Gadzooks! What a life.
Last night my pride and joy, my Ford Ranger pickup truck, went apeshiote on me. Let me start at the beginning.
It being my birthday yesterday, my tags for my vehicle were due. Yes, I had the bill a month ago, but being a cheap bastard I never want to pay the extra buck to have it mailed. So I was "illegal" as of midnight on my birthday. Usually this strategy of saving a buck ends up with either me paying a late charge a day or two later of $15 or driving like a mongoose on crack (*please note we at gutterpoet in no way endorse mongooses..mongeese?..er.. to drive while under the influence of crack) to get there before 5pm when the office closes on my birthday. Yes, welcome to the brilliance that is me.
I chose the latter and flew out of work to get my emissions test and pay for my sticker. I accomplished all this by 5pm! I then go as I do daily to Home Depot, then stopped at the trail to run a couple miles. Here's where it gets creepy.
You would think my truck, now street legal for another year would be pleased as punch. But not so much apparently. I finished my run, expelled a lung, and hopped in my truck. I pull out of the lot to head home and then it happens. Bizarre, strange lights flash and appear on my dash lit up like a christmas tree. Dire warnings are hurled at me with all the invective a machine can muster. "STOP NOW OR YOU WILL DIE!!!" "TURN OFF ENGINE! EVACUATE! DEAR GOD EVACUATE! OH THE HUMANITY...OH THE HUMANITY!! DRIVER WILL BE EJECTED UNCERMONIOUSLY IN 10 SECONDS!! REPEAT! 10 SECONDS!
"Check Engine!" "ABS Deployed!"???? What the hell? I grab the owners manual to make sense of all this only to discover that it's in Japanese! Drats, actually it's English but may as well be Japanese. The upshot is to "have vehicle serviced immediately, do not drive". Yes, practical advice there Skippy,at 8pm on a Monday evening, miles from a service center.
Now the engine seems just fine, sorta. The speedometer now doesn't work for some reason. And the truck won't go out of first gear. The result is I can do about 20mph tops. This does not make popular on the drive home where normally vehicles travel about 60mph on a two lane road. Ahh, screw them all!
I make it home and now I dropped off the truck this morning on the way to work. I wasn't sure what to write on the little form where you drop the key. So I wrote "truck went psycho" in the space provided. I figure that'll get their attention anyway. Hopefully, vehicle mental health is also covered under my warranty. ahem.
I wonder if this is karma coming back to get me from all my Bob Hope corpse jokes from yesterday. hmmm.
At any rate, pray for me and my lovable truck that we may be soon reunited and going zoom zoom zoom.