Car troubles...
Jan. 29th, 2004 03:44 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
missroseroseOkay, so I'm going along Egan Drive yesterday at about 65 mph, when suddenly the Chevy Lumina I'm driving (which, as it happens, belongs to Ryan's grandparents) starts to rumble. It's not a serious-sounding problem, but the steering wheel and most of the car is vibrating, which is troubling me. So I switch into the right lane and dropped down to 55 mph. The rumbling stops, until I press the accelerator, at which point it starts up again. Considering that this is a 14 year old car I'm driving, this is understandably quite worrisome. The car seems to be running all right otherwise, however, so I get to work, run my errands, and take it back to see what Ryan thinks of this. He thinks it's a problem with the exhaust system, but apparently not one he can fix, so we arrange for him to drive the Lumina in to work so he can take it in the next morning afterwards, and I can drive his Talon down to pick him up.
Well.
This morning arrives; I wake up early so I can go pick Ryan up; I make sure Cha has her dinner for the evening since I'll be in class; I take Garlic (Cha's dog) out for the morning walk, and I take the Talon out to go pick him up. I notice that it's pulling slightly to one side, which isn't unusual, but it seems a little worse than usual, so I make a mental note enlighten Ryan of this fact. I'm going down Egan Drive, about 45 to 50 mph in the right lane (it's snowed the previous night, so I'm trying to be careful), and suddenly I hear an explosion come from the front of the car, and I'm rapidly losing speed and drifting at an alarming rate into the left lane (which is going much faster). I'm honestly surprised that the guy in the SUV next to me was able to slow down enough to let me by as I pull over.
Oddly enough, I didn't panic at all. I'm usually pretty good about not doing so in high-stress situations; I just end up really strung out for the next couple of days from held-back emotion. In any case, I got the car pulled over and the hazard lights turned on; it turned out the left front tire had been flat and had eventually blown out (hence the explosion and sudden drifting across traffic). It's odd, too, because this was within a quarter-mile of the place where the Lumina had developed a rumble. *wonders if there's a connection*
In any case, a nice guy called Nathan pulled over to help (he'd noticed the flat and had been trying to signal me, though I hadn't had any idea what he meant at the time), and when the non-standard engineering on Ryan's Talon (probably courtesy of his dad) proved to be too much for us to figure out, we left it by the side of the road, and he gave me a ride into town. We went looking at a couple of places for Ryan, but were unable to track him down, so I had Nathan drop me off at the University.
Eventually Ryan caught up with me and asked for his keys back - apparently he'd come across the Talon by the side of the road and put the spare tire on. So we managed to get it to a shop to get its tire fixed, and I took the Lumina (still rumbling, but apparently safe to drive until tomorrow, when *it* goes into the shop) to the University, where I am now, waiting for my third class to begin and utterly strung out on a combination of sugar, caffiene and stress-related adrenaline.
I really need to learn how to relax myself. Normally I'm a fairly easy-going person, so it's not a problem, but at the moment I need a massage or something rather badly.
Anyway. After all this, I'm wondering if I really want to go through the sort of trouble that owning (or at least driving) a car will entail. Apparently UAS has a lot of openings available at student housing this semester, and if they still have any in mid-March I'd only have to pay half of the usual $1750. That's essentially what I was paying for rent at Ian's, and I'm apparently old enough that they won't require me to buy the meal plan...of course, that'll mean busing/walking all over the place again, but...
Man, I'm starting to miss being a kid and not having to worry about all this stuff.
Side note: I have Nathan's business card around here somewhere, so I'm going to have to send him something nice from Amazon.com as a thank-you for driving me all over the place this morning. He said that he loved flying, so maybe a book on planes...
Well.
This morning arrives; I wake up early so I can go pick Ryan up; I make sure Cha has her dinner for the evening since I'll be in class; I take Garlic (Cha's dog) out for the morning walk, and I take the Talon out to go pick him up. I notice that it's pulling slightly to one side, which isn't unusual, but it seems a little worse than usual, so I make a mental note enlighten Ryan of this fact. I'm going down Egan Drive, about 45 to 50 mph in the right lane (it's snowed the previous night, so I'm trying to be careful), and suddenly I hear an explosion come from the front of the car, and I'm rapidly losing speed and drifting at an alarming rate into the left lane (which is going much faster). I'm honestly surprised that the guy in the SUV next to me was able to slow down enough to let me by as I pull over.
Oddly enough, I didn't panic at all. I'm usually pretty good about not doing so in high-stress situations; I just end up really strung out for the next couple of days from held-back emotion. In any case, I got the car pulled over and the hazard lights turned on; it turned out the left front tire had been flat and had eventually blown out (hence the explosion and sudden drifting across traffic). It's odd, too, because this was within a quarter-mile of the place where the Lumina had developed a rumble. *wonders if there's a connection*
In any case, a nice guy called Nathan pulled over to help (he'd noticed the flat and had been trying to signal me, though I hadn't had any idea what he meant at the time), and when the non-standard engineering on Ryan's Talon (probably courtesy of his dad) proved to be too much for us to figure out, we left it by the side of the road, and he gave me a ride into town. We went looking at a couple of places for Ryan, but were unable to track him down, so I had Nathan drop me off at the University.
Eventually Ryan caught up with me and asked for his keys back - apparently he'd come across the Talon by the side of the road and put the spare tire on. So we managed to get it to a shop to get its tire fixed, and I took the Lumina (still rumbling, but apparently safe to drive until tomorrow, when *it* goes into the shop) to the University, where I am now, waiting for my third class to begin and utterly strung out on a combination of sugar, caffiene and stress-related adrenaline.
I really need to learn how to relax myself. Normally I'm a fairly easy-going person, so it's not a problem, but at the moment I need a massage or something rather badly.
Anyway. After all this, I'm wondering if I really want to go through the sort of trouble that owning (or at least driving) a car will entail. Apparently UAS has a lot of openings available at student housing this semester, and if they still have any in mid-March I'd only have to pay half of the usual $1750. That's essentially what I was paying for rent at Ian's, and I'm apparently old enough that they won't require me to buy the meal plan...of course, that'll mean busing/walking all over the place again, but...
Man, I'm starting to miss being a kid and not having to worry about all this stuff.
Side note: I have Nathan's business card around here somewhere, so I'm going to have to send him something nice from Amazon.com as a thank-you for driving me all over the place this morning. He said that he loved flying, so maybe a book on planes...
