2/24/2011

Stephen's car...again!

Last Friday Stephen took his turn driving to work. His sister Sue had been driving for several days, as in all week. We picked up the car from the shop the Saturday before and Stephen had to work late a couple days of the week. So, Friday he says he'll drive and does. They get to work, everything is great. When it's time to go home, they get to the freeway. As Stephen is going up the ramp, the transmission makes a huge clunk! noise. He got off the freeway at the next exit, which is 600 N. in Salt Lake. He used Susan's phone to call me and tell me where they were and asked me to come get them...and tow them home.
I've towed a car before, it's not easy but doable. I almost called my Dad but remembered he would've been too tired cuz of his work schedule. I almost called Stephen's Dad, but decided I needed to get there soon so they weren't stranded for more than an hour.
Poor Beck's was sick, but watched the kids anyway. (Big THANK YOU to her.) I drove out to Salt Lake after filling up with gas, don't want to have that kind of problem as well ;). I got there in record speed which I owe all to Heavenly Father for making it a safe drive. I prayed the whole way there.
Once I found them, we got the tow rope out, hooked up the Olds to the Durango and off we went. I forgot how nerve racking it is at first, but was able to do this. (White knuckles and all.) I even put it in 4 wheel drive cuz "someone" didn't know what I was doing for a bit. Either way, we drove slow, on the freeway, to 12th St. We were even passed by a UHP and he didn't bother us at all.
Thankfully this all happened between 8 and 10 p.m. Not a lot of traffic, no problems. We got home, and I had pulled them a little too far ahead of our parking stalls so I had to push my husbands car back a bit so he could get into the stall. His car could probably limp around at a max speed of 20 m.p.h. but, most likely the transmission would fall off the vehicle, hahaha. I'm tellin' ya, the little lime green camaro sittin' on wall ave is lookin' better and better every time I pass it.
I was a hero that day, but not only to my husband and sis-in-law, but to our neighbor. Earlier that evening, I drove him to his truck, jumped it, followed him till it died, jumped it again, then again cuz it wouldn't suck up the charge. I told him to turn off his head lights and we are going to let it charge up for 5 minutes at least. I took off the cables, slammed down the hood of the truck and told him to go for it. He was going to be going downhill so that would get him closer to home. He made it home easy enough, but his little truck died just before the parking stalls- yeesh what is it with parking stalls? I pushed his truck into the parking stall and he was so very, very grateful!! He's a nice guy who knows zilch about vehicles so, not a big deal, just trying to help people out.
I did drop home economics to take auto-mechanics so I kinda can do some things. It's kinda cool being able to do things like jumping cars, changing brakes and oil. I'm pretty sure my Dad felt safer knowing that I knew how to do other things when he wasn't around.
Now, we just need to figure out what kind of car we're going to get that will help Stephen get to S.L. everyday and not putter out on him...bah, I hate buying a newer car. The lime green one is way too much for us. Bah!!!

1 comment:

Julie w said...

I know of one for 1000.00. It's only an 80 something but it only has 111,000 miles on it. Interested? email me.. pilotjwood@yahoo.com
Only been owned by two people and the last person to own it, fixes up old cars for a hobby. So, I'm assuming he's kept this thing up and running well.