It’s cold up here in the great lakes region. We’ve been down into the teens most nights, lately. We caught perhaps 8in. of snow total, so far. Most of that has retreated. It’s still a driving issue, if your vehicle isn’t prepared for it.
So into of the middle of all of this, comes the smell of hot coolant inside the cabin of my brand new truck, and steam on the windows, which in the temperatures quickly turns to ice. Fortunately, the leak was relatively small, and therefore I didn’t lose much in the way of coolant. The truck was still drive the ball on a somewhat emergency basis. Like for example getting into work. Unfortunately the only way to drive and however is to leave the windows wide open and the heat off. Which one it 17° outside, produces rather predictably blue fingers.
Good thing the seats are heated, or I’d not bother at all. As it happens, I managed to get the thing over to the dealer before it quit on me entirely. $100.00 worth of deductable, for the repair item, and I should be back on the road tomorrow afternoon. A little unusual for this to be happening, just now; the truck only has about 40,000 miles on it. I’ve had heater cores quit on me before like this, but usually that occurs when the car has 150,000 miles on it or better. In years gone by I’ve done the work myself. Bastard of a job. So, as you can imagine, I’m appreciative that they were able to turn the part and the installation as quickly as they did.
All this experience of the last couple of days has made me attend just how much we depend on the vehicles we drive for our everyday existence. I suppose most people don’t think about that until such time as they don’t have that anymore. It’s simply impossible to survive without a reliable vehicle and more in most cities. And I wonder if any of the people running for office, both for the presidency and for various lower level seats understand what a central issue fuel prices are. What happens to our economy when people find they can afford to get back and forth to work?
It’s amazing how thoughtful you can get when your face and your hands are freezing….