It’s Come To This

The train wreck that was my first real car purchase is a long story — and certainly much more expensive than the pigeon fiasco. I’ve only refrained from telling it on here because I’m still hoping for clearer hindsight. The title of that post, when I inevitably write it, will be “10 Stupid Things I Did In My 20s.” (Look for it in six more months when my 20s will be behind me.)

But since I’ve heard almost entirely bad news from everyone I know this week, I know I could use a little laugh. Even if it’s at my own expense. So what the hell.

With money tighter than usual, whenever the tiniest symptom of potential disaster presents itself, I react with maybe just a tad more urgency than usual. For instance, I emailed building management the second I saw a pigeon land on my windowsill (see post below). When Firefox or Chrome loaded too slowly one day, I rushed my computer to the Geek Squad and made several contingency plans in the event they had to send it out (they didn’t).

So when I got lost on my way to a nannying case last week, I froze when I heard my car make some ominous noises. My radio is almost always on, usually loudly, so I’m somewhat unaware of my car’s usual sounds. If my muffler someday started sounding a little loud, I would be the last one to know. But when I turned the radio down so I could call the family, I noticed a weird rumbly sound I’d never heard before. It seemed to happen whenever I braked, but not the usual squeaky-brakes squeal. Just rumbly. Sickeningly so. I had to be back with the same family the next day and determined I couldn’t take action for a couple days. So I cranked the radio back up so that I could put the scary noise out of my mind — or at least earshot.

Two days later I decided to get it looked at. But after consulting my usual panel of automotive advisors learned that I first needed to take my car for a spin with the radio off and the windows down to get a better sense of where the sounds was coming from.

The minute I got in the car I knew what the problem was: an errant partially full Nalgene-like water bottle. More specifically, my last bit of swag from Kettle Foods. It’d been rolling around on the floor of my backseat — in the company of a couple cans of tennis balls — for a while.

Sure enough, I moved the bottle to a secure location and heard nothing suspicious. I laughed like an idiot for a good three blocks and thanked God that I hadn’t gotten as far as my reliable Firestone. Moral of the story: listen to your dad when he tells you to occasionally turn the music down. And, for the love of God, don’t call “Car Talk.”