When I woke up this morning, I didn't think anything unusual would happen. I just thought it would be a normal day off. (At junior high, we get Fall break! If only I had that when I was in middle school!)
Oh how the turn tables.
I guess it all started two days ago. Or really, it started 4 months ago, the day after my last day of work at I.S., when our car decided it had fulfilled its duty and would chug along no more. Since then, we have been working on getting it fixed. Months of aggravating slow-ups when the only thing standing between you and getting that dang part off was a rusted out, stripped bolt in a horrible place you could barely reach. And when almost ALL of your bolts you had to get off fit that description, it makes the process slow. Very slow. There were many times I wondered if we would ever even get to the head gaskets, seriously doubting that we would.
Well, we eventually DID make it to the gaskets! We had to take some shortcuts when there were some bolts that really were impossible to get off. But alas, we still did it. We had the rest of our greasy engine strewn about in the back of our truck as well as through our living room and kitchen. We also had tools strewn around for awhile. To use the table to prepare food on, we were required to lean over the head and as well as other huge engine parts. It was not the cleanest, or most appealing way to live.
Then came the putting back together. This went much faster than tearing apart. We got new gaskets, new spark plugs, it was coming together nicely. We even managed to keep track of where all the bolts went that had been removed. By Tuesday, two days ago, we officially had everything back on. (Well, almost everything. There is one tube that has mysteriously...disappeared. Can't find it anywhere. BUT, the car should still be able to start without it, and we can worry about getting it after we actually know that the car WILL start).
But....two days ago, Tuesday, I came home from work to find a ticket in our windshield. (Keep in mind I have been extra careful this summer to keep our tires clear of leaves and debris so the car didn't look abandoned so it wouldn't get marked for towing. That happened to us once already, on our first car. My first car. The Sundance. This was before we bought this 4Runner.) But, this ticket was not towing related. It was because our tabs were expired.
Sigh.
Our tabs expired in August. Unfortunately, Utah requires you to renew your safety and emmissions tests EVERY YEAR!!! Who does that! And, we couldn't really pass either of these tests without being able to get our car to the place to get it tested. And, even IF they passed us on emissions (because, how much emissions comes out of an off car? ZERO!) We wouldn't have passed safety because some genius punkface decided to smash out our driver's window while it was parked on the street. So, since we couldn't get those tests passed, we couldn't get new tabs. We have been fine since August, until Tuesday, 2 days ago.
I thought about fighting it, because our apartment won't let us park our cars in the parking lot if it's not currently running. So we HAD to park it on the street, where it got the ticket. But then I just decided to pay it because I figured the city wouldn't care and would just say "It's your responsibility, if it's on the street, it has to be current." So I paid it. They gave us 5 days to pay before it doubled, and 11 days to pay before it tripled. I paid it the very next day to make sure I wouldn't forget.
Since Tuesday, we have been trying to get the car started. But we just can't. It tries and tries, but just won't go all the way. We tried tweaking everything we could think of, nothing will work. We have no idea what is preventing it from starting.
Now we're finally up to the present. Today, 2 days after Tuesday, we get ANOTHER ticket. For the same thing. AUGH! I'm so angry because they gave us 5 DAYS to pay the first one, but apparently not to get it taken care of! So this time I decided to try to fight it. I send an email trying to explain how they had to give us more time to get it taken care of then 2 DAYS, and that we were in the process of getting it moved. The policy said I should have a response within 10 business days.
5 minutes later, I got a response. DENIED. "If your car is parked on the city's street, it has to be current." UGH. Talk about no human feelings and just trying to make money as fast as possible.
So now what do we do. We can't move it off the street into the parking lot because it doesn't run. We can't leave it on the street because it has expired tabs. We can't get new tabs because it doesn't run. We can't get it to run. If we leave it out here for one more day, we're just going to keep getting tickets, over and over and over. I hate Provo, and do not want to keep sending them my money.
This was around 4:00 PM today. So, we decided to do the only thing we could think of doing: calling a tow company to take it away forever. But, in the meantime (because we needed it gone pronto, not in a few days) I thought, heck, what's the harm in trying to put it on KSL and calling a towing company at the same time. That way, if by chance, someone really wants it they can come by and we can get a few dollars out of it.
One minute after I posted it on KSL, I had a phone call. He asked what the exterior condition was like. Not so good. He hung up.
Three minutes after that, I had another call. He probably wanted it. He would call his cousin and then call me back.
