Costly Cars

It's been a potentially expensive couple of days for ol'Joe due to my car. Since I was out in the burbs golfing, I took advantage of being in a lower gasoline tax county and fill up the tank. I still had a few gallons left in the tank, which is an 18.5 gallon tank, but thought it wise to fill up anyway. While filling up, 14.5 gallons worth, I cleaned some bird crap off the car with the window washer squeegee. After finishing with the crap, I turned to the pump since it stopped and there it was....the big 5-0! $50 worth of gas!! Holy crap!! You can't tell me that isn't going to take a huge toll on the economy. I'm NOT looking forward to repeating that event in the near future.

Somehow my car lights didn't turn off last night after I parked my car in my spot. A friend of my upstairs neighbors who knows me and my car, called my neighbors so they could call me and tell me my lights were on. Unfortunately, I got the message too late. Damnit. So today I spent WAY too much time waiting for AAA battery service to come jump my car. Then when they got there, they wanted to sell me a new battery. Now maybe I do need a new battery; in fact I probably do. But get this, they tell me I probably need a new one and I say "It's only five years old." They reply "ONLY five years old! You definitely need a new battery." The battery they want to sell me (and it was a very soft sell job really) comes with a three year full replacement warranty. Well if they have a warranty for three years, a five year old battery CAN'T be that old. I didn't argue with them, but I was pretty sure my battery would be fine for at least a little while. Their new battery was $125 and I just don't know if that's reasonable or not.

While I was watching them work on cleaning the battery, I noticed that most of the engine was actually shaking pretty seriously while the car was idling. That can't be good can it? Sure, parts move and all, but this was really shaking. I hadn't noticed it much before, but when I got in the car I could tell it was really vibrating even inside the car. What's THAT going to cost to fix, if I even need to fix it. Hmmmm, well, better address it now rather than later.

And I don't want to hear about how over in Europe you don't have these problems because everyone rides a bike!

I've been wanting to remember to mention PostSecret.com. It's a truly fascinating site that I like to visit periodically. People send in postcards with secrets on them and this guy posts them anonymously. It's pretty cool. The secrets people have are pretty amazing. Almost every time I check out the site, I start to well up....and I'm not afraid to admit that!

Finally, I have a faithful reader* in and around Slidell, Louisiana. I have no idea who you are!! My childhood buddy, Pete, is on the opposite end of the state, otherwise I would say it's him. Just so it doesn't drive me crazy, please toss me a comment or shoot me an email. Thanks!

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