Today my husband and I drove the 130 miles or so to Knoxville to pick up my car, which had been at the Mercedes Benz dealership getting fixed. It was a gorgeous day, and I made a sketch of some geese vee-ing overhead.
Since there's no Smart car dealer in Asheville, for the supposedly rare occasions when it needs computer upgrades or repairs, the car has to go to Knoxville. So we were resigned to having to have it towed there at great expense and having it fixed there; and according to the service manager, it was now fixed and ready for us to pick up.
As soon as I started it up, though, I senses something was still wrong. There was a slight hesitation before the starter clicked in; once on the road it didn't seem to be shifting itself through all of its gears. But I ignored my intuition and told myself I was just used to driving Phil's car with its superior gear thingy, etc., and anyway I have always driven standard transmissions and am not used to how an automatic feels. Well, 30 miles down the road the little wrench of death with its terrible lightning bolt flashed and the D for Drive started blinking off and on. I pulled over even though the traffic was heavy and the verge narrow. Phil pulled in behind me. I went over to his car and told him the car was acting up again. He suggested I move it to the next exit, but when I tried to start it up, nothing. Just like before it was "fixed."
The picture on the right shows my sweet little car being hauled up onto the tow truck for the third time in a week and a half, this time to deliver it back to the dealer at their expense.
On the way back home, I was once again a passenger and drew two on-the-move sketches of the roadside scenery. Stay tuned!
Your story reminds me so much of our happenings with our old Mercedes. All the time something is broken and we get the dreaded blinking, nothing worse than an electronic machin. An on our last drive from France to Germany a truck hit us behind - we are still waiting for the Portuguese insurance company to pay us for the damage the driver caused. We are driving in a wrecked car now -- till we sell it.
ReplyDeleteoh Annalise I am so sorry for your car woes! As of Thursday mine is allegedly fixed (they finally replaced the gear shift mechanism that my mechanic said needed replacing.) I told them to drive it to me and not tow it so they could actually test it, and they said it will arrive Tuesday. Why does a dealer act like an ancient priesthood?
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ReplyDeleteThose are nice drawings. I think you should pursue these, as they are in and of themselves telling. Cars won't hurt though, as the next step in the assimilation plan.
ReplyDeleteYvonne @ Georgetown Exxon