A hell of a day
So, today has pretty much sucked. I have the apartment to myself for a week, as S is off in Texas seeing family, and some old college friends. The apartment, however, is a bit of a mess. There's a lot of cleaning up, and packing up, and rearranging that needs to be done around here, and I'm kind of putting it off.
The day started out without hot water. I talked to our pseudo-resident manager (but not really) about it, and he tried to relight the pilot. Having no luck, he called the gas company, who then sent somebody out to relight it. We were told they would show up "some time before 8:00 pm."
Our prm(bnr) then had to leave to go get married, and asked me to keep an eye out for the gas man. I had wanted to run out to pick up a new tea infuser to replace my old one, so I drove out to the Glendale mall, a few miles away. As my car has a repaired flat (which needs to be replaced, I decided to take S's truck. The truck is a twenty year old Mazda pickup. I'm sometimes amazed that it functions.
Well, just as I got to the mall, the truck, which hasn't been running all that well to begin with lately, began rattling quite badly, and smelling of burning oil. I parked the truck and went in to grab the infuser, and get back home as soon as possible.
I started her back up, and while she ran, she was still sounding and smelling pretty bad, but home was only a few miles, using a fairly quick and simple route (that happened to include a short trip on the southbound 5, just enough to get to the next exit.
The entrance ramp I was using, the Colorado Blvd. entrance, is a sharp, descending turn that rather forces you down to below 30 MPH, followed by a (maybe, *maybe*) seventy foot long blind entrance lane that merges immediately with south bound traffic on one of the fastest and busiest stretches of combined trucking and civilian freeway traffic in the country. It is a dangerous, demanding and accident prone ramp on its best of days. I personally dislike traveling in either of the two right hand lanes of that stretch of the freeway, just because of the way it affects traffic. Most travelers on that stretch of the 5 don't seem to be very aware of the problem, however.
As I coasted down the sharp curve this afternoon, and into the entry lane, S's truck completely stalled out. The engine just stopped. Instead of accelerating as I should have been doing, I was coasting to a stop -- a machine gun stream of traffic barreling at full speed to my left, where the lane was about to dump, and a pile of other cars expecting to speed up behind me. I tried turning it over a few times, and got nothing at all. A look at the dash revealed the temperature gauge to be pegged. I rolled to a stop just outside the lane marker, facing the bridge wall of the overpass I had just used to enter the freeway ramp behind me, in probably the only possible space a vehicle could find to park in that particular vicinity, but not really where you call "out of harm's way." A lot of people entering the freeway at that point use at least some of the space I was occupying as an extra ten feet or so of ramp, since there's such a narrowed window of space and time to enter traffic moving at full speed.
I tried turning the engine over, but of course found no luck. Grabbing my phone and keys, I hopped out the passenger side door and tried to figure out who to call. It took me several minutes, way too long, and a couple other aborted calls that produced no help to figure out that I should just call 911. I was shortly connected with a California Highway Patrol dispatch operator and explained my location and situation to him, and he said he'd send a service vehicle (tow truck) and patrol car as soon as he could.
Thus began the rather nail-biting wait for one or the other of those vehicles to show up. Eventually, probably half an hour later, the patrol car showed up, and was able to guard my back long enough for me to get the truck started and on to the freeway. I took the next exit, and did my best to get the car all the way back home. I got in on to my street, to the bottom of the hill I live on, and she stalled out overheated and burning oil again. Thankfully, there was a very generous tow truck driver right there, just finishing up with somebody else, who towed me to the top of the hill. A few hours later, I was able to start the truck up long enough to get it in the parking spot.
I think the truck is pretty much fried. And right now, I can't really afford to tow the truck to a mechanic, let alone pay for the repairs (if it's even worth it). And S certainly can't afford those things, either.
The day started out without hot water. I talked to our pseudo-resident manager (but not really) about it, and he tried to relight the pilot. Having no luck, he called the gas company, who then sent somebody out to relight it. We were told they would show up "some time before 8:00 pm."
Our prm(bnr) then had to leave to go get married, and asked me to keep an eye out for the gas man. I had wanted to run out to pick up a new tea infuser to replace my old one, so I drove out to the Glendale mall, a few miles away. As my car has a repaired flat (which needs to be replaced, I decided to take S's truck. The truck is a twenty year old Mazda pickup. I'm sometimes amazed that it functions.
Well, just as I got to the mall, the truck, which hasn't been running all that well to begin with lately, began rattling quite badly, and smelling of burning oil. I parked the truck and went in to grab the infuser, and get back home as soon as possible.
I started her back up, and while she ran, she was still sounding and smelling pretty bad, but home was only a few miles, using a fairly quick and simple route (that happened to include a short trip on the southbound 5, just enough to get to the next exit.
The entrance ramp I was using, the Colorado Blvd. entrance, is a sharp, descending turn that rather forces you down to below 30 MPH, followed by a (maybe, *maybe*) seventy foot long blind entrance lane that merges immediately with south bound traffic on one of the fastest and busiest stretches of combined trucking and civilian freeway traffic in the country. It is a dangerous, demanding and accident prone ramp on its best of days. I personally dislike traveling in either of the two right hand lanes of that stretch of the freeway, just because of the way it affects traffic. Most travelers on that stretch of the 5 don't seem to be very aware of the problem, however.
As I coasted down the sharp curve this afternoon, and into the entry lane, S's truck completely stalled out. The engine just stopped. Instead of accelerating as I should have been doing, I was coasting to a stop -- a machine gun stream of traffic barreling at full speed to my left, where the lane was about to dump, and a pile of other cars expecting to speed up behind me. I tried turning it over a few times, and got nothing at all. A look at the dash revealed the temperature gauge to be pegged. I rolled to a stop just outside the lane marker, facing the bridge wall of the overpass I had just used to enter the freeway ramp behind me, in probably the only possible space a vehicle could find to park in that particular vicinity, but not really where you call "out of harm's way." A lot of people entering the freeway at that point use at least some of the space I was occupying as an extra ten feet or so of ramp, since there's such a narrowed window of space and time to enter traffic moving at full speed.
I tried turning the engine over, but of course found no luck. Grabbing my phone and keys, I hopped out the passenger side door and tried to figure out who to call. It took me several minutes, way too long, and a couple other aborted calls that produced no help to figure out that I should just call 911. I was shortly connected with a California Highway Patrol dispatch operator and explained my location and situation to him, and he said he'd send a service vehicle (tow truck) and patrol car as soon as he could.
Thus began the rather nail-biting wait for one or the other of those vehicles to show up. Eventually, probably half an hour later, the patrol car showed up, and was able to guard my back long enough for me to get the truck started and on to the freeway. I took the next exit, and did my best to get the car all the way back home. I got in on to my street, to the bottom of the hill I live on, and she stalled out overheated and burning oil again. Thankfully, there was a very generous tow truck driver right there, just finishing up with somebody else, who towed me to the top of the hill. A few hours later, I was able to start the truck up long enough to get it in the parking spot.
I think the truck is pretty much fried. And right now, I can't really afford to tow the truck to a mechanic, let alone pay for the repairs (if it's even worth it). And S certainly can't afford those things, either.