It Could be Worse

 It all started with the Suburu. It needed to be inspected. Tim made the appointment and took it in. I went off in another direction with my own errands. I finished off by going to gym and then headed for home. 

Tim was not home, but I did not expect him to be. He had called with the unfortunate news that the car needed a ball joint. He had replaced one, but thought the other one would pass. It is a hard job. The last one took a while to replace because it was so rusted. He decided to let the garage handle the replacement this time around. He called to tell me that he would not be home any time soon probably.

Imagine my surprise when Tim opened the door for me. 

Turned out that in removing the ball joint, damage had been done. Another part needed to be ordered. The garage drove Tim home. 

Ah well, as the story goes: 'It could be worse.'

We still had my car. And the truck. The new old truck, anyway, the 'old' old truck having a tarped load of 200 4 x 8 sheets of hardy backer board that Lowe's had clearanced out for a mere $2.39 a sheet a 90% discount.

We got our snow storm the next day. It was then that the hydraulic pump on the tractor went. This was a huge blow. The tractor was our snow mover.

Bring out the shovels. 

Except Tim had a plow for the old dump truck. He switched out the battery, and amazingly it fired up. He hooked up the snow plow, and plowed. 

That night he found the part he needed on ebay, and I ordered the $400 part for him. He said, 'Lucky we had the dump truck.'

Yes. He was right. It certainly could have been worse.

Except the very next day, the starter went in the dump truck. 

Tim placed an order for a $200 part from Rock Auto. The snow had pretty much let up. He said, 'Ah well. The next storm is not due in until the weekend. By then. One of those parts should be in by that time. Until then, we just drive the 'new' old truck."

Such a sensible idea. The truck sits higher than the car, and if we ran into trouble. It also had 4 wheel drive. His solution was perfectly sensible. It could after all, be worse.

Until, the very next morning, when the truck would not start. Tim popped the hood and began testing this part and that and. Unbelievably, once again, this truck also needed a starter.

We were down to one vehicle unless we wanted to unload 200 sheets of hardy backer board. Lord knows where we could put it. It was supposed to siding on the garage when we got a break in the weather.

At that point, I put my foot down. More money or not, we needed to take my car (our last driveable vehicle) to Titusville and get a starter for that truck. We had another storm due in. 

Except...When we got to the parts store, they explained that year truck had two different possible starters. He would have to bring the starter in to figure out what starter he needed.

Of course. 

But, once again, we were saved. The garage called and the Suburu was fixed. What perfect timing. It is all wheel drive and can handle snow better than my car.

Just to prove it , my car slipped sideways in the snow and got stuck. 

It could be worse, I suppose. We might not have had a brother-in-law with a big truck to plow us out. Once plowed, Tim was able to back my car out of the snow bank. Also, the starter for the dump truck arrived today.