and that someone would be me.

Thankfully all of you lovely readers are nice enough to not point out to me yesterday that my title indicated that there might be updates and/or addendums. And really, there weren’t any. But I had every intention, but was dumb and hit “Publish” instead of “Save” and ran out the door to bring the car into the shop. By the time I came back I was so tired, hot (holy crap it was still 90 degrees at 6:30pm!), hungry, and stunned from a near-miss with a potential car repair, that I had forgotten that I didn’t actually finish the post and just went about the rest of my evening. Read comments from folks, replied to some of those comments, all the while completely oblivious of my error. I wasn’t aware until my internet service came back up this afternoon and saw my article on my reader (hatred from Comcast’s ineptitude may or may not be forthcoming. You know, if I remember).

So, now will be your REAL updates and addendums:

First off, I came back from getting the car checked and it is the catalytic converter. Good news is that the issue won’t affect the actual runability of the car…it will keep running. The bad part is that I won’t be able to pass the emissions because the catalytic converter is not getting the correct ration of oxygen to fuel or some mess like that, and is polluting a little more. The worse part is that my emissions is due later this summer and failure to pass means the state won’t renew my plates unless I pay to repair it. The worsest part is that the estimate I got was $700 for repair, which even if it didn’t fully fix the issue, I’d at least get a waiver on my emissions because I spent over $600. Yeah.

So do I get a “pass” now for writing like an idiot? I mean, most of you would probably have a little heart failure, or at least would bat an eyelash at a potential $700 car repair, right?

Well, the garage cleared the error (check-engine light) and did some other diagnostics to make sure there weren’t any other underlying issues. This just seems to be an issue of a 7-1/2 year old car with nearly 100,000 miles on it. He also told me that if the light stays off to still go ahead and try to see if I’d pass the emissions…because if I do, I don’t need to worry about the catalytic converter again for 2 more years. By then we’re hoping to replace it.

More updates….This morning I get up, start getting ready for work, check on Cooper and he still feels feverish. Crap. He had a low temp, but was physically warm enough to alert the teachers in his class if I was so rotten as to bring him in. Crap-crap.

I get out the Elmo videos and some of Cooper’s favorite toys and some of Gavin’s most coveted-from-Cooper toys, start up my work lap-top and can’t.get.on.the.VPN. What? I putz around with a few settings and try again. No dice. Just as I’m about to get beligerant, Justin calls asking if the internet is down because he can’t hit the server. One check of the modem validates our suspicions. Two power-cycles assures us I need to call Comcast. Thirty minutes on hold to talk to one underinformed Comcast rep (albeit he was very nice), two more power-cycles, and a reset confirm that there is an outage in our area. Crap-crap-crap.
However, my rep tells me “for some reason a lot of modems in {my town, my zipcode} are just going ‘offline’.”
Me: “A lot of offline modems in one area sounds like an outage to me.”
Rep: “well, that’s not really an outage.”
Me: “huh. That’s funny. The telecom company I work for usually considers this same sort of situation an outage. Why else would a bunch of random modems in a concentrated area go offline?”
Rep: “well, it’s still not an ‘outage’.”
Me: “ok, whatever. How soon till it’s back up?”
Rep: “we need to dispatch a technician…soonest we can get is Tuesday morning.”
Me: “what? You know it’s Friday, right? I have blogging work to do.”
Rep: “yeah, I know. I’m sorry. You could try calling tomorrow to get an earlier date.”
Me: “why can’t you give it to me now?”
Rep: “well, I just mean there might be an earlier one available tomorrow.”
Me: “that makes no sense. Okay. I’ll call back tomorrow.”

But it came up on it’s own later in the day. Like it has a hundred other times. Stupid Comcast.

On a much more fun update, Marmarbug over at My Life as Momma, gave me this lovely award!!!

Isn’t it cute??? I think I’m going to pass it along to a few folks who I don’t think have gotten it yet…so to Tootsie Farklepants and Precarious Tomato because they both make me laugh till I scream, to Caramama because she’s so open-minded and doesn’t mind my rather conservative leanings in our email discussions, to Burgh for letting me be a PITA and harrass her all the time (or rather, she tolerates me), and to Karen for propositioning me last week…that totally made my summer, lady! Oh, and also to Justin, and not because he’s my husband. But because he found a petition community group on Facebook that is trying to get Facebook to adjust their rules on considering photographs of breastfeeding to be offensive. Apparently 26,000 people have joined. And I might just join Facebook so I can join the petition as well. We’ll see.

By the way…tonight is the last night for the silent auction and fundraiser to support the Victims of the Midwest Floods.

Cooper came home yesterday with a low-grade fever. He seemed alright, if a little fussy. His cold seemed to have taken a turn for the worse because he was coughing more, his nose was running more, and he had goop coming from his eyes. Not pretty.

