8/14/12

Today didn't turn out like expected.

We got up and did the morning routine as usual.  Then we cleaned the lizard cage.  All good so far.  Then we decided to go into Santa Maria to get some tools I will need to finish a few projects around here.  It was lunch time so we decided to check out a local eatery in Nipomo that I had heard good things about.  It looked like this hole in the wall dive, which is a good start in my book.  Turns out they wanted $9 for their hamburger and up to $17 for their steak sandwich.  Uhhh....no.  So we went to In and Out burger instead.  We hadn't been there before.  When we pulled into the parking lot we noticed the temperature guage was pegged high.  Not good.  As we stopped and shut it down we got a strong whiff of antifreeze. Another not good.  I opened the hood to a cloud of sticky sweet steam for the not good trifecta. 

We went inside to get food while the car cooled.  Pretty good burger really and for a good price.  Simple ordering system too.  It was nice to see them making fries from real potatoes there while you watched.  Not a bad deal.  Too bad we didn't find them before we decided to eat a more vegetable based diet.  Actually that is probably a good thing.  After we finished I walked over to Trader Joe's and bought some bottled water. I went back and filled the radiator so I could find out where it was leaking.  The water was seeping out from the entire top plastic portion of the radiator itself.  It was slow enough that I thought we could make it home.  So we filled everything up and drove home.  On the way Sarah called a local auto parts store and lo and behold...they had a radiator for a 99 Honda Civic in stock.  I drove the truck to the store, picked up the radiator and spent an hour or two putting it in.  The old radiator was a crumbling mess.  The fitting for the radiator hose broke off when I tried to pull the hose off.  Nice.

Got the new one off and drove the car to Wal Mart to buy a new coffee pot.  Everything seemed fine.  Heck...with the truck poser steering hoses, the RV toilets and water heater, the Civic's brakes and radiator, if I'm not careful I could end up Handy.