Breakdown Season

Fortunately, I'm talking about objects, though it probably applies in other ways as well, truth be told.

Perhaps this season of breaking machines began in the summer when our gas line rusted through and started leaking and had to be replaced. Or when we got stranded in Austin and had to replace the radiator in Lone Star Pa's car. Or when the power steering fluid in my car started a slow leak. Perhaps it began in September or early October - whenever it was that the water heater in the garage that heats the water for our washer broke. We haven't replaced that. Washing our laundry with cold water isn't such a big deal, except that we are supposed to wash the Lone Star Girl's bedding in hot water because of her dust mite allergy. And there were those lice the day before Halloween. So it would be good to have a hot water heater there again, and I thought we would save up for one after a bit and all - but things just didn't work out that way as you will see. And we had the dryer, after all, the heat of which could be used for killing dust mites, etc.. So. Perhaps the season began on Halloween when I drove Lone Star Pa's car for the first time in a good while and noticed that it felt tight and difficult to steer. He said that I was feeling it pull right and that it was fine once he fixed the tire involved. Uh huh.

Those previews aside, however, the season got serious the week before Thanksgiving. I started noticing a lot of flickering lights in the house and I also drove Lone Star Pa's car again and found that the steering problem was still there. Our favorite quasi-mechanic shop told us that the power steering pump was about to go and, since having it professionally replaced would cost about as much as the 1994 Camry is worth, I spent a bit of the Thanksgiving break calling and visiting junkyards and Lone Star Pa and my dad spent a couple of really hard days taking out the old power steering pump and putting in the "new" one, because they rock like that. One of my uncles, a journeyman electrician, came over and said an entire breaker box in my house really needed to be replaced, which he then did at cost, with many hours of labor, because he rocks like that. Then he came back twice (as of yesterday) and chased down some other problems, ending with tightening up some connections on a light fixture, so that I finally don't feel frightened of the lights anymore. A couple of weeks ago, my car failed to start at the Lone Star Baby's school after I went to pick her up. Lone Star Pa and my dad got the battery properly watered and charged and it was good to go except that a couple of days later, Lone Star Pa's car wouldn't start so we had to get it all charged and thankfully that looks like it was all it needed. Then the back-up disk for the computer broke and had to be replaced this weekend. Then the dryer broke and the heating element had to be replaced yesterday.

This has been....a little ridiculous, really. As well as a lot expensive. I'm ready for the gremlins to move on.