Here is how my Friday went. We moved my youngest daughter to Chicago for school.
Got up at 4:10 am, and were on the road by 5. The daughter and I in her (my) Ford Escape (140,000 mi), followed by Wifey-poo in her 2016 Jeep Patriot, both loaded to the hilt with **** my daughter thinks she needs for college.
About 7:30, my daughter says,"I don't see Mom behind us." I said, "Oh, she's back there -- probably waiting so she can get in about 5 minutes worth of driving at the speed she likes to go." A few minutes later, the phone rings. WP says Did you miss me yet? and I say No. She's sitting back at a rest area we passed. I thought maybe she needed to make a quick potty stop, but in reality, her transmission shot craps -- won't shift into 3rd gear.
So we back track and find her. I'm a member of AAA so I call and line up a tow truck, and then they connect me with Hertz in Davenport, IA. Tow truck is going to be a couple hours, so daughter and I head to Davenport (30 miles) while WP waits for the tow truck.
Found a repair shop in a little town about 10 miles from the rest area, and after getting the rental, we meet her there, just as the tow truck pulls in with the car. Got the stuff transferred to the rental (Nisan Pathfinder, very nice), and headed out again by about 10:30.
About 11;30 my oldest, who was going to let our dog out to the backyard, calls. Garage door won't open. I had just changed the 9V battery to the entry pad about two months ago, but will admit it was an old battery. I said,"Can today get any worse?" then said,"Just kidding, of course it can." She managed to get the cover off and replace the battery, so that was a good thing. I told her to leave the backdoor unlocked just in case, as the neighbor girl would be our dog's life line until Saturday night.
Get a call from the repair shop. Transmission's shot, but the good news is it is under warranty, but will have to be towed to Muscatine, to the nearest Jeep dealership. He gives me the Chrysler road side assistance ph #, so we wouldn't have to pay for the tow. Umm, after trying to deal with that for 30 minutes and two phones -- the animated voice wanted to track our cell to find the car we'd just left in Iowa -- I called the service dept in Muscatine, to find out if they had any pull with the service. No he said, and in his opinion, that's a really lousy service. Well, I need to get it there so it can get fixed, so can you please just line a tow up to get it to your place. He agrees. $130.00.
3:30 pm, Scott with small town repair calls. No one has been there to pick up the car; were they still coming or what? I had no answer, so he was going to call Jeep and find out what was what. Still not sure yet if it got delivered Friday, but will be calling later this morning to get some answers.
The rest of the weekend was pretty good -- nephew got married in Manchester, and we got back home Saturday nite, dropped the rental off this morning. We are still going to have to rent a car to go get our car (if it's ready) next Saturday, before heading to Dubuque for my mom's 80th birthday party next Sunday. That and right now we are down to my old pick-up truck to get WP to work, me to work and pick her back up for the week. Ahh, first world problems.