Bad Car-Ma. (Karma, get it?)

So okay.. It starts out with the title and paperwork on my new neon getting screwed up. 2 weeks later, I find this out and have to take time off of work (nigh impossible) to handle it. But okay, it should be handled.

Then, this last Tuesday, I get a call from my wife, sanjikrhys that she stalled and her car is on the side of I-90. She called AAA (and that's another story) and 3 hours later in the 96+ degree heat, she finally gets a tow-truck and gets towed. However, she called me, and again, being the knight, the protector husband, I pulled the impossible twice and got time off of work to try to go to her and see if I could do anything. (She felt like crap the rest of the day and I suspect had heat exhaustion. I didn't fare much better.)

About an hour into the drive, my car suddenly dies while in the left lane, and I pull over to the side of the highway as well. So now we're both stranded. Fucking Great.

So I had to call my dad to come get me, I was much later back to work than I had intended, and I got a lecture from my boss about stupid shit like "prior notice." (How do you give advance notice of a sudden emergency?) Especially when the average notice they gave me last Sunday morning that I needed to come into work was to call and wake me at 10:30 am so I could be at work by 1. Love that double standard, guys.
Especially when they try to guilt me into believing that my job is more important than my wife. Knowing that AAA left her stranded on the highway in extreme heat and that she was sick because of it makes me feel justified in wanting to go to her, no matter what the job says.

Anyways, long story short -- Rachel's car is making very bad broken metal noises inside of her engine -- we're talking spun bearing thrown rod type noises. -Boom-. The water pump on my car died, which is run off the timing belt, which let the timing belt go, which possibly let the pistons crash into the valves.

So basically, her car is dead, most likely, in the final death sense, as is my "new" (only had it 3 weeks!) car. Oh yeah, I'm real happy now.. just give me a happy helmet.

So my old car is re-licensed and insuranced, which Rachel is driving for the moment. I'm borrowing my dad's car until this weekend, when most likely, I will be doing some car work on the van they gave me (the one that was stolen and recovered) so I can drive it until we figure out otherwise. My dad's been trying to guilt the dealer into something for us, and we've been told he'd take the neon back as a "trade-in" on something else -- and instead of me getting a new car, letting Rachel get a new car instead. Since my old car is at least drivable and reliable, I'll just put some money into fixing the little annoying things about it.

We -SO- did not need this, though. I mean, 2 cars dying DYING on the same damn day. This is the kind of thing that momentarily makes me feel defeated and want to just give up, lay down, and die for a while.
(Or at least get some rest..)

So I may be out of the world for a little while while I regroup and get things settled back into some semblance of "normal."

TW