Manly Geniuses

Well, Big Red is back in our good graces, thanks to the genius of my husband and my Uncle Hepburn ("Hep"). Last night, Hep brought out his handheld diagnostic tool and they figured out that the number 4 cylinder was misfiring, so I went into town and got a replacement fuel injector. It's a good thing O'Reilly's Auto Parts is next to Pizza Hut. So Carl installed that (the fuel injector, not the pizza) and the "Check Engine" light went out, but it still wasn't right. So this afternoon Hep came out again with some type of diagnostic gizmo-gadget and they figured out that the injector coil was bad (it had shorted to the chassis) and that the spark plug harness was shot as well. So off to town Carl went and got the appropriate parts and spent all of this evening putting Red back together. And viola! success. The truck is back up and running right. The real test will be tomorrow morning when Carl drives into work. I hope the truck doesn't die on him because he has to be at work by 6:00 am to do rig testing, and I don't want to have to get me and the girls out of bed to go rescue him. Brrr!

You know what I just realized? I just rattled off a bunch of stuff about auto repairs and rig testing and I have absolutely NO idea what any of that means. The only parts I understand are A) Carl fixed the truck B) it's working C) Carl has to go to work very early in the cold dark of early winter and D) Uncle Hep dug us out of yet another hole. Thank God for Uncle Hep, a certified genius with a heart of gold. He and Carl have those things in common, genius and gold heartedness.

This episode reminds me of an incident that happened to me in high school, where my parents' van broke down and I had to go get them in the rain, but I'll save that story for another time.

I'm tired. Good night!