Oh no, Geronimo!

Today has been a day of highs and lows. It was beautifully sunny this morning, but there was a fair bit of snow on the ground and it was cold. We had a delicious breakfast of coffee and oatmeal with Molly, but Geronimo, our car, wouldn't start.

We had suspected there might be problems already yesterday morning. The engine stuttered when we started it up, and it took us several tries to get it going. We thought it might be the combination of low fuel, high altitude, and cold weather. It turned out we were partially right.

We called a tow truck to bring Geronimo in to the Volkswagen dealership here in Denver. That went fine, and we were able to get a few errands done while the mechanics figured out what was wrong. We went to the post office to mail a few things, and a really friendly woman there helped us out and wished us all the best with the car and our trip.

We returned to the dealership. And we waited. Then we waited some more. And some more. We watched a couple episodes of The Office. Then they let us know that we needed a new fuel filter, which is standard maintenance. So we did that. And we got an oil change. Then they told us Geronimo was ready to go.

So we went. Rhoda went up to settle the bill while I went to bring our things to the car. Then things went bad. Really bad.

The woman at the till entered one too many digits on our credit card. This put us way over the limit on our card and made it so that we could not pay the original total. She voided the original entry, but a hold had been automatically placed on the card. While this was happening, she was nonplussed and unapologetic, and she proceeded to answer several phone calls. When Rhoda asked to use a phone, the woman gestured vaguely toward the far wall. This raised our frustration level up several notches, and it didn't help when we had to wait on hold while clearing things up with the credit card company. We ended up waiting for another half an hour while the issue was sorted out. It was, as my father would say, a total disaster.

We finally left the dealership after receiving a ten percent discount and a couple free car washes from the manager. We were both feeling pretty crumby. Then we filled up with diesel and drove to the car wash. We dropped the car off and went inside the shop. And that's when things got better.

Rhoda bought some Altoids, and the total was $2.10. She paid with a twenty and apologized for not having ten cents. And that's when a man named Jerry from Australia handed her a dime. And that's when we started talking with Jerry outside in the sunshine. It turns out he met his wife in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and they had spent the last twenty-six years living in Australia. We told him we had gone to Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and we talked about how much we loved the wild, beautiful beaches of Lake Michigan. Then a man standing behind us walked up and said he'd grown up in Grand Rapids. So we talked with him a while about our trip. And then he gave us directions for a scenic route to Jackson, Wyoming, which is where we plan to go tomorrow. We introduced ourselves, and then his car was ready and he left. Then our car was ready and we left. And we felt really good.

So it was a day of ups and downs. Geronimo is fixed and clean. We ate a delicious late lunch at Molly's house. Rhoda took a nap and I wrote for the blog. We walked down to the grocery store to get food and beer for dinner. We stood around in the kitchen, getting the food ready and talking with Molly. Now it's time to eat dinner.

All in all, it was a strange but good day.