Around 3am-ish, he got up crying and was sitting up in his crib when I walked in, so I knew he was gonna be up a while. Thankfully he calmed down right away, though he did not go back to sleep quickly. I rocked him for about a half hour and wrapped him up tight in one of his blankets to keep him warm since he still seemed to have the fever (too tired to fight him to check his temp…he was warm but not blazing enough to cause alarm). In the morning I heard him talking in his bed, Justin gave him his cup of milk and told me while I was still half asleep that Cooper had lost of poop in his eye. What? I asked Justin alarmed, “he had poop in his eye?” Now it was Justin’s turn to look alarmed, then corrected my groggy hearing, “no, he had GOOP in his eyes”. Not much better, but at least goop is less smelly than poop. I mean, I remember reading horror stories of people’s children figuring out how to take off their diapers and playing in their poop. That alone makes me consider using duct tape on diapers.

So I get up and get ready for work. I get Cooper and he feels warm still. Take his temp and it’s 100 degrees. Not high, but at 8am, it could really only go up. Argh! I call and leave a message for my boss and jump in the car to run up to the office to pick up my laptop (cuz dude! if daycare had called me when they took his temp yesterday, I would’ve brought it home. Yoiu know, so that Cooper wouldn’t be sick). While in the car I call the pediatrician to get an appointment, wondering if this is going to be another one of those visits where they proclaim it a mere cold, stamp his butt with “fine, grade A Baby”, and take my co-pay. But I figure better safe than sorry since I’m suffering from a sinus infection (brought on by a cold) and hey, since I failed with the laptop, I’d better try my other “insurance”.

When I’m about 25 miles into my 30 mile trip to work, my check engine light goes on. NO EFFING WAY!!! Yeah, I try to keep it clean, but folks, I got ticked. Thankfully it seemed to be running alright, no weird noises, no chugging or rough-running, no smoke, and no visible demons flying out of the engine compartment. I call Justin all mad and annoyed but continue on to work. I get there, greet my officemates, grab my laptop, and head back to the pediatrician’s office.

For the first time in a long time, I didn’t have to wait very long, which was nice (and what sucked me into going there in the first place!). Coop’s temp was down to about 99 (but I had him lightly dressed and the AC on full blast), and his lungs were clear. However, his left ear is infected, his right one has a lot of fluid behind it, and he’s got a ton o’ mucous running down his throat (hey, sounds like my diagnosis on Tuesday!). Cooper only cried when she was checking his ears…and understandable since they probably hurt.

Off we went to The Best Target in the World with Rx in hand. Considering how tired and miserable he was probably feeling, Cooper was good while we walked around waiting for his antibiotics. Twenty minutes later we were home. I stuffed some lunch and strawberry gunk antibiotics in him, and layed him down for his nap.

So I got some work stuff done and I searched for “dang car” with little luck. Justin’s on his way home early so that I can bring my car to the shop to figure out it’s main malfunction. Or to see if it just missed the shop, because it’s been a good 8 or 9 weeks since the last time it was there!!! Wish me luck. Or wish me a newish car. Or wish me a good tornado to pick that bad-boy up and rid me of it.

In other news, don’t forget that the fundraiser and silent auction end at 11:59pm tomorrow (Friday)…so go put in your bids or email me your jewelry orders! And thanks to all of you who have helped out so far…I appreciate it so much.

Yes, kids, it’s time again for that fun, fantastic, fanciful game of “What’s that Smell?”  where we give you an odor and you get to guess what it is!  Here’s the first scenario:

We’re sitting in traffic in Colleen’s little 2001 2.4 liter Cavalier, complete with a sporty spoiler (read:  MILF-mobile).  You detect a strange scent…is it:

1. a wayward sippy cup that has been wedged partially under the front passenger seat since Mid-December with a half-ounce of unidentifiable contents
2. Cooper’s diaper
3. Colleen’s cavalier burning oil like a 1970 Buick Skylark
4. Gavin’s butt after Taco Night
5. old formula puke on Cooper’s carseat, or
6. all of the above

And the answer is…anyone?  anyone?  Bueller?  Bueller?…yes, you in the back with your hand up, jumping up and down saying “oooh!  oooh!  oooh!”   Yes, #3 is correct!  Colleen’s car is now burning oil and stinking up the place.  Although for those of you playing at home, the judges will also take #2 (have we discussed that this child poops a minimum of 3 times per day?) or even #6, since well, most of you realize that anyone who spends 3 hours a day in the car will have all sorts of scents.  According to our garage, though, there’s not much I can do about my car stinking since it’s 7 years old and up around 93K miles on it…it’s just getting old and leaky.  What bothers me is that it wasn’t getting old and leaky prior to my 90K mile check-up a few weeks ago (where they also did a transmission flush).  Man is that smell annoying and acrid and makes me wonder about the affects it might have on us (particularly the kids) since we sit in the car for so long each day.  I mean, I don’t have smoke billowing out and they stated my car was safe (nothing actually leaking onto the exhaust or any fire hazards), but I still wonder.  Anyone have any words of wisdom?

