Cars and Water Don't Mix

The Friday we were in Branson, Sean finished up his orientation. Having a little free time, he made a quick stop to Home Depot. When he exited Home Depot, it was pouring rain. But it had just started, no big deal.

Wrong. Big Deal.

Just a couple blocks from home, Sean hit a puddle. A big puddle that didn't look like a big puddle. First the transmission went out, then the power. Then water started coming into the car. Unable to get the car moving, he got out (letting in even more water), found some good-hearted neighbors to help push the car out of the intersection onto a side road.

Sean let it dry out over several days but it would never start. Then a notice was put on the car that it needed to be moved. I was back from Branson by then, so we tied the Honda to our SUV's hitch and slowly towed that sucker back home.

Having only one functioning vehicle, Sean took that to work and the rest of us were homebound. We visited a loooot of playgrounds. The Honda sat dead in our driveway. We had to wait until Sean had time to go to the car shop to see if the Honda was salvageable.

When the time finally came, the mechanic got our hopes up, saying just X and Y needed fixing, no problem. Then they fixed X and Y and realized the rest of the alphabet was broken too.

She was a goner. My first car. The car the saw me through high school and college and married life and parenthood, gone.

By chance, the place we took the Honda was a Honda dealership. They were willing to buy the old girl and give us credit toward a new vehicle. Honestly, we got probably about as much as she was worth before the flooding- she was 18 years old, after all.

Soooo... hello minivan!

We were planning on replacing Sean's car soon anyway- the A/C was shot (not so good for a MN summer), the ABS didn't work (not so good for a MN winter). So this just shifted our timeframe. I use the van and Sean has the SUV.

Dash is giving her a nice washing. I love having a van. It's nothing fancy (though it does have heated seats!) but just having the space to move, it's so great. In the SUV, I'd have to go to three different doors to get the kids and I in. Now, I get all the kids in one door and just walk on up to my own seat. So simple.

And now Sean has A/C! He's a happy man. This all ended up pretty happily!