAA in the morning because the manual was nowhere to be found.

Fortunately, in a last ditch effort to re-re-search the car for the book, I found it stuck to the inside picked of another booklet (Florida heat isn’t to kind to things kept in my glove compartment apparently). Not wanting to disturb my neighbors any more late at night, I opted to make it tomorrows issue. So first thing today I run down, hook up the battery and commence the wailing of my alarm, while I follow the steps to reset the security system. After a few attempts I figure it out and shut the damn thing up. Wanting to make sure the battery is in properly I drive down to Jiffy Lube and have them take a look at our handy work. They offer to scrub the battery connects to get rid of some of the nasty acid buildup from the old battery and tighten up the connectors. They where pretty helpful and friendly guys. After my oil change I head off to get some errands done. Little did I know my car troubles where not yet over. TO BE CONTINUED…