Well since there isn't any internal arguing this am

I guess I can write on something else.
Car trouble.
I think others can relate.

Anyway... our minivan has given us over 5 years of service. And if you combine it with it's twin we owned before we traded it in for the same van... we've had essentially the same van for 7 years. If you ever want to hear that story, I can dig that one out...

And it has alot of memories, it was functional transportation, and it is paid for which is good for the budget. However.. I've never been filled with 'oh I love my minivan' about it. In fact I've never loved it. I've always had a fantasy about 'when this dies, I'm going to get..(fill in the blank)' however now that that fantasy is closer (the minivan dying part) I'm suddenly not so fast to go buy one.

Why? oh, because our Dave-Ramsey inspired 'new car fund' has about $400 in it and $400 won't get you the registration and fees for a new-to-us car.

So.. here we are. I'm afraid to take it to the shop to get an estimate. Partly because of what I think they'll tell me but largely because when I drive it I start praying hard to get home safely.

(ok mom, this is the part where I assure you it's now permanently parked in the driveway until something changes)

So.. it's been giving me alot of warning signs. About 2 months ago Larry was driving us home from church and he stepped on the gas and it went  'bluuuuugggghhhh' and rather than accelerating nearly stalled out. Like it was out of gas but with 1/2 a tank.

So.. I drove the truck for a week after that incident but after getting myself stuck somewhere that I was praying hard 'Jesus please guide me out of here without running over a compact car or two' I went back to driving the van. First for the really short trips around town then for the ones about 20 minutes away.. and it was behaving fine. well.. except for lack of Air conditioning, but that was fixed last year and for $1000 I can buy a whole lot of cold drinks for us. And well.. it's not like we live in Texas or somewhere you need Air conditioning....

So.. this week I was driving the kids to their end-of school standardized testing and when I hit the breaks the van felt like I was running over a grumble strip. Minus the grumble strip on the road.
And in my panic, I did the math and realized I was closer to their school than home so we went slow, tried not to hit the breaks and when I did hit them gently.. no grumble strip.

OK... so... that was last week and things were going ok. Mostly. And I didn't really go anywhere. Larry thought it might be my CV joint. We know the shocks are bad and the transmission has been shifting really hard but still shifting (cept for that one time and we'd forgiven it for that..) and without $3000 in our car repair fund or enough in the new car fund I was going to limp this van along a big longer..

This week I had to do the library run, a milk run and a few other errands. And while I've been going between the van and truck, yesterday I "had" to take the van. Because I was going to the library on a farmer's market day which means.. parking trouble. And my parking the truck takes about 500 backing up and straightening out IF I haven't already taken out someone's bumper with the side of the truck in the process.  I realize it's because space is at a premium here, ther's a pesky smog problem and most people should be driving Prius's. However.. if you do the math, I can fit 3 prius's and their cargo in my truck, so I can get 1/3 their gas mileage and come out ahead. so I win. Wish they's see it that way....

Anyway.. because I need a turning radius of 1/2 a football field to get straight into a parking space on the first 3 trys and because the parking radius is perfect for a Prius or Civic at the parking garage at the library I took the van, which I can park on the first try. Usually.

And all was going well until I went to brake and I started looking wildly around for the jet that MUST be landing on my roof. Or at the very least the HUGE semi bearing down on my rear. Nothing. A Mercedes behind me and no jet overhead. humph. not good sign. not a good sign at all.

Pull into Lowes put the windows down and hear a 'grind-grind-grind-grind' with each wheel revolution. Which vaguely reminds me of the time my civic had cv joint issues or brake issues. I don't remember which it was. Perhaps both. It was a bad year for my civic that year.

Debate taking the bus home and leaving the van in the Lowe's parking lot with a 'please steal me' sign taped to the window.

Go into Lowes, return something Larry had bough that had been sitting in the van for the better part of 2 months waiting for me to remember to return it and debate the bus vs drive back roads home decision.

And it got home with that jet just waiting for me to brake to turn my roof into a miniature air craft carrier landing strip. Pulled it into the driveway and emptied it out. of everything.
Took 2 hours to empty it, scrub it, shampoo the rugs and take pictures for craigslist.

And tell Larry about the Jet plane that night.
He tells me 'oh, that's the rear brakes, I should be able to fix that this weekend'

So the van is given a stay of execution for now. But the ad is written. I can add "need to tow away" should the brake repair turn into a nightmare.

And in the mean time I think I need those training wheel flags- tape them to the 4 corners of the truck so I can get a feel for where the ends are and not run anything else over.

Anything else? oh. you noticed that?

Last year when the AC was broken and we had an unusual hot spell I was driving the truck. And decided I needed to go to Old Navy. No, not that I needed to go, but we were driving by and the kids needed something.... and there was a big one-day sale

Anyway.. one day sale+southern ca= few open parking spaces.

So rather than park 1 mile away I tried to get into a parking spot and scraped the Toyota next to me. She didn't come out so I had to leave her a note. I was sweating that for 2 weeks when she finally called me and told me 'it wasn't a big deal to her, but thank you for being honest' phew. I'm sure the next time the next someone won't be so forgiving about it.  So now I park miles away if possible. And when there aren't 2 spaces open next to each other in a parking lot I sweat lots and lots of bullets.