July 6, 2019

Yesterday was a rough day.  Although it wasn’t funny for me, I can still see the humor in all this…..

Early this week, I had contacted the new owner of our house to confirm he was switching over the utilities. He said he was handling that day so I called to get the services (water/sewer, electric, trash, etc .) taken out of of my name effective yesterday.   That morning, after coffee with our regular breakfast club, I went to our old house (now the buyers house) to pick up a couple items we were taking to the local Home-to-Home furniture consignment store. When I got there around 10am, the coffee had done its magic and I had to use the bathroom. Unfortunately, when I went to flush my business, the toilet didn’t ‘t respond. The water had a been turned off!  Unfortunately, the new owner had not switched over the utilities to his name so when I took them out of my name, they ended up being turned off Friday morning. I had to go to my neighbor Dean’s house to get a bucket of water so I could flush the toilet! Ugh!   Later that day, the electric was also tuned off….so the new owners will not have utilities at their new house until this Monday (7/8)…..and the weather these days is brutal…..temps in the 90’s with 70%+ humidity…..very steamy! The new owners are still in their old house so it’s not a huge deal except that they had planned to use the pool this weekend. But alas, my day gets better……

I left our old house around 10am to follow Nancy to the consignment store to drop off the furniture items. On the way, I phoned to say I’d be 5 minutes behind since I needed to fill my truck tank with diesel fuel (I was on “Empty”). Of course, since I was in a hurry, someone had parked and left their truck unattended next to the only diesel pump at the station. So I waited for at least 5 minutes and then went in to the store to find the perpetrator and ask them to move. I asked several people but had no luck. Finally, an older Mexican guy walked out of the restroom and started looking for some snacks. I asked him if the truck was his and after a little effort (he spoke very little English), he confirmed the truck was his and would move it. So he goes to the counter to pay and then walks out to his truck. As he walks by me, he tells me he still has to pump his gas! Seriously?!  I was compelled to tell him that it really isn’t appropriate to park in front of the only diesel pump at the station and take 15-20 minutes to go use the restroom, shop, pay, and then pump his gas!  Finally, he pulled away and I pulled up to get diesel for my truck. Since I was in a hurry, the whole episode left me a little frustrated.  Nancy had already left the furniture c consignment store. I just need to drop off the item in my truck and head home to relax for a while……

When I left the station, the engine started sputtering. I’m thinking “wow, are you kidding me!”.  I drove a mile to a Dodge truck dealer and asked if they could look at it.  It was the Friday after July 4th…..and since they only had a skeleton crew, they couldn’t look at it until the next week. I checked with another local dealer and had the same response, and checked with a local auto repair shop who told me they didn’t  work on diesels. UGH!  I went back to the first dealer, explained my situation, and asked if there was any way they could look at it and make any needed repair that day. I even offered to “pay a little extra” to get it done. In other words, I offered a bribe. Luckily, the head mechanic understood my situation and agreed to take a look. They pulled it around to look at it while I waited. He came back a little while later to tell me he knew what the problem was………I  had filled my trucks diesel tank with 27 gallons of regular gas! OMG!

He agreed to take the tank off, empty and dispose the gas, put the tank back on, add a little diesel, and then check to see if there was any other damage. Luckily I had only driven about 5 miles. If I had driven much more, the mechanic  said I could easily have burnt up the injectors, which cost $1700 a piece to replace!  I’m an idiot….

The cost for a tank of diesel…….about $75-80 and 5 minutes of my time. The cost to fix my stupid mistake……$600 and about 6 hours of my time! I also had them replace two diesel filters.  When it was all done, the total bill was just over $900. I just can’t explain how upset I get with m myself when I do something this stupid. But the day wasn’t over.   Geeeeezzzzz……..

We finally got  back to the trailer at about 6pm…..just in time to clean up and head to meet some friends for dinner and a Eagles Tribute Band concert at a local amphitheater.  The music was ok and the time with friends was great,  but the weather made the experience almost unbearable. It was 90+ degrees with 75% humidity and absolutely no wind.  It was worth going but I can assure you that I and several others were extremely hot and uncomfortable. We couldn’t find a parking space so and one other couple decided to park in bank parking lot with one of those signs that indicating it is a private lot and cars will be towed at owners expense. After my day, nobody blamed me for being a little hesitant to do that. But I was over-ruled and when we returned, our cars were still there. We got home at about 10pm.

What a day!

Thankfully, we have finished most of the work we needed to complete before leaving on our 2019 adventure.  Now we just have to wait until the ac repair is completed. We look forward to our first destination – the Finger Lakes area of upstate New York.