Tanks for the Memories

Photo source

I’ll never be rid of the heap of the metal Mr. Wright calls a car. “The Phoenix,” as I’ve taken to calling it, is a dilapidated pile of parts slightly resembling an older model Honda.

It is the bane of my existence. Well, the Phoenix and grease spatters on the stovetop.

Loyal readers may recall it was stolen last year. Unfortunately, our local boys in blue solved the crime and returned the bucket of bolts to us. Someone hit it in the grocery store parking lot and we received a check from the insurance company, but I decided I’d rather pay bills with the money than buy a new jalopy. I sort of regret that decision. A poor credit rating can be fixed in seven years, but the Phoenix seems determined to hang around much longer than that.

As a vegan, it shames me to say it, but I’ve sort of been hoping Mr. Wright would “accidentally” hit a deer, and the insurance company would be forced to total the car. I mean, he’s a hunter, so killing Bambi, whether by bow, firearm or vehicular deerslaughter shouldn’t bother him in the slightest.

When I was in high school, my idea of a “hot” car was a cherry 1966 Mustang. Now that I’ve grown, my idea has changed. I now know, without a doubt, that a truly hot car is one which has broken air conditioning and a radiator leak. The Phoenix is all that, and a bag of chips—spilled across the back seat.

As you can imagine, I was thrilled when Mr. Wright called me the other day to tell me he’d been in an accident. “Really? That’s fantastic!” I said.

“In case you were wondering, I wasn’t hurt,” he replied.

“But the car’s a total loss, right? I mean, you can’t possibly drive it, right?”

“Thank goodness I was wearing my seatbelt. Not a scratch on me. It was pretty scary, though…”

“That’s the best news I’ve heard all week! Be sure to get a lot of photos. I’ll start checking the auto section in the classifieds. What color do you think we should get? Black always looks so dusty, don’t you think? Oh—I didn’t even think to ask… Are you okay?”

As it turned out, the car wasn’t exactly totaled, and I must say I’m rather disappointed in Mr. Wright’s ability to get into a proper accident. He was driving down the highway, about twenty minutes out of town, when a rogue scissor jack, liberated from a vehicle in front of him, came bouncing down the road. In spite of his best efforts, Mr. Wright was only able to lodge the animated road hazard into the bottom of the Phoenix’s gas tank, effectively immobilizing the vehicle and requiring him to call AAA.

Our roadside assistance program provides towing for situations such as these, and Mr. Wright assumed he’d be picked up within a matter of minutes, being only fifteen short miles out of town. Imagine his surprise when the AAA agent told him to expect the wrecker to arrive within an hour.

“An hour? Are you kidding me?” he asked. “I’m only twenty minutes out of a major city.”

The agent laughed, and explained that Mr. Wright was two miles over the coverage boundary of a contracted company fifty miles away. It was hot and dusty that day, and Mr. Wright was not pleased.

He was even less pleased when the wrecker finally arrived an hour later, and the tow rig busted. “You’re not going to believe this,” he said when I answered the phone. “The tow truck broke down, so now the driver has to call for two wreckers—one for our car, and one for his truck.”

“That’s a shame,” I said. “Did you ask him if he has AAA?”

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