Tuesday, October 23, 2007

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Part One of - well, let's just not count these, shall we?

Back in high school, I turned 16 before all of my friends because my birthday fell two days after the kindergarten cut-off and I started a year later than everyone else. So I was one of the first to have a car. Unfortunately for me, my parents were of the thrifty sort and my first car was a hand-me-down that both of my parents had driven. Getting a hand-me-down car from my mother wouldn't have been bad, because she's never been hard on cars. My dad, however, is where cars go to die. He drives too fast and neglects basic maintenance. By the time I got this car, it ran and the radio worked. That was all you could say about it. It was also a puke green Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera. Stylin'. (You're jealous, aren't you? I knew you were.) When I turned it on, all the warning lights lit the dash up like a Christmas tree. Some of them never went off. So I took to ignoring them. Oh-so-smart. Then one day, my car died on the side of the road. Some nice folks picked me up and gave me a ride home. We had the car towed to our mechanic, who promptly taught me that there is one light that you don't ignore - the oil light. Yep, I ran the car out of oil and blew up the motor. Guess who did not have a car for the last half of her senior year of high school?

9 comments:

Tess said...

This is fricking SWEET! I was a big-time light-ignorer too. If my car wanted me to be all johnny on the spot, then it shouldn't have been the car that cried "check engine". That's what I'm saying.

One of my car leaked oil so badly that I had to add a quart every TWO DAYS.

Anonymous said...

As I was reading this, I knew Tessie would be all over it. That car incident would have scarred me for life!

Shelly said...

Tessie - the car that cried "check engine". OMG, that is priceless. And I could not agree more. Check engine was definitely one of the ones that didn't go off.

Shelly said...

Hey Shelly! Yeah, well, I've only been telling Tessie that I'd do a series similar to hers for about three weeks now. I owe her big time. Well, it certainly made all my cars after that one a step up. : )

kirida said...

I'm totally going to do a post now about my sweet high school ride: the Toyota Previa.

Laura said...

My father taught me how to put a piece of black electrical tape over the warning lights so that they wouldn't "bother me" because they "didn't mean anything". My husband (who did maintenance even when it wasn't needed) was stunned when we began dating. And, an Oldsmobile? Maybe I'm dating myself but the kids with the Olds' were the cool kids.

Laura said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Shelly said...

Hey Mona! A Toyota Previa, huh? That is hilarious! My high school best friend had a Dodge Aries that was a total K car. So I wasn't the only one with a lame ride.

Shelly said...

mrsgrumpy - ROFL!!! That is great advice! My husband's ex-wife's father told her that there was no reason to have trash in her car when there was a perfectly good window right beside her.

And HA! on the Old's being the cool cars. Maybe where you grew up, but this puke green POS wasn't anyone's definition of cool!