And Then There Was One.

Since Leslie's parents live with us, it is a necessity that we have three cars. I have the Big Red Car to get to work, Leslie has Stella the Van to get Julia to school, and Leslie's mom has the Taurus to take her to her job. Each vehicle did its job and all was right with the world.

Until last week.

Last Monday, the car of Leslie mom gave up the ghost and went to that big graveyard in the sky. No worries, the holidays were coming up, Julia was off school for a few weeks and I have some vacation time coming up - so she could use Leslie's van to get to and from work until around the third week of January. There was plenty of time to figure out a plan by then.

Until last Friday.

Stella got sick. She just managed to get Julia to school before deciding that she could not go any further. Luckily, I got AAA to save the day and they arraigned a local tow service to take Stella to the repair shop that we have personally kept in business with the repairs they have done to Stella over the last few years.

Only we apparently didn't do a good enough job of keeping them in business as we were greeted with new owners in our familiar establishment. Apparently, they only had one mechanic on duty, but they were not busy and went right to work on Stella. Leslie and I left our contact numbers and patiently awaited information on Stella's well being.

For two hours on Friday. And for most of Monday.

Now mind you, we were told that he would come in on Saturday to fix anything he doesn't get done on Friday. So I call him on Monday and this is the response I get:

I don't know what the problem is. I've been pulling my hair out over it.

I called again yesterday - Same response. It has now become painstakingly clear that we will not have this vehicle until next week.

Meanwhile Leslie drove her mom to Wheeling (70 miles) Sunday night so she would be able stay at "the house that will not sell" and go to work Monday morning. Once we figured Bubba Ray the mechanic would rather pull out his hair than fix our van yesterday - Leslie again made the trek down to Wheeling, picked up her mother and brought her home, then drove me into work (55 miles) and then returning - the latter trip happening during a semi-ice storm.

Yep, the Big Red Car put on alot of miles this week. PLEASE stay together a little longer...

On that note, thought I would give you a shot of holiday lights to the tune of "Rusty Chevrolet" by Da Yoopers (Ironically, a make of car that we do not own). Consider it like kissing your Uncle Fred or Aunt Edna under the mistletoe.