When Life Hands You Lemons...

Sometimes you just have to grab the tequila and improvise a Sunrise.

Tooling along today on the way home from taking Snarky to the airport, I was feeling kind of groggy, because frankly, it's been a HUGE weekend, and all the excitement has me plumb wore out. So, being the self sufficient type I am, I cranked up the tunes and cardanced until I felt a little more pumped up.

Left the tunes cranked because I was enjoying them, until suddenly, whilst going up a hill, I realized that I was actually slowing down with the cruise control set.

Uh oh.

Turned off the cruise first, and then the radio, to hear the dreaded indistinct knocking sound coming from the general direction of the engine.

Crap.

I limped it into the next town because, let's face it, while I'm perfectly capable of walking ten miles, that doesn't mean it's particularly pleasant or that there will be any place open by the time I get there to get any oil or other miracle "hmm try this" bits suggested by folks who are just trying to be helpful.

It's not their fault I'm an hour from home with guests still at the house and dinner gonna be a-waitin. One shouldn't growl at those who are trying to be helpful, no matter how dim-witted the suggestions, nor how dim-witted they insinuate I am. (Yes, I did check the oil when I stopped. No, I don't carry a case of oil in my trunk "just in case." Why? Because that space is taken up with emergency power steering fluid because the hose clamp going from my power steering pump has been known to sink into deep depression and commit suicide at odd moments, leaving me on the side of the road in a situation where a skinny girl, a spare hose clamp, and some power steering fluid will save the day. But I digress.)

Got into the next town, shut her down, popped the hood, and checked the oil.

Dry.

Shit.

Ran across the street to the obligatory small-town stock feed/vet meds/tire repair/bbq shack and grabbed three quarts of the cheapest oil they had (having the lump sum of twelve dollars in my pocket at the time) and poured em in. Started the car back up in the hopes that nothing had been severely damaged and a little oil would let me gently limp it on home rather than leaving the car parked an hour away and having to get the car trailer up there.

No dice.

Crap.

Called mom back, since I'd called her when the problem became so obvious that even I couldn't ignore it with the message "You may have to come get me."

Knowing me and my luck, she had already started my way and my wait time was shortened thereby. Thank you, Farmmom, for being well aware of your daughter's ability to screw up mechanical objects.

Right now status is: car isn't driving anywhere but onto the trailer until a real mechanic looks at it, but I'm pretty sure he's gonna tell me the engine is toast, or repairs would be expensive enough that it might as well be toast.

Tomorrow, once we get MattG and JPG on the road home, and AD up and rolling from his close encounter of the deer kind, after having finally located a radiator for his truck, I'll start looking for a cheap engine to drop in the car just in case.

If you're wondering what the Sunrise part of this story is, it's this: I finally have an excuse too good to ignore to go find myself a truck. Just as soon as I sell a couple of horses. And maybe trade Farmmom the progeny of my cows for the next few years for cash.

Possibly after I stand myself on a corner in clinging jeans with a sign saying "Butt Grabs: $10"

After the attention my ass got at the blogmeet, I figure that there ought to raise enough to get myself a nice new-ish Dodge Ram 3500.

And if AEPilot Jim starts selling copies of the pictures of my butt, he'd better remember I get 75% of the profits and the other 25% go to Farmmom for giving me the genes (and oftentimes, the jeans) that went into making the butt.