What a Day

So I took off for work, right on time. I got about half way there and my battery light came on. I hoped that I could nurse it to work. I very quickly began to lose power and couldn't even get up to the 35mph speed limit. Then I began to notice smoke coming from under the hood. So I pulled inot the Tractor Supply parking lot.

I called Nelson's work and asked if someone could have him call me ASAP. Then I called the son who lives the next farm up from where I watch Ma'am. He offered to come get me. Nelson called and suggested that I nurse the car over to the Jeep dealership (about a half mile away, but within sight from where I was). The son agreed to follow me over. The car started, but as soon as I pulled back out onto the street I had no transmission. The Chevy part of the Jeep dealership was a stones throw away, but it was painful to get there. I went to pull into their lot but couldn't even get it up the drive.

So there I was half hanging into the stree (one of the busiest 4 lane streets in town). The son put on his 4-ways and called his son who has a 1 ton truck to come and tow my car over to the Jeep part of the dealership. Since his son was on the way Son offered to stay with my Jeep and let me take his car over to Ma'am's.

I agreed and hopped into his car, a cadillac (AKA big boat on wheels). When I got in I had two options. First, I could keep heading the way I was and take the back road over. The only part of this that made sense was that it was the way I was facing OR I could do a u-turn and go the way I had been heading. I opted to go the way I was facing. Bad choice.

We've had LOTS of snow, but I thought by now the road would be cleared. I was wrong. I decided I would probably be ok and would just take it slow and easy. I met several cars and then it happened. I got over to let a car by and got caught on a patch of icy snow. Next thing I knew I was sliding into the ditch which was deep and full of snow. There I was then, sitting practically on my side.

I sat there and cried and then there was a weird change that was more of a mixture of crying and laughging. Once I composed myself I called Son and said, "Son, it's just not my day. I'm on Smith road and I'm in a ditch." He was so calm and said he'd be there in a couple minutes with his son's truck to pull it out. They showed up, I crawled out of the car and they pulled it out, making it look way too easy.

Good news was that the car gently slid into the ditch and it wasn't damaged at all. It was about 8:30 when I arrived at Ma'am's. Any other day this wouldn't have been a problem, but today she was up early and fixing her breakfast. She was in a snit because I was late. I was starting to feel like I couldn't win for losing.

Beth came and got me from work and brought me home where I watched Asher for a bit while she ran some errands. She came back. Nelson came home and took his afterwork shower (aka scrubbing off the graphite). While he was showering I got ready to go to Curves to work out. When I went out to the garage I noticed a red trail in the snow where I had backed out to go to work. My car was dying even then.

I had a really good work out. That's three really intense good workouts this week! I was feeling pretty good when I got home. I walked in and Nelson asked, "Are you going to start crying?" I knew that the car repair shop had called, but that wasn't the latest problem. He was standing at the sink and we had no water pressure, which as we watched became we had no water.

Looks like we have a water main break down the street. What are we going to do without water? I have to be at work at Curves at 5:15, which already is a burden to the family since Nelson will have to get up early to take me to work.

As for the car...the previous owners put a mechanism on the transmission to cool it but the were supposed to flare it out somehow and they didn't and today all the transmission fluid leaked out. Now the potential good news is that if there is no damage to the transmission it'll only be about $250 to fix it. Given the way the day is going, Nelson isn't holding out too much hope, but I've been praying that I didn't do any major damage in the move from Tractor Supply to the dealership.

"Edit" Then tonight I got an email from one of the associate pastors at church, since only about a dozen people are picking up the devotional guides they wondered if I wanted to stop writing them. It was up to me. I could tell that the pastor was being gracious so I agreed to stop writing since "all things run their course." I'm sad because I really enoyed the challenge of writing a devotional thoufht for every day and it was good for me spiritually as well--besides it was one of only things left that felt like I was involved in ministry.

Tomorrow is Asher's birthday. His being three reminds me that time passes quickly--this kind of day will pass. And maybe tomorrow there will be water so I can get a shower.

It truly feels like Alexander's Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.