There's the GoKart, my little grey sporty looking thing. I love it. It's adorable. And uninsured.
There's my Mom's Evilnox. It's insured because my mom wants to keep it on the road, but since she has no place to park it at her new condo it lives at my house. In return for my car babysitting skills (easiest babysitting job ever) I get to drive it around.
And then there's the Trusty Buick. That's Cookie's car. It's been having heater issues, but it's cool because the heat blows just fine on the highest setting, even if the lower settings blow no heat at all.
We often joke about how if something goes wrong with the Buick we don't have to worry because of our stable of back-up cars, just waiting to spring into action.
So... recently we've been experiencing a bit of a cold snap. Last Friday when I tried to start the Evilnox (after digging it out of a two foot deep snow drift), it didn't start. Which sucked, but it's not the end of the world. We figured that we'd get around to jumping it eventually when the temperature ventured back into the above zero range.
Now, due to the non-starting car and the uninsured car and our lack of laundry-doing facilities at home, Cookie ran out of clothes. Also not a big deal. On Thursday we loaded the laundry into the Buick and set off.
The plan was: I drop him at work, go do laundry, run some errands, and eventually pick him up when his shift ended.
What actually happened: On the coldest damn day of the year (4 above, wind chill hovering in the negative teens), we set off. Deciding that we were hungry and in need of nibbles, we stopped to grab a burger at Wendy's.
I turned down the heat because it's loud and when I worked fast food I hated trying to decipher what someone was ordering when I couldn't hear them over their heater/music/screaming kids... I was being thoughtful.
And then, the heat didn't turn back on.
Longest, coldest drive ever. 30 minutes to Cookie's work and 40 minutes home.
After defrosting my feet/hands/face I figured that I'd finally go and jump the Evilnox. I dig out the two foot drift in front of the car, shovel off the hood, stick my hand in there to release the latch... And nothing. The latch won't move. The hood stays firmly shut. Cookie laughs via text at my weak girl fingers.
I go back inside, thaw out once more, and listen to Cookie's ideas about What Is Wrong With The Car. He thinks it's the Blower Motor Resistor and can I go pick one up? Sure I can.
And hey, maybe it's this HVAC relay thing, so how about I get one of those as well?
So I head uptown (which is actually, oddly, south of us), nearly freeze to death, acquire the parts, and head home.
Being slightly car-savvy, I replaced the relay thingy with ease. I was hoping that would do the trick... It didn't. So I stand there, looking at the car, at the ice on my driveway, all while trying to keep my back to the wind... How the hell am I supposed to replace this other part without getting frostbite?
My mom has a garage! Yay, mom! It'll be ass cold, but at least there won't be any wind.
More super-cold driving and I've got the Buick tucked up snug as a bug in a rug. The garage was much smaller than I remember it being. Thankfully, with the driver's side of the car right up against the wall I can open the passenger side door all the way- Which I need to do because this stupid Blower Motor Resistor is up under the dash on that side.
More good news! Because it was laundry day and all the dirty laundry is in the car I don't have to actually sit on the concrete floor, though my towels may never fully recover.
I'm thinking this should be easy. I watched a few youtube videos, I found a blog with pictures, I'm not totally inept... Then I encountered The Christmas Tree Peg Things From Hell.
Cookie says it looks like a butt plug from hell.
I'm pretty sure there is a special place in hell reserved for whoever decided to use those things instead of a nice, easy to remove screw. You can't just pull them out and I guess there's some special tool to remove them... But lacking the tool I used brute strength and Hulk style rage to remove them. I also managed to bash my head into the dash in the process. Ow.
Right. Kick thingy off, I cram myself into the foot well to find the BMR, and there it is right where the video and blog said it would be... Waaaaaaaay back, behind the blower fan, right up against the firewall in a place where only a professional contortionist can reach it. A very skinny professional contortionist with hands the size of baby starfish.
I got one of the three screws off using the ratchet thing that Cookie had conveniently left in the trunk of his car and was insanely, painfully cold on my poor bare fingers.
The next step was "Use a screwdriver to unclip wires from BMR and from Blower fan..." It didn't happen. I tried to make it happen for an hour, but the BMR hated my guts and the feeling was entirely mutual.
By this time it was about 9, the temperature was hovering somewhere around 2 below, and there's only so much that a girl can take. When my mom got home I begged to use her car to pick up Cookie from work. My mom loves me so she agreed... But I had to bring the car back because she had stuff to do Friday. Mom doesn't love me that much.
So- Pick up Cookie, go back to mom's, pick up Buick... And now it's 8 below and as soon as we start breathing the Buick starts fogging up and freezing over. So Cookie and I drive home with the windows down.
We thaw out at home for an hour or so and then he tries to open the Evilnox's hood... No doing. So much for my weak girl fingers.
I try to start the GoKart, the vehicle of last resort. No surprise, he's not playing ball. He's also nearly out of gas (damn white trash neighbors keep siphoning my gas), so even if we did get him started he wouldn't run long enough to get to the gas station.
Nothing else left to do, I wrap Cookie up in a bunch of blankies and he somehow, miraculously, gets all the clips unclipped from the BMR only to find out that the final two screw on the damn thing are BEHIND THE FIREWALL.
Says I, "Dude. Just plug the new one in and let it dangle. Who cares? It's effing cold (negative 14 says my phone with a wind chill of -30), I can't feel my anything, and you need heat to drive to work."
So he does and it works and we celebrated by driving the now-warm car up to McSlavelabor for a few burgers.
I did not turn the heat down when we ordered.
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