My current frustration is my vehicle, and today has been stressful for me because she is still laid up. I did find a radiator leak, and I did fix it – mostly myself, with a little encouragement from a friend – and I’m proud of that. I’m no mechanic, I know next to nothing about cars. But I am smart, and I can look at something and trouble shoot like a motherfucker. So that’s what I did. I started it And ran it And crawled underneath it And watched it for patterns. And I fixed a leak in a car. And I did establish that it indeed is the thermostat again. So. There’s that. Regardless, the overheating problem does still exist, Clarice is a picky bitch and apparently has expensive taste. No AutoZone parts for her. Gotta spend double on dealer parts. Whatever. She’s slated to be fixed tomorrow, by a trustworthy person who will not fall through. Scratch that off my list.
I got to drive the Jeep again today, and while I’m still not a fan of the ride, it does definitely appeal to me on some level. Clarice is classified as a wagon, and looks like a minivan, which I’m not a fan of. She drives like a car though. I like how high up the Jeep sits, and I also like the size and maneuverability. It’s a smaller vehicle though and doesn’t offer much space. I do have two kids and I do require space to cart them and groceries and bikes. . . I think I need a truck. That’s what it’s coming down to. I’m not a minivan kinda mom. But I need the space that a minivan provides. Maybe an SUV, but I’m feeling a truck more and more. We’ll see what happens when I go car shopping.
So, I took the day off work to figure out my vehicle situation, and while I didn’t get her fixed I did get something figured out and I did learn some stuff, so it wasn’t a wasted day. I also did some planning for the next couple of weeks as well, and made dinner, hamburger helper, but dressed it up enough so that the boys actually enjoyed it. I helped Chase make a picture for his teacher and worked on teaching him to read. There was a picture of a guinea pig, and the sentence was “The guinea pig is here.” Chase read, “The. . . Pig?”
“You missed a word, kid.”
“I don’t know that word.”
“What letter is that?”
“G.”
“So what word is that?”
“Joe?”
I forgot how frustrating and entertaining teaching a child to read can be.
Matt’s fighting off a head cold, and it’s made him a little more forgetful than normal. He’s usually pretty good, and he’s established a routine in the morning, mostly on his own, so he doesn’t forget anything. He forgot to take his ADHD med this morning and had to come back, and still managed to forget his ID and house key. Chalk it up to being Monday and the brain fog that head colds create.
Moral of the story is this. 1. Have faith in you. Yes, someone else is fixing my car, but until I could get a hold of that person, I started working on the problem myself. And I learned a lot. 2. Make the best of the situation. I didn’t sit idly by, worrying. I still accomplished things beyond my car. 3. Wake up and be Awesome. Because someone has to be, it may as well be you. 4. Don’t be afraid to venture outside your comfort zone. Vehicle maintenance is waaaayyyy outside my comfort zone, but had it come down to it, in order to get my kids from point A to point B, I would have attempted to change that stupid little part myself. 5. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. While I am determined enough to try to do something I’ve never done before, I am also not foolish enough to attempt it without exhausting all other options, first. I am not a mechanic. Period point blank.
Happy Monday, folks.
So, This is Real Life 