car repairs, monster truck, visiting parents, no films
This morning, "J" had an appointment. I drove her there and waited. It didn't take long, and went well.
Next, we went to a car repair shop, but first the back-story. Quite some time ago, I noticed an empty washer fluid light on the car. I put off doing anything about it, because Seattle rains provide an abundant supply of natural washer fluid through much of the year. But when we had a stretch of dry weather, rain was not doing the job. I bought some fluid, opened up the hood, poured in fluid - and heard it running out and splashing on the pavement. I took a closer look, and found that the washer fluid vessel had a big crack. With a moment more looking, I discovered that the car's bumper had a big crack too.
I hadn't been in any collisions, so it must have been a parking lot hit-and-run, possibly dodging responsibility, possibly just clueless about the damage done. So, the other day I phoned GEICO and told the story of woe. Unfortunately, any kind of vehicle collision - even one damaged while parked and unoccupied - is counted as a collision claim, not a comprehensive claim. That meant the higher deductible would apply. Anyway, I got an appointment for today, to drop off the car for repairs.
We drove up, went through the paperwork for the repair company, the insurance company, and the rental car company that would provide a service loaner. All were efficient. We gathered essential stuff from the car (most notably our film festival passes), and hauled them to the vehicle the rental car guy had shown me.
The vehicle was huge. It's a Chevrolet Tahoe, a giant SUV. The rental guy said it was a free upgrade because it was their last vehicle, but bigness isn't necessarily an upgrade when I have to find a place to park it. I mentioned that to the rental guy, and he said I could exchange it later when more vehicles returned, ideally on Monday morning. I am not sure when I'll be able to make it to an exchange, given the SIFF schedule.
Update: I didn't have time to make the exchange, but the vehicle (which we dubbed the Monster Truck) was tolerable, and even came in handy for a cargo errand.
We visited parents in Bellevue for a while, and somehow we managed to foul up our film schedule, and saw none of those I had wanted to see: either Human Nature (a documentary about gene editing) or The Extraordinary Journey of Celeste Garcia (a Cuban film with some science fiction elements), and either the drama The Third Wife or the locally-made comedy Good Kisser.