Aisai's Car Woes
7/26/1

I think I just saw a penguin die of hypothermia in the hallway.

Good thing I have my space heater. Since they �fixed� the air conditioning, it�s usually around 59 degrees when I get to the office in the morning.

I slept very badly last night. I tossed. I turned. Velvet, the youngest cat, bugged us all night too. And the aquarium, though on the other side of the house, needs water added so it was a really loud waterfallish sound coming from it.

Oh, about Aisai�s car: I�m out in the field, but remarkably got clear cell phone reception, and I get a page from an unknown number. I call them and it�s the Toyota place. The attempt to salvage the radiator [a $260 job] didn�t work, so we�ll need a new radiator.

The new radiator and everything will be $350ish. That�s fine. I�m just glad we have the money to pay for it [and the car in general, I suppose]. And since I was thinking it would be around $500, I�m pleased.

But we still haven�t addressed the oil leak issue. The car started leaking oil last year, just like a drop a day, and now it�s doing around 8 drops an hour. That�s bad.

They looked and found that the recirculation system [or whatever replaces the PCV valve on that Camry] was clogged.

I knew the PCV or the EGR valve had to be involved. They always are. Maybe that is why the Camry of that year was made without the PCV.

In any case, it�s clogged so the pressure builds up and that is why her engine seems to be trying to leak oil from everywhere possible. They�ll change the oil [needed it anyway], put in a new valve cover gasket and steam clean the engine. When they put in the oil, they�ll also put in some dye so they can see if it is leaking from the Rear Main Oil Seal.

Now, that�s all about $200. But, if it is leaking out the rear main oil seal, then we don�t have the means to pay for it now. That would be $500 more dollars. However, the tech dude told me that it can be driven with that seal leaking and with the dye inside it.

However, rather than Aisai�s car leaking oil, it will be leaking dye. Wonderful.

Now, all this sounds like the car is a piece of junk, which, arguably this event brings it closer to that designation. But her car is really rather nice, for being so boring. It�s a cruiser car. It handles like a two story house, but it takes bumps like the titanic. Smoooooth.

My car, on the other hand, handles rather well, but if I ran over a dime, I could feel it. Well, if the road was smooth enough.

Ah, enough about cars. What a boring entry. And unfortunately, I don�t have an icon of a stodgy car like Aisai�s Camry to put at the top. Only one that represents my car.

Decaf coffee is lame. And very hard to get excited about making it.

Oh, another good thing, that $260 cleaning of the old radiator, they are oddly not charging us for that. Freakish.