Car trouble?

In the 4 years Tim & I have been married, we have been limited to owning only one car. In February of this year, the engine died in my minivan. Something about the crank shaft braking off in the engine. (which supposedly never happens). Anyhow, we had been looking for a cheap second vehicle, but after spending nearly 2 grand to fix my van, Tim decided we should by something newer and more reliable.

So, with not much money to put down and not being able to afford much for monthly payments we were pretty limited. We found a dealership with a pretty good inventory and they started the paperwork to get us the loan. What it boiled down to was we only had a couple of choices. A 2002 Blazer Extreme. A gorgeous car, but not really practical for a family of 6. A 2004 Voltzwagon Jetta, which got excellent gas mileage, but wouldn't fit us all. Plus Tim had to fold up into an accordion shape to get into the little thing. Or a Suzuki XL-7, which I am very fond of, but had high mileage.

Somehow we wound up with the candy apple red Blazer Extreme. It is a nice car. It really is. I love to play with the gadgets in it. It just isn't exactly what I had in mind.

Yesterday, the kids and I took it for a quick run to PetSmart and Barnes & Noble. I had trouble starting it, but once we got going it was fine. We made our 2 stops, and both times it started like a charm when we got back in it. I forgot I had even had difficulty starting it.

Last night, Tim and I decided to run to Sam's and then go out to dinner. When we came out of Sam's, the Blazer wouldn't start. Dead. D E A D. We tried and tried. Tim fiddled with things under the hood. But, it wouldn't start.

We decided to call my ex husband, Steve, because he lives about a mile away from Sam's. We figured if nothing else, we could jump off the Blazer, get it home and figure out what was wrong there. For 45 minutes we tried to get it started, but no luck. We decided since the Blazer had a V-6 Vortec engine, Steve's battery in his little Mistubishi truck wasn't enough to get it going.

So, we go to ride home in the back of Steve's truck. We had to have been quite a sight, going through the heaviest traffic area in the city in the back of a pickup. Not only is it illegal, it is about as redneck as you can get.

Today, we went back to Sam's with a friend, Joe, who has a workvan with a V-8 engine. "Surely", we thought, "his battery is big enough to jump the Blazer."

Nope. It would try to turn over but nothing would quite happen.

We checked everything we could think of. Even made sure the gas gage indicated it had gas. As a last ditch effort, Tim sent me to the gas station for a couple of gallons to put in there. It was the last thing we could think to try before calling an expensive tow truck.

Tim put the 2 gallons in the Blazer. I said a little prayer as he hopped in to try to crank it one more time.

VVVVRRRRROOOOOOM

She started up beautiful, just like normal.

Evidently, the gas gauge had somehow gotten hung up and we were just simply out of gas.

The funny part ( well it will be funny one day ) is that on the way to Sam's I commented, "Honey, we've been almost 400 miles on this tank of gas and we aren't even out yet. Isn't that great?"