A Thing About Machines

When I lived in the city (SLC) which by personal experience has undoubtedly the worst drivers in the nation I drove on the defence. Could be something to do with so many people driving without insurance meaning they probably haven't taken any kind of drivers course well why should they, the plates on the cars are usually taken from parking lots or the U of U. I can attest to this.

Maybe just to bring things up to speed on the driver issue I should tell you a story of being stopped on Main Street, maybe 3rd or 4th South for a red light. There was a car along side of me also stopped. All of a sudden I see out of the corner of my eye a white Chevy Van blast past me without slowing down and bam, smashes the car to the left of us and of course pushes it into dangers way. Nothing happens for maybe 15seconds or so but the van is bouncing up and down. Huh? Then the doors fly open and a bunch of South of the Border People jump out with bags in there hands and all run 5different directions. Yes they had robbed a bank in Portland and made it as far as SLC before destroying their wheels. Do you see where I'm going with this? Penny also was driving along minding her own business one fine day and a nearly out of control car runs a stop sign and nearly kills her. Had she not been in the hefty Jeep probably would have. Did he have a licence? Was there insurance? Of course not.
They don't need it in SLC.

Which brings me to my initial thought of which is that most accidents happen within 3miles of one's home. Daa in Ely 3 miles will take you all the way out of town in any direction.

Back to the machines. Susie is going to the doctor for a scheduled appointment and goes to the bottom of the hill below our house, approximately 4 houses down, stops, makes a left turn and is distracted yes believe it or not and slams into a parked New GMC truck which she inbeds the little SideKick in its front bumper. Susie is an old hand thou at being slapped by the air bags and just gets some bad knee bruises and another wake up call that you have to watch what is happening beyond the windshield.

My friend Gary Weever told me he would take away Susie's shoes.

Fortunately it has been seven years since she totalled out our other car while dreaming of the nice little kitty she had saw at the Animal Shelter so it doesn't do anything to the insurance which I had just changed over to not two weeks before.

Do any of you believe in certain things happen for a reason? Well, approx a month before the crash my great friend Mike in SLC had told me he wanted to get a newer car to build up credit and asked me if I wanted his meticulously maintained 89 Honda Accord. I thought at the time, no way, I'm not taking anything from anyone for free cause that is just how I am and just how my dad was. Well I changed and took Mike up on his offer. He has had this car for like 15 years and serviced it every 2500 miles religiously. He even had all the lights replaced, yes every single light so there wouldn't be much of a chance of one going out. After logistics were figured out Penny meets me in Wendover, turns down a delicious Buffet, and takes me back to Mikes where I spend the night and most of the next day reminiscing. I'm a night driver so it gets around 9 PM and off I go back to Ely just cruising along, listening to his delicious cassette tape collection (do they still make those?) in 5th gear when I see the tachometer go way up and the car speed go way down. What the? Well maybe it just slipped out of 5th somehow. I push it harder into 5th position and nothing. Whoa this is bad. I mean how am I going to get back to Ely, get the car back to SLC when I think maybe it has more gears that might work. Waa Laa I have 4th gear and not taking any chances leave it there till I hit Wendover and then find I also have all the rest cept 5th. So now I have a great 89 Honda Accord, wow these are luxury with 4 speeds. Could be much worse. Susie went with me Friday toin the Honda to Wendover to get the truck and it was almost all worth it. We had the Seafood Buffet at the Peppermill and I ate at least 35 pounds of crab legs and oysters. I didn't even get food poisoning like I did last time and almost died.

You see the carburetor on the Jeep is a two piece carburetor and it stripped all its threads and the carburetor almost literally fell in two pieces stranding me with three dogs in the middle of main street. God was with me and there were three leashes. Bear had never been on a leash and threw himself about like the had been taken over by some spirits at a religious gathering. And of course slipped out of his collar and started for the road. I dared not chase him (heavy traffic) as he would run that much further so it was "Nice Bear, come to daddy" which he did and I latched on to him and put the collar into a partial strangle hold to get him home. Bear now is no little puppy anymore. Like 45 pounds and as tall as his mom. He picked up leash walking real good by the time we got home.

The old Dodge Truck we have has a horrible vibration and will only run smooth at 68 miles per hour. It was this that I drove to Wendoever. I suspect a bad torque converter but you have to pull the trans to get to it and I am not up to that. I just did this job last year changing the transmission and torque converter in the gravel and mud. Had it not been for my nieghbor hearing me curse and coming to my aid I surely would have torched it.

The KTM motorcycle no longer runs since it stranded us on Ward Mountain and we had the long, long, walk back. When we went up to get the motorcycle it started right up and I rode it home. That was two years ago and I have not been able to get it to even pop since.

I'm a driver, I'm a winner, things are going to change I can feel it.

Oms

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