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Firing on all cylinders


Up until recently, we have never had much trouble with the truck.  Key word is recently.

Lately, it has just been a big bouquet of awesome that I am ready to send off a cliff.

First it was some valve.  Don't ask me what exactly it was, because I really have no idea, nor could I describe it adequately. All I know is that it was a $200 valve.

Then, some random switch went.  Again... don't ask me because all I do is write the cheques.  And this particular one was $450.

Ok.  Alright.  $650 in the space of a year.  I'm not exactly thrilled, but whatever, we haven't had to pay much in the past, so it was expected I guess.

Then somewhere in March, the carnival lights on the the dashboard started up again.  Fan-fricken-tastic.    This time, $650 wasn't going to cut it.  Nor did $1,000, nor did $1,500.  When it was all said and done, that b*tch of a #6 cylinder cost us about $2500. Are. You. Freaking. Kidding. Me?

Breathe. It's no ones fault, but we needed to get it repaired, so we cut the cheque and agreed that was the last big repair we would put into the thing.

In April, I was driving to my grandmothers for a visit.  As I went to drive away, the truck stalled and the check engine light came on.  There is no way this is happening again.  I shut off the engine and tried again. RRR RRR RRR RRR RRR.  Nothing.  Nada. I am not a patient person by any stretch of the imagination and I was very close to losing my proverbial sh*t.

While I was stranded in the middle of a road, thankfully it was a little side street without much traffic, so I let it sit for a second and tried again.  Perhaps it sensed my angst towards it, but it started, albeit with the check engine light on just to let me know that it wasn't happy about it.

Since the light was just on and not flashing and since we have paid a lot of money on this thing as of late, we decided to ride it out and see what would happen.  The next time Brad filled up, the light went off.  Apparently the gas cap wasn't on properly which was causing some sort of pressure differential... who knows, I'm boring myself just talking about it.  Bottom line is that the light went off.  Hurrah. THEN.... this May long we were at the cabin. Solid weekend..  Drinks with friends, boys getting dirty fishing, chasing squirrels, reading on the deck with wine glass in hand.  Perfection.

On the drive home.... BEEP BEEP BEEP.  This is not happening.  It was a flash back to the carnival lights experienced in March.  Trouble was we were about an hour out of the city. Of course we were, I mean really, what fun is there in having your vehicle break down in your driveway.

Thankfully we were able to limp home, but at any given traffic light the engine was idling really rough.  I'm no expert, but that sounded bad. That's it.  I'm tapping out. I'm done.

I refuse to put another dime into this piece of sh*t just so another cylinder can decide to retire 2 weeks from now.

As we limped into the city, I was on my phone googling truck sales.

You know what are expensive?  TRUCKS!  A 2016 Toyota Tundra can EASILY run you about $60K.

Jump right into my nightmare, the water in warm.

I should preface this by saying that we own our truck free and clear.  This means that I will somehow have to finagle things so that we can purchase a $60k truck. Sure.  No problem.  On my lunch break I'll find life on Mars and end global warning by the dinner.

Just like any vehicle, as soon as you drive it off the lot, it loses value.  Trucks are especially affected by this.  So I think realistically we are likely going to buy a 2014/2015 model.  I'd like to buy a Toyota, because they are the sh*t when it comes to Trucks.  You would think that Chevy or Ford would corner the market, but not even close.

We'll see though.  I called a few friends.   One of whom is good friends/neighbours with the GM at Murray Chev, so we will be going there this week to see what we can get in terms of a trade in and new truck (or new to us anyways). I was hoping to get a new SUV in the fall, so that we would again be a two vehicle family, but it looks like that will be on hold for awhile.  D*mn.

So that was the end to my May Long.  Awesome.  When we got home we decided that all of this sh*t could wait until tomorrow and we went over to our neighbours place for a BBQ.  Logan looked after their 2 year old Blaise in the backyard (we were all there as well).  Logan is really good with little kids.  He's got a big brother vibe going on and is super protective.  Blaise loves him and was all giggles are Logan took him for a spin in his wagon.

That's where I am tonight.  I'm going back to my old reliable; Everything will be alright in the end.  If it's not alright... it's not the end. Posted by Jodi Follow @scalded_flea Amazing Links Hi! I'm Jodi. Nice to meet you. AMJ Attempt #83