Hey, it’s a great little car…when it runs!!!

Friday night, I pick up the kids from daycare and pick-up Justin from our house so that we can go pick up his truck from the shop.  He had a bunch of well-needed maintenance work done and the shop we go to are great about letting us pay over the phone and pick the car up after-hours (since I usually don’t get home until around 6:30pm).

Justin gets in the car, he’s in a great mood.  Gavin’s happy to see Daddy and Cooper is sleeping.  We go to the shop, pick up the truck, Gavin jumps in with Justin, and we head out for the 6-mile or so trip back home.  While waiting at a light, my car stutters a second.  I think “hmmm…that’s weird” and put it in neutral until the light changes.  I then put it in drive and gently ease it through the intersection.  About half-way through, it starts stuttering and shuddering and stops responding well to my increased pressure on the gas pedal (hey, just wanted out of harm’s way).  My traction light comes on (tells me that the fancy traction thing that keeps me from sliding all over the road in bad conditions is not working) and my yellow Check-Engine light starts blinking.  I throw on my hazards, call Justin (who was, by now, 1/2 mile in front of me), and tell him I’m breaking down and I’m pulling into a Burger King.  He’s very calm over the phone, which was a good thing, since I was panicking because I was starting to lose my power-breaks.  As I’m waiting to turn left into the restaurant, the car continues to get noisy (like it lost its muffler or something) and shuddering worse.  I see a big break in oncoming traffic and prayed a little prayer to get past safely.  As I hit the gas and turned, I felt the car shudder again and I lost my power-steering, too, and had to nearly stand on the gas to not only make it through two lanes of traffic, but to also give me more leverage to turn the silly car so that I didn’t hit the curb instead.

So I get into the parking lot of the Burger King and was literally rocking back-and-forth in an effort to will my car to continue forward towards a parking space (and not the driving areas of the lot).  I rolled into a space…well, over a couple of spaces…and couldn’t get the silly thing any farther.  So I put it in park, turned it off, sent up a prayer to God for keeping Cooper and I safe while I tried to cross that busy traffic, then promptly burst into tears.

I’m not exactly sure why I started crying, although I know I was annoyed when Justin asked me.  I guess I was scared because it broke down while I had one of the kids with me, scared because we REALLY don’t have the money for what seems like another costly repair (we’ve already sunk over $2500 into the silly thing since April), upset because we’re really budgeted tightly right now with our giant increase in daycare expenses, annoyed because I really try to make sure I take care of this car so that it will last us a while because we’re not at a point where we can afford a car payment right now (it’s paid-off) or the increase in insurance that a newer car would bring, and sad because I really do like my little car but I just cannot trust it as much anymore, it seems.  So literally, that entire paragraph went through my head and out it came as tears and steering-wheel beatings. Also, nasty oaths about leaving it in a bad part of town where someone who won’t love it as much will take it and defile it and put a really funky-huge non-manufacturer endorsed spoiler, like this one.

So really, if anyone wants a little car to putter around to-and-from the grocery store, or for short commutes (less than my 60-mile/day commute), just contact me.  According to Kelley Blue Book, it’s worth about $4,600 once I have it repaired.  I’m willing to sell it at $4,000 because I know if I try to trade it in, the Dealer will screw me big-time even though the car is in excellent shape (besides the silly non-running thing right now).  Here’s a list of all the great attributes of my little car:

• it is a 2001 Chevy Cavalier LS, 2.4 L sport engine, four doors, good paint, indigo blue, clean grey cloth interior with a rear spoiler (extra sporty!), and that increased traction control thing I talked about earlier
• it’s got a CD player and a cassette player, power windows, power locks
• about 84,500 miles (highway miles, baby!)
• tires are 2-1/2 years old, but are in EXCELLENT condition…we’re stunned at how great the tread looks on the tires considering how long they’ve been on the car
• brakes and rotors done last fall…still in great working condition
• new water-pump, timing kit and belts, and new battery in April
• new body control module (aka electronic computer thingy) in July…three days before I gave birth to Cooper
• it parks nicely into small spots
• has working heat and a/c
• when I don’t have all my crap in the car, it comfortably seats four adults (or two adults and two car seats, or any variation there-of, although not three car seats cuz then one would be in front and that is just bad, bad, bad)
• uncomfortably seats five adults (or three adults and two car seats, or four adults and one car seat)
• new ignition module (aka ignition computer thingy) nope…back to square one…new ignition module doesn’t make a lick of difference…going to return useless ignition module and hit Plan B–tear the thing into five bazillion trillion and ten pieces and see what else it could be

So everyone, be sure to go out to your garage, your assigned parking spot, or wherever you park your vehicle, and be sure to give your well-behaved car a hug.  And prayers for my problem-child car would be greatly appreciated (as well as a bake-sale or candy-sale to raise funds for repairs…I also wouldn’t mind some wine right now so that I am prepared for the shop calling me with the repair quote).