Five minutes go by: He calls me back. He definitely wants it. He is very concerned about getting me to promise it to him and making sure we have a deal so I won't sell it out from under him. Having had that happen to me a few times, I know just how frustrating it can be and would never do that to someone else. I tell him he can have it. He offers me 50 bucks under my asking price. I say heck yes (I thought it might be a little too high, apparently not). He says he's coming from Salt Lake and will be here at 6. I don't go play volleyball (which I usually do at that time of night on Thursday nights) to wait for him.
At 6, I get another phone call. He wants the car too. I tell him I already have someone interested who is coming by. He says "Well, does he just want to look at it? Or is he going to buy it?" I say "He said he was going to buy it." I think to myself, what if I said he was just looking, would you have said you wanted it and come straight over? I will never know. I tell him I will call him if it doesn't work out with the first guy. Now I feel even better because I have a backup plan. When we tried to sell our Sundance, we had one scammer try to scam us, and we had another guy say he definately wanted it and would come by in a few days, but never did. So I'm a little wary about people not coming by.
7:00 rolls around. He's not here yet. I call him. He says he's on his way.
7:30: Another phone call from a third person. He wants to know if I would be interested in trading it for something. I say "I haven't really thought about that, but what would you be thinking?" I'm thinking some type of car. He's thinking his cards with store credit and extra credit cards..... I say "Um, well I have someone else coming, so if he doesn't take it I'll call you back and we can talk." (Please oh please work out with one of the first two guys so I don't have to work something out with trading man!)
Finally, at 8:00, right when the Office starts, he shows up. He looks it over. He gives me cash. I give him the keys. It is no longer ours. Though as of right now it is still parked outside our window so I can longingly gaze at it. But any minute now a tow truck should be pulling up to take it away. Forever.
Though we are both sad that it just didn't work out and we couldn't get it working again, I think we are both happy with the service it DID do for us during its working life. If it weren't for that car, we wouldn't have been able to move to where we did. If it weren't for that car, we wouldn't have been able to bring home....all....of our furniture that we bought once we moved here. (Our last place was fully furnished, this place was not.) If it weren't for that car, we wouldn't have been able to learn a ton about engines. I now know what a head is and looks like! As well as fuel injectors, camshafts, crankshafts, spark plugs...the list goes on and on.
So long car. Thank you for taking me to work and back until my last day.
Oh how the turn tables.
I guess it all started two days ago. Or really, it started 4 months ago, the day after my last day of work at I.S., when our car decided it had fulfilled its duty and would chug along no more. Since then, we have been working on getting it fixed. Months of aggravating slow-ups when the only thing standing between you and getting that dang part off was a rusted out, stripped bolt in a horrible place you could barely reach. And when almost ALL of your bolts you had to get off fit that description, it makes the process slow. Very slow. There were many times I wondered if we would ever even get to the head gaskets, seriously doubting that we would.
Well, we eventually DID make it to the gaskets! We had to take some shortcuts when there were some bolts that really were impossible to get off. But alas, we still did it. We had the rest of our greasy engine strewn about in the back of our truck as well as through our living room and kitchen. We also had tools strewn around for awhile. To use the table to prepare food on, we were required to lean over the head and as well as other huge engine parts. It was not the cleanest, or most appealing way to live.
Then came the putting back together. This went much faster than tearing apart. We got new gaskets, new spark plugs, it was coming together nicely. We even managed to keep track of where all the bolts went that had been removed. By Tuesday, two days ago, we officially had everything back on. (Well, almost everything. There is one tube that has mysteriously...disappeared. Can't find it anywhere. BUT, the car should still be able to start without it, and we can worry about getting it after we actually know that the car WILL start).
But....two days ago, Tuesday, I came home from work to find a ticket in our windshield. (Keep in mind I have been extra careful this summer to keep our tires clear of leaves and debris so the car didn't look abandoned so it wouldn't get marked for towing. That happened to us once already, on our first car. My first car. The Sundance. This was before we bought this 4Runner.) But, this ticket was not towing related. It was because our tabs were expired.
Sigh.
Our tabs expired in August. Unfortunately, Utah requires you to renew your safety and emmissions tests EVERY YEAR!!! Who does that! And, we couldn't really pass either of these tests without being able to get our car to the place to get it tested. And, even IF they passed us on emissions (because, how much emissions comes out of an off car? ZERO!) We wouldn't have passed safety because some genius punkface decided to smash out our driver's window while it was parked on the street. So, since we couldn't get those tests passed, we couldn't get new tabs. We have been fine since August, until Tuesday, 2 days ago.
