Friday night we planned to go out on a date. We were due for a date (we generally have a date every other weekend), but we were both rather ambivalent – couldn’t figure out where to go or what to do or what we wanted to eat. We finally decided that what REALLY sounded fun was to find a restaurant where we could enjoy a leisurely meal and sit and play pinochle. = ) In thinking through the various options, it seemed that most of our usual eating establishments wouldn’t take too kindly to our occupying a table for a long time, especially on a Friday night when there were other people waiting to sit in our seats, so that pushed us in the direction of “some small mom and pop place where there’s not a line out the door and they won’t care if we sit and play cards,” and that made us think of Mr. G’s pizza.
Mr. G’s is in old downtown, a couple blocks away from Dick’s Five and Dime. It’s not at all fancy, sometimes smoky (we don’t smoke), and very big on kino (we don’t gamble), but their Chicago style pizza is really good, and I also like their salads. They’ve never been full when we’re there, and we knew that as long as we could find a table that wasn’t near a cloud of smoke, it would be fun, so off we went to Mr. G’s.
When we pulled up to Mr. G’s, something didn’t look right. The place was darker than usual. There weren’t any cars around. Oh, don’t tell me Mr. G’s is closed!!! Read it and weep. Not only was Mr. G’s closed, there was a typed notice taped to the door with a padlock on the outside. Not a good omen for pizza and pinochle. Sigh.
Pulled up to the curb and stopped on an uphill there at Commercial Street, we tried to figure out what to do next. We sat there for several minutes, and the A/C was running full blast because even though it was about 7:00 PM, it was still something like 94 degrees outside. While we sat and pondered, we began hearing some kind of a low rumbling afar off. Kind of like rocks tumbling softly. Or like a very heavy truck going over a bridge a quarter mile away. Or actually very much like the sound a pot of plum preserves makes when it finally comes to a boil. . .
Me: What’s that noise?
Scott: I don’t know.
Me: Is it. . . ?
Scott: Well. . .
Me: Our car?
Scott: Maybe. . . uh. . . hey, I think I see smoke!
Me: Huh?
Scott (turning off the car and pointing): See?
Me: Coming from our car?
Scott: Uh-huh.
Well, this clearly was not good. We’re downtown on a Friday night when most everything is closed or closing, our car is smoking, and we can’t even (legally) have Andrew bring the Durango and come rescue us. What to do?
We got out of the car, and Scott cautiously lifted the hood. Yes, the radiator had boiled over and was in fact, from the sound of things, still boiling fairly vigorously. I could hear my dad’s admonition: “Never open a hot radiator. Don’t even touch the cap. Wait for it to cool completely, and then open it very slowly.”
Me: Ummm. . . I think we have to wait for it to cool down.
Scott: Yeah.
So we stood there beside our boiled-over car and talked about our options. Scott’s theory was that it had just overheated because it was so hot outside, and we had sat there idling for a long time with the A/C running and with, because we weren’t moving, no airflow over the engine. And anyway, he couldn’t remember when the radiator had last had a flush and fill, so there was probably little to no antifreeze in it.
I listened more or less patiently. OK, somewhat less than patiently. His anaylsis may have sounded logical, but it didn’t sit well with me. It seemed to me that even at 94 degrees with the A/C on, any self- respecting car – even if it is 16 years old and its odometer shows nearly 200,000 miles – shouldn’t boil over.
A man just leaving the antique store on the corner, saw our hood up, and asked if we needed help. Scott told him the car had overheated because we’d been sitting there idling with the A/C on. The man said he had a jug of water in his truck, which he dug out and handed to us. It was over half full, and that was a blessing. Once the radiator was cool, we’d need to pour in as much water as it would hold, and all we had on hand for that purpose was our two half-full water bottles. We took the jug, thanked the man, and got back in the car. Scott took a big swig from his water bottle. I successfully resisted the strong urge to blurt out, “What the heck are you doing?!? The car obviously needs that water a lot worse than you do!”
My thought was to leave the car there to cool, walk the couple blocks over to where the little diner-type restaurants are, have a meal, come back, pour the water in the radiator, head for home, and hope for the best.
Scott’s plan was to drive to some other restaurant Steak n Shake? Applebee’s? A Chinese place in Hollister? and eat while the car sat there and cooled. He was quite sure the problem was just our choice to sit with the A/C on, so he was sure that once it cooled down, all would be fine.
I was more skeptical, but then, he always sees only the positive and I always see only the negative, so our different opinions made sense.
In the end, we compromised. We drove a few blocks past all the mom and pop restaurants and parked the car on a side street. Then we walked back to the Branson Cafe, but found that, despite the fact that it’s now owned by a family we know, it had closed five minutes earlier. So, probably looking just like a couple of confused tourists, we crossed to the Farmhouse Restaurant, which was still open and appeared to be the happening place on Main Street that night.
