Home... finally.
Nov. 26th, 2006 01:41 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
plonqWe made such good time on the road yesterday that we decided to push through to the far side (or the near side, depending on your perspective) of Minneapolis before we stopped for the night. Our thinking was that we could get up at a decent hour, have breakfast and be on the road by 9:30, which would get us home before dark. That was the plan. It was a good plan.
In reality, we loaded up the car with the mountain of shit we were packing home on the trip... and things went downhill from there.
Just as we'd planned, we had the car loaded with our stuff and ourselves by 9:25 (five minutes early) and we prepared to set out. The car, however, was not prepared to go anywhere. However much I cursed and cajoled it (and perhaps more importantly, cranked over the engine) it refused to start. At 9:48 I placed a call to CAA. I described the problem (it cranks over fine, but it just won't fire up) so naturally they sent around a guy in a small pick-up truck armed with a battery booster. They told me that he would show up between 9:48 and 10:32. He showed up at 10:31 and 1/2 and quickly determined that we did not require his battery booster. Fortunately he also came equipped with a cell phone, and he called in a tow truck that showed up 20 minutes later.
He towed us to the nearest garage (actually the only garage) in the area where they determined that the problem was either the Camshaft Position Sensor or the Distributor -- or both. They decided to replace the sensor first, since it was the cheaper one to replace -- though it had to be brought in from the greatest distance. Naturally that didn't fix the problem, so they replaced the distributor as well - along with a couple of badly worn belts. Then, of course, they had to adjust the timing... Approximately $1000 later, we finally got on the road a mere 6 1/2 hours behind schedule. As an interesting side note, the garage that handled our car was actually a tire retailer with an attached, all-purpose garage. They noticed that my car had new tires and remarked that it was "some seriously nice rubber you got on there. I wish we carried that line."
The rest of the drive was mercifully uneventful until we got to the border. The line of cars waiting for Canada Customs snaked out of sight in front of us. I wish that I had kept a closer eye on the odometer so that I could get a proper measure of it, but I know that it was over two kilometres in length. The elapsed time from when we first hit the line until we got to the customs booth was just a couple of minutes shy of two hours. As we approached the booth, we could see that they were waving aside and searching virtually every car that passed through (hence the delay).
On the other hand, this is where we caught our first break of the day. The customs agent asked about the value of goods we were bringing back. I flashed the itemized list at her, and mentioned that we were bringing back gifts worth an estimated amount. She took a keen interest when I mentioned the emergency repairs to the car, and she demanded to see the receipt. After commiserating over our bad luck, and expressing sympathy over the cost ("highway robbery" in her words) she bade us a good weekend and waved us through. It wasn't until we had driven away that it occurred to me that she had never asked us if we were bringing back tobacco or alcohol, nor had she even bothered to ask for our ID.
I think it must have been because she saw our expressions. There is a certain look that engraves itself into a person's face when they are 14 hours into a 6-hour trip. The deep-sunk eyes and sallow cheeks say, "Search my car, I don't care. I just want to go home, slam back a stiff drink and pour myself into bed."
The drink is taken care of. Now bed.
In reality, we loaded up the car with the mountain of shit we were packing home on the trip... and things went downhill from there.
Just as we'd planned, we had the car loaded with our stuff and ourselves by 9:25 (five minutes early) and we prepared to set out. The car, however, was not prepared to go anywhere. However much I cursed and cajoled it (and perhaps more importantly, cranked over the engine) it refused to start. At 9:48 I placed a call to CAA. I described the problem (it cranks over fine, but it just won't fire up) so naturally they sent around a guy in a small pick-up truck armed with a battery booster. They told me that he would show up between 9:48 and 10:32. He showed up at 10:31 and 1/2 and quickly determined that we did not require his battery booster. Fortunately he also came equipped with a cell phone, and he called in a tow truck that showed up 20 minutes later.
He towed us to the nearest garage (actually the only garage) in the area where they determined that the problem was either the Camshaft Position Sensor or the Distributor -- or both. They decided to replace the sensor first, since it was the cheaper one to replace -- though it had to be brought in from the greatest distance. Naturally that didn't fix the problem, so they replaced the distributor as well - along with a couple of badly worn belts. Then, of course, they had to adjust the timing... Approximately $1000 later, we finally got on the road a mere 6 1/2 hours behind schedule. As an interesting side note, the garage that handled our car was actually a tire retailer with an attached, all-purpose garage. They noticed that my car had new tires and remarked that it was "some seriously nice rubber you got on there. I wish we carried that line."
The rest of the drive was mercifully uneventful until we got to the border. The line of cars waiting for Canada Customs snaked out of sight in front of us. I wish that I had kept a closer eye on the odometer so that I could get a proper measure of it, but I know that it was over two kilometres in length. The elapsed time from when we first hit the line until we got to the customs booth was just a couple of minutes shy of two hours. As we approached the booth, we could see that they were waving aside and searching virtually every car that passed through (hence the delay).
On the other hand, this is where we caught our first break of the day. The customs agent asked about the value of goods we were bringing back. I flashed the itemized list at her, and mentioned that we were bringing back gifts worth an estimated amount. She took a keen interest when I mentioned the emergency repairs to the car, and she demanded to see the receipt. After commiserating over our bad luck, and expressing sympathy over the cost ("highway robbery" in her words) she bade us a good weekend and waved us through. It wasn't until we had driven away that it occurred to me that she had never asked us if we were bringing back tobacco or alcohol, nor had she even bothered to ask for our ID.
I think it must have been because she saw our expressions. There is a certain look that engraves itself into a person's face when they are 14 hours into a 6-hour trip. The deep-sunk eyes and sallow cheeks say, "Search my car, I don't care. I just want to go home, slam back a stiff drink and pour myself into bed."
The drink is taken care of. Now bed.
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no subject
Date: 2006-11-26 09:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-11-26 05:01 pm (UTC)I bet that's like the third or fourth time you've heard that phrase, isn't it?
Seriously though, what you've gone through sucks, but I'm glad you made it home ok.