Know what’s really fun? Wrecking your car in another state.
There’s nothing like surviving the fender bumper bender and dropping off your ride to get a quick fix. Things sound like they are going good and you get the call to come pick it up. Great you think! It’s just hours before they close for a couple of day for the Christmas holidays, so the timing couldn’t be better.
You arrive to pick up your freshly fixed, newly bumpered and reassembled car from the auto shop and guess what? There’s nothing like not getting it out of the parking lot before all the bells and whistles go off! Lights you’ve never seen before come on and it’s not looking good. The auto body shop suggests taking it to a local dealer to have a closer inspection. Tick-tock goes the clock, ’cause Santa’s on his way.
Finding a dealership was easy. Finding out that the Prius needed a $2,000 part that was at least two weeks away wasn’t. How do mechanics miss things like that? “Sure, it’s safe to drive, you just won’t have ABS,” says the dealership. Apparently, braking is not important.
Brett drove our poor little Prius home, ABS-less and all, and I followed behind in his mother’s car. There’s not a better conversation stopper than, “I have to call you back, I think our hubcap just flew off!” As he made a turn, sure enough, one of the hubcaps went rolling down the street. I’ve seen this happen before in traffic…and for some reason thought it was hilarious. It was not funny then.
It was even less funny when Brett didn’t notice and kept driving. I had to pull over and fish it out of the gutter…with a homeless man watching me like a hawk.
Sometimes, I just have to double check my driver’s license to make sure my last name really isn’t Griswold.
