...I'm just going to read this.
I'm currently in Rawlins, Wyoming. I was heading out to Ogden Utah for some shows with the Bucket Boys last week, and on Thursday right before getting back on the interstate in Rawlins, the car decided it didn't want to go anymore. I was towed from a Holiday Inn Express parking lot to pretty much right across the street to the Sinclair gas station, where the only mechanic in town works (well, there are a couple others but they refused to look at the car upon hearing it was "foreign").
Larry the mechanic looked at my car and said, "A Volkswagen, huh? Hitler died 50 years ago and we're still supporting him". This did not invoke much sense of security or confidence in me for my little car. As I waited for him to look at the car, I got to talking with a couple who saw my Kalamazoo College sticker in my window. They asked what I was doing sitting on the bench outside the gas station. I told them. They kinda nodded and said, "yeah, we're here with a woman and her son who broke down last week. I think they'll get on the road today. Our church and another church have been helping them out."
I had never contemplated the fact that a car repair could take more than a day or so.
I told Larry the problem, and he said it sounded like a fuel filter. We got that installed, got the car started, I let it run a little bit and took off out of the parking lot. I had just merged onto I-80 when the car sputtered and died again. In a construction zone. I got it off the road as much I could and called the tow man to bring it back to Larry. As I waited for the tow, a pickup truck pulled over that had two people in it--a very pregnant woman and a guy about my age with three teeth. In his slow Wyoming drawl he asked, "so what's the problem?" I told him, he gave me a couple suggestions to try, and then said, "You LDS [Latter Day Saints - Mormon]?" I said, "no sir, Catholic." And with that, he and his wife looked at each other knowingly and said, "that's too bad. If you were LDS, we coulda helped a little more" and took off.
Larry's best guess is that it is the fuel pump. But he didn't have that part. He said he could order it for $580 + labor, but it wouldn't get there until Monday or Tuesday. That's when I started to stress out a little bit, more about the time than the money. The good thing was, my parents were coming out for this show and then continuing on to a vacation around the national parks in Utah and Colorado, and were a couple hours behind me.
Larry'd never worked on a Volkwagen before. The only one in town who had is on vacation for two weeks. Larry's wife who owns the gas station called her sister in Rock Springs (100 miles away from Rawlins) who owns a Volkswagen and asked where she got her car serviced. She said she took it to Ogden. Which was where I was trying to get.
We checked into the hotel next door to the gas station to brainstorm plans.
1. Buy a tow hitch package to attach my car to my parents' minivan to get it to Ogden, then stay with my aunt until it was fixed. [this wouldn't work because we would have waited until Monday to get the two hitch for my parents' car]
2. Pay for my car to be towed to Ogden and stay with my aunt until it was fixed. [this was nixed when we found out it would be $980 to be towed 250 miles]
3. Rent a Uhaul truck with a trailer and I could drive my own car to Ogden and drop off my car to be fixed and stay with my aunt. [this was nixed when there weren't any Uhaul trucks with trailers available in town, and the closest one available was in Rock Springs, but wouldn't get to me until Friday afternoon]
4. Junk the car. [I nixed this one. I'm too attached to Gatsby]
5. Order the part, ride with my parents to Ogden, play the shows, then have the Bucket Boys drop me off in Rawlins on their way back to Minnesota, and wait until the car was done.
2. Pay for my car to be towed to Ogden and stay with my aunt until it was fixed. [this was nixed when we found out it would be $980 to be towed 250 miles]
3. Rent a Uhaul truck with a trailer and I could drive my own car to Ogden and drop off my car to be fixed and stay with my aunt. [this was nixed when there weren't any Uhaul trucks with trailers available in town, and the closest one available was in Rock Springs, but wouldn't get to me until Friday afternoon]
4. Junk the car. [I nixed this one. I'm too attached to Gatsby]
5. Order the part, ride with my parents to Ogden, play the shows, then have the Bucket Boys drop me off in Rawlins on their way back to Minnesota, and wait until the car was done.
Number five is what I decided to do. I called Checker auto parts who said that they didn't have the part in stock, and couldn't even order it because it was an Advanced Auto Parts part (they share an online database). The closest Advanced Auto store was in Laramie. I called them, and they didn't have the part either. It would have to come from the warehouse in Kansas City, Missouri, then they could express it over to the mechanic here. But it wouldn't get her until Monday.
And that's what I did.
As I type, I'm sitting in the lobby of the Quality Inn in Rawlins since I had to check out of my room at eleven. The part arrived about 11 AM, and Larry is currently working on the dreaded Hitler car. One of two things is going to happen.
He's going to get it running here, and I'll get on the road soon.
He's not going to be able to fix it, and I'll be stuck in Rawlins for an indeterminate amount of time.
I'm banking on the former.
But at least it's not a bat in my hair.
And I'm wearing really cute shorts today.
Posted by allegralingo
at 13:31 CDT
