September Adventures cont'd...

The September fun continues!  This past weekend some of my girl friends and I were invited to go down to Lake Livingston while my uncle house-sat for his cousin. Several of us had made this trip in June when he last house-sat, so we were looking forward to a reunion of fun times and relaxation.  We met up at around 7pm and headed out in a two car caravan to Livingston, comprised of my Honda CR-V with myself, Rachael and my dog, and Courtney's Honda CR-V with herself, Tiffany and Beth.  Traffic was fine until we exited onto the Woodall Rogers Freeway, where we were met with a sea of brake lights in bumper-to-bumper traffic.  Up to this point, Rachael and I had been commiserating about our shared introvert nature - so we weren't paying as much attention to the status of my usually reliable Honda.  It was at this point that a truck pulling a flatbed trailer cut me off, and I thought I smelled smoke of some sort.  I looked at the rude truck/trailer in front of me to see if maybe I was smelling their exhaust, but suddenly noticed that it appeared that my own vehicle was smoking or steaming as it turned out.  That's when my eyes darted to my dashboard gauges to notice that my car was indeed overheating - a lot!  Thankfully, we were already in the right-hand lane, so Rachael smartly turned on the heater to full blast, and we opened the windows to pull the heat away from the engine.  Then she called the girls in the other car and let them know we were pulling over to the shoulder because traffic was barely moving, and I was not sure whether my car would even make it to the exit that appeared close but so very far away at the snail's pace we were traveling.  Once we had pulled over onto the shoulder, I turned off the car and immediately called AAA.  The operator that I got was barely competent.  Considering that she was likely equipped with computer and internet at her disposal, while I only had the very "smartphone" that I was speaking to her on as my reference guide - you would have thought she could have NOT asked me fifty million stupid questions.  Pretty much, she scheduled the tow-truck for me - and that was it, as she asked me questions about the place where I wanted it towed and even the places that she suggested, she was unsure about...for the love.  Only by the grace of God did I remain relatively calm throughout our interchange.  I don't think I even got terse with her at any point - although Rachael would be the one to verify if that is true or not.  Obviously, we knew it would be a while before a tow truck would be able to get to us, so we patiently waited, while I continued to furiously search with my "smartphone" and look into places nearby where I could take my car - as my AAA membership only covers me up to 3 miles of towing, after that you're charged $7/mile.  Well, that obviously means I would not be towing it back up to my area of town - so I was looking to see what garages in the area would be good, which was kind of stressful since I'm not familiar with that part of town much less know of a reputable garage there.

Beth's snapshot of my car and the bumper-to-bumper traffic beside us.

After waiting an hour in that spot, we noticed that traffic which had been crawling beside us suddenly got much faster and then disappeared altogether.  It was then the light bulb went off in my mind, as we were in an area under construction - they've closed down the freeway behind us!  Taking a chance on my car having cooled off completely, I started it while Rachael called the girls behind us to let them know we were taking our chances with driving to the garage where the tow truck would have taken us.  Heater blowing furiously, windows wide open, Rachael with her iPhone GPS - we wound our way three miles over to a Kwik Kar on Lemmon.  We arrived to an obviously closed facility with a roped off parking lot thus no place for me to leave my car, much less a drop box for my keys.  From this point, I decided to take my chances on a chain of garages that has a location near my apartment, but also has another location open on Saturday and Sunday.  Of course, we arrived to that facility which I knew would be closed - but also did not have a drop box for my keys...We then drove over to the garage near my apartment, which unsurprisingly also did not have a drop box, so I made the decision to drop my car off at my apartment.  Rachael offered to be our second driver - so after dropping off my car and transferring my dog and our bags from my car, we all took off for Livingston....mind you it was 11pm by this time...ugh.

We made our normal stop at the Buc-ees in Madisonville, at which point we made the decision to put off our late night Walmart grocery trip until after we got a good night's rest (was about to say until the following morning - but really it was morning when we arrived at Buc-ees...about 2am).  Thus, I snagged us some Buc-ees cinnamon rolls for our nutritious morning breakfast.  We arrived at the lake house at around 3am.  My aunt and uncle had waited up for us to make sure we arrived safe and sound (as I'd kept them apprised of the fun car drama).  After a happy, but brief welcome - we all got ready for bed and gladly snoozed the rest of the "night" away.

Saturday, was a gloriously stress-free, relaxing day.  We ate a leisurely breakfast, made a quick jaunt over to the Livingston Walmart for our lunch and dinner ingredients.  Lunch was a simple, make your own sandwich buffet followed by decadent chocolate malts prepared by my uncle.  After that a few ladies decided to float in the lake...now, the lake was not quite what it had been earlier in the summer.  With the drought, the area where the boathouse resides was now a beach with a bit of lake lapping up against the sand.  Obviously, there would be no boat action that weekend, but Tiffany, Courtney, Beth and my uncle waded out into the water for a relaxing float.  Rachael enjoyed the hammock looking out at the lake, and I took up residence on the deck's covered swing where I caught a few more zzzzz's.  As the sun drifted lower on the horizon, my aunt served us each a glass of sangria - and one by one we made our way into the not-so-hot tube.  Relaxing jets, sangria in hand, and plenty of laughs filled the early evening air.  After we were all nice and pruny, it was time to make dinner!  Enchiladas, fresh guacamole, salad, and margaritas were on the menu.  Dinner was followed with watching The Adjustment Bureau on the big screen TV.  

Collage of Saturday's fun! (as photo-documented by Beth)

Sunday morning Courtney, Tiffany and Beth left out at 6am; while Rachael and I left around 9am.  The drive back to Dallas was gratefully much less dramatic.  Later Sunday evening, I called up my friend Russell - and he kindly and patiently talked me through what needed to be done on my car - in layman's terms.  Tiffany chauffeured me around to gather the required coolant and cooling fan relay switch.  Ended up that I didn't need the relay switch, but instead needed to replace a fuse (thankfully there was a replacement fuse available in my car's fuse box).  At this point my car was fixed! :-)  However, it did end up blowing through the replacement fuse on Monday :-(  Thus, there is some sort of electrical issue with the cooling fan.  Russell can help me fix it when he comes into town in November.  Until then, I must keep a watchful eye on my gauges, on my radiator fluid, and avoid stop and go traffic like the plague!  Considering my impatient tendency to avoid brake light traffic, the latter shouldn't be too much of a problem - just have to be diligent about doing the former part as well by paying attention to my gauges and radiator fluid.

Praise Jesus for His timing and surrounding me with some pretty fabulous friends and family!  I am completely thankful that I was surrounded by an abundance of helpful friends when my car overheated rather than having been on the road alone.  And to have a friend that is knowledgeable about the inner-workings of cars and able to guide me over the phone in fixing my vehicle.  Yet, I also wouldn't mind if this is the end of the crazy adventures for a while ;-)