When It Rains It Pours Department

When it rains, it pours department.

I had Loretta serviced at my friendly BMW mechanic yesterday.

The tranny warning light was coming on sporadically so I took it in and had the fluid level checked and decided to change the fluid. I have never changed automatic transmission fluid before in my entire life, maybe because I usually had stick shifts. I have considered changing the fluid just another ploy to have a fool part with his money but the FBMWM said it could help and it certainly wouldn't hurt. While there, we also topped off the coolant as it was a wee bit low.

When I left the FBMWM the car ran better than ever and we loaded up the trunk and set forth to place where elephants go to die, Palm Desert. Please humor me a bit more because this is when the shit storm started.

Picture it, we're on the 91 freeway at rush-hour. We even took the seven buck toll road option because of the traffic. It didn't take long to figure out that all of the traffic was on the toll road because we were sitting in gridlock and the freeway, emphasis on the word free, cars were whooshing past us.

About the point where the toll road ended, we started to finally pick up speed, IE seven to ten MPH. Soon the dreaded light on the dash that contained a gear and an exclamation point and the notation about how we were so screwed came back on and the car went into "limp" mode and defaulted to third gear as the speed picked up to seventy.

That's when the little light that indicates when coolant is low came on. I was starting to feel like a commercial pilot who just had one of his jet engines fall off with all of those dash lights coming on. I absolutely knew that we had sufficient coolant as we had just topped two hours ago but never disbelieve a German car when it is trying to tell you something. Heed the warning(s). The steam wafting from under the hood is yet another sign that this isn't one of your best days.

We got off of the freeway and LIMPED into a Mobil gas station, gas station not SERVICE station. The long slide into the abyss was almost over, but not quite. I'll spare you some of the details but after waiting over an hour the AAA flatbed tow truck showed up. The world class hand wringing then started. There were four of us, the driver, Jamie, me and the dog. We all couldn't fit in the cab of the truck so Jamie said she'd get an Uber to take her to a hotel/motel that was dog friendly. Oh wait, Uber won't take dogs. I suggested that we humans sit in the cab and miss fur storm ride in the car now on the back of the truck. No, the poor dear doggie can't ride back there all alone, it will cause irreparable harm to her mental state.

OK, what do you want to do? Oh, I'll ride with her in the car. The driver chimes in that state law forbids that. By now, I'm in silent mode having made the only pragmatic option. Now we're in audible hand wringing mode. Alas, the frau suggests that we people ride up front and miss doggie rides alone in steerage.

Good choice dear, good idea.