I really enjoyed my meal there (DELICIOUS chicken fried chicken, mashed potatoes, biscuit, and coleslaw) and, it being a totally casual good ole’ boy kind of place, we did break out the pinochle cards while we waited. The kitchen messed up Scott’s order, giving him coleslaw instead of his fried okra, so while he waited for the okra, he did try a small bite of the coleslaw. The look on his face confirmed that he still feels about coleslaw just like I still feel about barbeque. Convenient that we are allowed to be different, and proof that some things never change.
After dinner, we requested two large ice waters to go (which Scott did not drink) and walked back to our car. The radiator was cool and low, so Scott poured in our two ice waters plus some of the water from the man’s jug. (Perhaps I’m not supposed to say that he discovered the next morning that he had forgotten to replace the radiator cap and then had to go visit our friend, O.) Anyway, not realizing the system wasn’t pressurized, we drove home with the A/C off and the windows down and were thankful to arrive unscathed and with the temperature gauge still showing “normal.”
That evening and again Saturday morning, there was more commentation – to which I chose to listen silently – about why the car had overheated. Scott decided he wanted to take it to Taney County Tire (TCT), our current repair shop of choice, and have them flush and fill it and do an oil change. But they are closed on Saturday, and with our present dearth of legal drivers, and Scott’s need to drive to work in Springfield on Monday (and Wednesday and Thursday, for that matter), it wouldn’t be possible for us to get the car to them on Monday morning.
So we dropped it off Sunday after church, on our way out to the annual church picnic and baptism at Table Rock State Park. That was about 12:30 PM Sunday. Scott called TCT Monday morning to tell them why there was an extra car in their lot and ask them to repair it. We planned to pick the car up Monday evening.
But TCT called him back later Monday to say that they had determined the cause of the overheating. It seems that a fan had gone out and needed to be replaced. Now, I am not sure where under the hood this specific fan lives, but it must be in some totally unreachable location – like Tanzania? – based on the priced they quoted us for this service. But it had to be done, and for that amazing number of dollars, they would also do the flush, the fill, the oil change, (“And wait! There’s more!”) and a tire rotation that was due.
Except that they called back even later Monday to say that the part they had ordered had arrived, but it was the wrong part. Ugh. So they’d get the new part Tuesday morning and it would be ready Tuesday afternoon. Well, that would work out all right. I had a doctor’s appointment in Branson on Tuesday afternoon, so we could just leave a bit early (Scott working from home on Tuesdays) and I could drop him off at TCT to pay and pick up, before I went on to the doc.
Expect that they called Tuesday morning to say that they had received the part, but it was once AGAIN the wrong part. Ugh, Take Two. They would have they correct part in hand Wednesday morning, and the car would be ready Wednesday afternoon. This did throw a wrench in the schedule, however, because Andrew and I were planning to go to the grocery on Wednesday morning. Now, since Scott would take the Durango to Springfield that day, we’d have no car to go to the grocery. Hence we would need to go to the grocery on Tuesday morning (I refuse to hit Wal-Mart in the afternoons, if there’s any possible way to avoid doing so), and Tuesday morning was rapidly going away. As in, “going away, going away fast.” So we dropped the academics we were in the midst of, quickly scribbled out a list, and went first to Wal-Mart and then to McKenna’s, where I intended to procure peaches, cantaloupe, and watermelon. Scott had requested “a small melon to take with us on our guys’ float trip this weekend. The river’s stream-fed, and I’m going to float it behind us in the water.” Whatever.
Except that when we got to McKenna’s they had NO PEACHES because, “The peach man’s running a day late,” and they’d have them tomorrow. Wednesday. When I would have no car. “And by the way,” Jean McKenna added, “That’ll be the end of the peaches for this year.” I almost cried standing there. Their peaches have been almost as good as the Colorado ones. Sigh. Very. Big. Sigh.
So I arranged with our neighbor to be on stand-by to take me to town this (Wednesday) afternoon, whenever I got word that the car was ready.
Except that Scott called at noon to say he had heard from Taney County Tire. Hope rose. It seems that the part did not come in today. Hope fell. The manufacturer didn’t send it. Oh, yes, the manufacturer had received the order for the part from TCT and evidently had the part on hand; they just failed to get it into the box to be shipped overnight. AARRGGHH!!! It was now being overnighted to arrive in Springfield at 8:00 AM Thursday, it would get to TCT by 9:00 AM Thursday, and the car would be ready sometime Thursday afternoon.
Scott, of course, would have to drive the Durango to Springfield on Thursday, leaving us once again car-less, but Andrew and I would need to be at the church at 8:00 AM Thursday. So I texted Pastor Barb, explained the situation briefly (I can do that; it’s just that here I have chosen not to), and asked her to come four miles out of her way to pick us up. Sigh. She, being willing to do almost anything for enough homemade salsa and homegrown tomatoes, said that would be fine.
All that to say that, while I do fondly hope to have our fully serviced Honda back home tomorrow afternoon, I will not be holding my breath till it arrives.