eskatological volumes

12.29.2003

 
21:48

ok, so here's the monumental posting of xmas week; only proceed if you're really bored, or just that curious.

dec 22: we saw erin that night and that's where i scored the yellow knit underwear. didn't do much else that night.

dec 23: the morning and day was pretty uneventful; sitting around, prolly watched some firefly, sat and enjoyed our tree...oh, i think we watched some roseanne for some reason too. then we packed up and headed home. being as the wagon was still on it's first tank of gas i wanted to try and run it pretty low so i could know how much mileage it really got, so we didn't get any gas in m'boro as i usually would. it showed having between 1/2 and a 1/4 of a tank. so about 10 or 15 miles from home the car just kinda starts losing power and i pull it off the road as it just dies. i get out and try to smell and possibly see anything resembling a clue in the pitch black. there's quite a bit of smoke, but i can't see well enough to determine anything. got back in the car and even the inside of the car had smoke in it pretty bad. we sit there for a bit and i finally spot a house across the four lane highway we're on and make my way across. call the house and no answer; i hang up. then i figure i at least need to leave a msg. so i call back and leave a msg. tell the guy at this house that i may be back if my parents don't show up soon. julie and i sit there for a bit and figure maybe we should just call a tow truck, cause with pop there or not i figure the car isn't going anywhere. but before i do that, i try to crank the car up. and it starts. sounds fine. so i try going down the road for a bit; we go about 2 or 3 miles and it starts missing again, so i turn around and try going back up the road to this church we'd just passed with plenty of ppl there. it doesn't quite make it there, but julie and i both make it to the church and ask to use the phone. had to use this guy's cell phone as the church phone couldn't make a long distance call (we're in warren county technically and not white county). mom picks up and says pop is on his way; that they were home when i called but didn't recognize the number on caller id and didn't pick up the first time, and the second time when i left the msg they were back in the bedroom and couldn't hear me till right at the end. so anyway pop shows up and this guy at the church mentioned he had a 24' trailer and he'd haul the car home if we needed. so when he comes back with the trailer we go out to the car; it starts up again and seems to run ok, with just a little bit of smoke (or maybe it was steam from the rain). the guy with the trailer thinks it's the catalytic converter that's stopped up and causing the car to die out. we figure we'll have to take it to a muffler shop on friday as no place will be open for the next few days. so we tow it home and the guy won't take any money from us, but julie gave him $20 and asked him to put it in the collection plate, which he agreed to.

dec 24: we didn't really do anything this day; julie and i sat around and i talked to pop about the car a bit and just other little bits of things that i wish i could remember as those little things are what i cherish. mom had to work and didn't get in till that evening. we wrapped everybody's presents that night as usual and went to bed. julie couldn't sleep so well.

dec 25: i woke up before julie and laid there for some time wishing she'd wake up. 45 mins after waking up pop comes down and says i need to come upstairs to see something. so i go up and there are 10 wild turkeys roosting up in a tree across the road. pop is just dying to try and shoot one, but is afraid to as the neighbors are kinda close. so pop chickens out and we start opening presents. i've listed most everything i got below. julie and i got mom a good pair of can openers. we got pop a dvd player (and the first season of married with children and a 128mb jump drive) if i hadn't mentioned that. mom got a diamond necklace, and some wrinkle cream; and she picked out some perfume later. um, so while i was playing with some of my stuff julie feel asleep in the big chair in the living room. but after a bit we cleaned up and went up to bon air to eat with some of julie's family. my stomach had still been a little wonky so i didn't eat too much. but we spend some seperate time with the good granny, and then with julie's aunt katherine and uncle richard. oh, and we had to take back the clint eastwood triple dvd pack that we got for julie's dad. apparently there was some 'language' in it that julie's mom didn't jive with. then we headed down to the tobitt homestead for a while. then we just went home and settled in for the night.

