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My Day, a Very Long One

Today on my vacation, I decided to go down to Sassy Bead Co. (in the Yonge/Eglinton area) and see just what kind of glue I needed to make necklaces with knots. I had my little excursion and then I headed back home.

I was driving on Eglinton Avenue going up the hill towards Bathurst St. when all of a sudden my car wouldn’t accelerate. Going up a hill. I had taken the Allen Expressway (highway for those of you not in the neighbourhood) downtown and was headed there again when this happened.

You’ll remember that this happened to me once before and I took my car in (had it towed in) to Glenford Transmission where they rebuilt my entire transmission for $1340 CASH.

Well, boys and girls, that was on April 2nd when I got my transmission fixed the last time. You know that a 3-month warranty would expire then on July 2nd. What’s the date today? We’re just a few days short of 3 months on that new transmission. Was that the plan with the transmission… pay $1340 for something that lasts 3 months and then you’re out of luck?

Well, to continue the story, I was going to turn onto Bathurst Street rather than try to get on the highway and then realized that there was a little hill up if I turned, and I didn’t think I could make it up that hill. So I kept going on Eglinton and after a minute or so of driving, it seemed that I was accelerating again.

Great, I thought. I’d get onto the Allen and take the highway right over to the mechanic’s place. Nuh uh. Again I was unable to accelerate, so as traffic was stopped at another set of lights, I tried to pull over into the parking lane, but that wasn’t working well since I couldn’t accelerate, so I ended up with cars behind me honking like mad, as if I was holding them up on purpose. Never mind that you could hear my enging revving like crazy as I tried to get over there, they continued to honk.

I finally parked over to the side, right by a side street, so that was good… nothing could park in front of me.

I called CAA and requested a tow at 10-to-12:00. They told me someone would be there within 38 minutes and would call me 5 minutes before he got there. So I walked up the street to Timothy’s (there were no Tim’s around) and bought myself a mild coffee for $1.95. I dunno why their stinking coffee is $1.95, it certainly wasn’t as good as Tim’s.

I went back and sat on a bench right by my car and waited. I got a call after about 20 minutes saying the guy was 5 minutes away. I waited about 15 minutes and called CAA back to say, “the guy called me 20 minutes ago to say he’d be here in 5, where is he?”. They told me he was right there at Eglinton East.

Earlier, when I’d called them, I told them I was at Eglinton West. She’d said by Don Mills? and I’d said by North York… in between Bathurst and the Allen. So why was this guy at Eglinton East when I’d told them Eglinton West? The woman told me that she’d call the tow truck guy and let him know.

I waited another 20 minutes thinking that traffic was pretty busy. Then I called back the number on my cell phone and said, “where are they?” to which the woman told me, “we don’t service that area, we do Eglinton East, not Eglinton West, you’ll have to call CAA again.

Hey, thanks for letting me know that 20 minutes ago when I called. So I called CAA again and told them the situation. They put me on hold a couple more times (using up my cellphone minutes that I have on pay-and-talk, not a plan) and then told me that someone would be there in 8-10 minutes.

So once again I headed to Timothy’s, hoping to get a coffee and some kind of cookie or something as lunch. The phone rang, and as I pulled it out of the little holder that I was wearing on my pants, it came whipping out and went flying onto the street. Oh, fucking fantastic, now I’d have to buy a new cellphone. It was ok.

It was the CAA guy saying that he was just about there. I said that I was just getting a coffee at Timothy’s and I was about a block away, would be there soon too.

I got my $1.95 coffee and a Rice Krispie square (good, nutritious lunch) and as I left, I saw the CAA tow truck go by, so I ran the two blocks to my car when the guy phoned me again and I said, “yes, I’m right here behind you now”.

He towed my car to Glenford Transmission. The guy I always deal with, Paul, wasn’t there, but another guy checked out my car, smelled the oil dipstick and told me to leave the keys.

At the same time the tow truck guy, Trevor, told me to look at my two front tires. He told me that they’re going to blow any time… see that metal poking through? Oh fucking fabulous. Those are my $700 winter tires that I haven’t taken off yet.

So now it’s going to cost me at least $60 to have my tires changed (which I should have done already). Hopefully my all-season-radials are in good shape. And now I’m fully aware that I’m going to need at least two new snow tires for the winter.

Anyway, while the one transmission guy was taking down my driver’s licence number, Paul showed up. It was not a good thing to hear the first guy telling Paul that the car was “toast”. And I mean that literally. He told him it was “toast”!

And I’m a little concerned that he didn’t give us a receipt or anything the first time – because it was CASH, that he’s also going to tell me that there was NO warranty.

I called them just a while ago to see what the verdict was and found out that Paul had left and they said that nobody would be looking at the car at least until next week. I said, “what about tomorrow”. They’re closed. And they’re closed on Sunday. And Monday’s a stat holiday.

Luckily for me that Trevor drove me home (that was really nice of him to do, he didn’t have to wait around and do that – I suppose except for the fact that he had to get his towing money from me… my CAA “regular” plan only pays for 10 km. of towing). So the tow only cost me $13.50 – but I only had $12 cash on me and he didn’t take Interac. So Trevor said he’d put in the $1.50 himself. Thank you so much, the only nice thing that happened to me today.

As soon as I got home I called CAA and told them to put the Lumina back onto my insurance. Once that was done I headed over to Tim’s to get a good coffee. The Lumina is in bad need of some brakes. Or a brake line. Or something with the brakes. They weren’t squealing but they weren’t doing a great job of stopping either.

So there ya go. That was my day. I have no money, yet it’s going to cost me I dunno how much to have a drivable car, whether it’s for brakes or for transmission or for tires.

I’m not enjoying my vacation so far.

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