I thought about fighting it, because our apartment won't let us park our cars in the parking lot if it's not currently running. So we HAD to park it on the street, where it got the ticket. But then I just decided to pay it because I figured the city wouldn't care and would just say "It's your responsibility, if it's on the street, it has to be current." So I paid it. They gave us 5 days to pay before it doubled, and 11 days to pay before it tripled. I paid it the very next day to make sure I wouldn't forget.
Since Tuesday, we have been trying to get the car started. But we just can't. It tries and tries, but just won't go all the way. We tried tweaking everything we could think of, nothing will work. We have no idea what is preventing it from starting.
Now we're finally up to the present. Today, 2 days after Tuesday, we get ANOTHER ticket. For the same thing. AUGH! I'm so angry because they gave us 5 DAYS to pay the first one, but apparently not to get it taken care of! So this time I decided to try to fight it. I send an email trying to explain how they had to give us more time to get it taken care of then 2 DAYS, and that we were in the process of getting it moved. The policy said I should have a response within 10 business days.
5 minutes later, I got a response. DENIED. "If your car is parked on the city's street, it has to be current." UGH. Talk about no human feelings and just trying to make money as fast as possible.
So now what do we do. We can't move it off the street into the parking lot because it doesn't run. We can't leave it on the street because it has expired tabs. We can't get new tabs because it doesn't run. We can't get it to run. If we leave it out here for one more day, we're just going to keep getting tickets, over and over and over. I hate Provo, and do not want to keep sending them my money.
This was around 4:00 PM today. So, we decided to do the only thing we could think of doing: calling a tow company to take it away forever. But, in the meantime (because we needed it gone pronto, not in a few days) I thought, heck, what's the harm in trying to put it on KSL and calling a towing company at the same time. That way, if by chance, someone really wants it they can come by and we can get a few dollars out of it.
One minute after I posted it on KSL, I had a phone call. He asked what the exterior condition was like. Not so good. He hung up.
Three minutes after that, I had another call. He probably wanted it. He would call his cousin and then call me back.
Five minutes go by: He calls me back. He definitely wants it. He is very concerned about getting me to promise it to him and making sure we have a deal so I won't sell it out from under him. Having had that happen to me a few times, I know just how frustrating it can be and would never do that to someone else. I tell him he can have it. He offers me 50 bucks under my asking price. I say heck yes (I thought it might be a little too high, apparently not). He says he's coming from Salt Lake and will be here at 6. I don't go play volleyball (which I usually do at that time of night on Thursday nights) to wait for him.
At 6, I get another phone call. He wants the car too. I tell him I already have someone interested who is coming by. He says "Well, does he just want to look at it? Or is he going to buy it?" I say "He said he was going to buy it." I think to myself, what if I said he was just looking, would you have said you wanted it and come straight over? I will never know. I tell him I will call him if it doesn't work out with the first guy. Now I feel even better because I have a backup plan. When we tried to sell our Sundance, we had one scammer try to scam us, and we had another guy say he definately wanted it and would come by in a few days, but never did. So I'm a little wary about people not coming by.
7:00 rolls around. He's not here yet. I call him. He says he's on his way.
7:30: Another phone call from a third person. He wants to know if I would be interested in trading it for something. I say "I haven't really thought about that, but what would you be thinking?" I'm thinking some type of car. He's thinking his cards with store credit and extra credit cards..... I say "Um, well I have someone else coming, so if he doesn't take it I'll call you back and we can talk." (Please oh please work out with one of the first two guys so I don't have to work something out with trading man!)
Finally, at 8:00, right when the Office starts, he shows up. He looks it over. He gives me cash. I give him the keys. It is no longer ours. Though as of right now it is still parked outside our window so I can longingly gaze at it. But any minute now a tow truck should be pulling up to take it away. Forever.
Though we are both sad that it just didn't work out and we couldn't get it working again, I think we are both happy with the service it DID do for us during its working life. If it weren't for that car, we wouldn't have been able to move to where we did. If it weren't for that car, we wouldn't have been able to bring home....all....of our furniture that we bought once we moved here. (Our last place was fully furnished, this place was not.) If it weren't for that car, we wouldn't have been able to learn a ton about engines. I now know what a head is and looks like! As well as fuel injectors, camshafts, crankshafts, spark plugs...the list goes on and on.
So long car. Thank you for taking me to work and back until my last day.
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