dec 26: friday morning pop calls the mechanic at what use to be the subaru dealer in sparta to ask some advice; he says it's not the catalytic converter. that if that was the problem that the car would not start back up at all. ... he was a bit puzzled as to what it might be, but agreed with pop that it might be the fuel filter. so pop and i head out to auto zone and pick up a fuel filter, pcv valve, and i get some wipers also. ran into nathan while there; talked to him for a bit. we stop by the local computer store on the way back home and pop got an old case free from the guy there, and he gave me a handful of screws, mobo posts, etc for free. we get back home, put in the fuel filter and try to crank the car. it won't even turn over. pop pulls the fuel line off the engine and it's not even getting any fuel to the engine now...but this wasn't due to the fuel filter. so we figure it must be the fuel pump. i show pop where it is and we go back to auto zone to get a fuel pump. we get one for 124 bucks and head home. pull the fuel pump out and the one we bought is way smaller and won't even connect properly. so we go back to auto zone and they have another fuel pump but the connectors don't look quite right, but the size is pretty much the same. we figure we'll try the other auto shops in sparta. none of them have one in stock, or just have the same small one in stock. so we go to cookeville; go to 4 auto shops there and it's the same deal. so we come back home and pop calls the subaru dealer in harriman. they have the entire fuel assembly in stock for $320, but can't (won't) sell just the pump. pop takes a shower and i figure we're kinda done for untill he finds something else and that i'd just drive something else home while he worked on the car. but we decide to give it another go with the pump at auto zone that was about the same size but had different connectors. so we get that, rig it up, try to drop it all back in and we can't get the assembly back down into the tank just right. mind you it's getting dark by now. we finally get it in and hook everything back up..and the car doesn't crank. but while we were having trouble putting the assembly back in pop noticed it seem awfully low on gas. this was a little hard to be sure of as the car was on a bit of a slant and we were looking at the high side of the tank. but we run over to the gas station and get 2 gal of gas to give that a go. we drop in the two gallons and give it a shot. the car churns a few times, then finally pull some gas through the line and cranks up just fine. *sigh* so all this trouble...and entire day wasted, and pop broke two fingernail just because i'd fucking run out of gas. but mind you it still said 1/4 of a tank when i pulled off the road. so we run to wal mart and put $5 in it to see if the float in the tank rises properly, but it didn't. it was still sitting below empty even with 5 gallons in it. so we figure pop got the float hung on something when putting the assembly back in. we call it a night, me and pop clean up a bit, and i took him out to supper cause lord knows he deserved it.

dec 27: me and pop start working on the car around 10am after it's warmed up just a bit. we take the pump back and get it back in properly so that the float is at least not on total empty. the car had 343 miles on the trip meter when it died...and with 5 gallons in it, it says it has 3/4 of a tank now. so we finally conclude that the float is just bad. we decide to just leave the fuel pump in there as the 'correct' one was only $93 and i'm quite sure the one we took out was the original one which has 180k miles on it. we get the pcv valve on there pretty easy, pop sprays on some engine cleaner to get some of the gunk off to try and see if we can tell if and where it may be leaking any oil. then we take it out for a little drive and wash it. we get back home, let it run for a bit to see what it's gonna do and all seems well. julie and i clean up and we go to cookeville to take back two things to penney's that mom got julie, and a denim jacket that i got julie (mom found the jacket julie really wanted on xmas eve i think, so julie still got one). so we head off to the mall and julie takes the penney's stuff back, but they don't have the red sweater she was wanting. and maurice's won't take the jacket back without the receipt, which i was stupid and left in nashville. after a while my parents hook up with us at the mall and julie bought some sneakers at peebles. then we went and ate a tasty supper at gondola. then we went shopping at super d (where mom got the denim jacket), to hobby lobby so julie could get some yarn, to kmart so i could maybe find a cassette holder/case for the tapes in the wagon (no luck), then to big lots, and then to lowe's so pop could find a new cart to put his convection oven (no luck there either). then we head home, but julie and i stop at sparta wal-mart to try and find some more sweatpants to match a hoodie i got her (again, no luck there). we get back home, watch some firefly on pop's dvd player while i pack some of our stuff up. then i hooked his player up with the s-video cable and set it all up in the tv cabinet how he wanted it.

dec 28: i get up around 7 or 8 and talk to my parents a bit. i really didn't want to leave. i had already started feeling down about it on sat. but i started packing a few more things up and kinda getting ready to head out. we packed it all up and headed out for a late breakfast with my parents before we left out and ended our vacation. we had a good breakfast at a home cooking type place between sparta and mcminnville. it took me forever to step away from my parent's car and get into my own to leave out. i just wanted to go back home with them. but i finally got the strength to walk away and get back here. we took m'boro road from m'boro to here instead of I24 as pop didn't want me going over 65 since he put in some lucas engine treatment to help seal up the valve cover gaskets. we stopped at the kmart in m'boro, and big lots and kmart in smyrna to try and find the cassette holder but still no dice. all of sunday evening and night was spent setting up, hooking up, and playing with all my xmas loot.

tonight i went to tower to take back back the clint eastwood pack but they didn't have the one that my parents got for me (which is what julie's pop wanted), so i just traded it in for the beth gibbons & rustin man cd, and i got julie the REM best of cd. we were going to go to hickory hollow mall and get the red sweater from penney's that julie wanted, but we just decided to sit it out since we both didn't get home till 6:40 or so.
and that's it.