Rust in Peace

It has finally happened. Our little Red Honda, which I've referred to a number of times before in this blog, finally blew a gasket.

Or threw a rod.

Or some such other mechanical mumbo-jumbo that I'm horribly ill-qualified to share, but which is more or less like a fatal heart attack to a car engine.

All I know was that I was supposed to do all my big first-of-the-month errands today, when I ended up with some car problems in the parking lot of the dollar store (my first stop on a long list of to-do's). That was where the car started sputtering like it was going to cut out on me-which is nothing new, mind you--though it hadn't happened in a few months since Jeff fixed the problem before.

Now we'd had a little battery cable trouble recently, which Jeff also fixed. And by fixed, I mean that the problem went away. However, since then, I had taken that car out on a dirt road near our home (commonly known around these parts as a chatterbox road) and had only just this morning noticed that the battery light was randomly coming back on then fading off. Again. Instead of heeding the warning light, I'm thinking that something must have been shaken loose on the dirt road, and wrote it off as no big deal.

So when the the car began acting up this time, something about it reminded me of my church youth leader's infamous rattletrap VW van back in my high school days, and how the idling would get to where you'd need to give it gas at intersections to keep it from cutting out.

So I tried that at the stop light near Olive Garden. Revved it up good. And lo and behold it worked! At least it kept it from cutting out, which enabled me to get through the next major intersection without incident. In fact, it was humming along almost like normal, so I went ahead and drove it along the frontage road, and almost to the freeway overpass near my home with no troubles at all, which was a good three miles or so.

But when I glanced down at the panel, I noticed that a new warning light had come on beside the flickering battery light. This one had a little symbol on it that looks like a baby aspirator with something dripping out the end. Babies...choking. Okay, this was serious.

As I'm turning the corner to get from the frontage road to the overpass, the car started lurching and coughing and wheezing. I kid you not, it was like a cat hacking up a hairball. And it nearly died right there on the overpass.

Frightened, I spurred it on, and it bucked and kicked it's way through the intersection and all the way to the street leading to my home, with Judah and I hanging on for dear life.

We got two blocks up the road leading to our neighborhood when I glanced in the rearview mirror and saw dark gray clouds of smoke billowing out of my exhaust pipe. And then I then heard a full out boiling sound from beneath the hood. Uh, oh.

Amazingly, the check-engine light never once came on. And no smoke was pouring out from under the hood. Aside from that new warning light, the only thing that had changed on the panel was the temperature gauge, which now registered HOT. So I pulled over to let the car cool down for a while, and got out my phone to call for help.

And wouldn't you know...I couldn't reach a single person that was available to help me right then.

So I texted Jeff, "CALL ME! CAR DIED." (Yes, as you may have gathered, our cell-phone situation still isn't remedied. See now the reason that this blog is titled STUCK in Frump? I'm a hopeless procrastinator. And never do I feel it so keenly as at times like this!)

So Judah and I sat there and waited. And waited. And waited.

I was concerned about the engine being so hot, having boiled out all the water and coolant over onto the street, and after a thorough inventory of the inside of the car discovered that the only liquid we had in said car was a bottle of tangerine juice.

Now, before you freak out, I did NOT pour it in the hole where the anti-freeze/coolant stuff goes! Nope, I gave that to Judah to keep him from getting too restless.

After waiting for a good twenty minutes more for someone to call me back, and being I was still several blocks from home, AGAIN with no stroller, I decided to go ahead and try and nurse the car the rest of the way home. The check engine light hadn't come on, after all.

After a few false-starts, the engine finally sparked to life, and I urged onward.

It arrived in our driveway chugging and gasping, gave a big cough and a shudder, and promptly kicked the bucket.

Sadly, I feel very depressed about this.

Not because I was attached to the car or anything, but because now we're going to once again have a car payment!

Well, that and the inconvenience of being down to one vehicle again.

Honda, Free Honda...you served us well.

Rust in Peace.