I bought a 1997 Mitsubishi Montero last December and it’s been more trouble than it’s worth.
In October, it started screeching whenever I turned it on. Because I’m lazy, I told myself that that was okay; I’d take it in if the sound got worse.
By Halloween, the sound got worse. Because I’m cheap, I decided I’d wait and see if it got any better. It didn’t.
In November, the noise had reached a glass-shattering pitch and I winced every time I started the car, accelerated, stopped, or in anyway offended the engine. My determination wavered. I finally took it in and assessed the damage.
It turned out that there was a problem with the belts. I don’t know anything about cars, so I have no idea if that was a serious problem. The belts were silenced, so I didn’t ask questions.
Last Tuesday, I got out of rehearsal at 11:30 p.m. It was cold. Really cold. I ran to my car, looking forward to getting home and curling in bed.
I put the key in the ignition. I turned it. Nothing. I turned it again. Nothing. My battery had died.
My friend Jessica, to whom I’d promised a ride to her car, told me to call Giddy-Up. It turns out that if your battery dies, they’ll come give you a jump. When it’s past your bedtime and below freezing, that’s the greatest service anyone could offer you.
Jessica chose to brave the elements and walk to her car, leaving me alone with the cold. Giddy-Up came really fast and hooked their cables to my battery. A siren sounded.
Apparently, my car has an alarm to keep people from jumping the battery and driving off.
That was news to me. Truth be told, I’d rather not have an alarm; anyone desperate enough to try to steal my piece of junk is welcome to it. But my car couldn’t be jumped because of a safety feature I neither knew I had nor wanted.
The very nice Giddy-Up man asked if I had AAA. I do, so I called them.
The woman I talked to asked what I needed and I told her that my car wouldn’t start and that an alarm kept going off whenever I tried to jump it. She said that she’d send someone to help if I told her where I was. I gave her the address, and she told me that she actually couldn’t send anyone because she was in Alabama, but that she’d transfer me to the Texas office.
The guy at the Texas office said he could send a car. He just needed to look up my membership info. I gave him my name; he couldn’t find it. I gave him my mom’s name, since she was the chief policyholder; he couldn’t find it. He transferred me to the Florida branch, because that’s where my home address is.
I was on hold for 15 minutes. As I stamped my feet to keep warm, a very nice automated woman kept telling me how AAA could help me book a hotel if I wanted to go on vacation. Then she told me how I could place my service request online. I thought that sounded great, if only I’d had a computer on me.
When I got through, they finally found my policy information, which was good. To send me help, they had to transfer me back to Texas, which was not so good. After a little more time on hold, they finally said a car was on the way. I should expect it between 12:25 and 1:25.
I called my friend Emily, who lives in Peyton, so I could wait inside. She let me in, but because she had to get up in just a few hours, she left me to hang out with my other friend, Grant.
Grant and I had a great time. We laughed, we cried, we went to 7-Eleven to get quarter-pound hot dogs. It was a blast.
At 1:25, AAA finally came, disabled the alarm, and jumped my car. The guy said my battery was fine and there was nothing to worry about. I drove home and turned off my car. Just to make sure the AAA guy wasn’t joshing me, I tried to turn my car back on. Nothing happened.
Exhausted and past the point of caring, I got out of the car and decided to deal with the problem the next day. As I climbed out of the front seat, the alarm started going off again. At 1:45 in the morning. My neighbors must love me.
I called the AAA guy back and asked what I should do. He told me that there was nothing that could be done and to just let the alarm keep going until the battery died again. My neighbors must really, really love me.
I had to skip my 8:00 a.m class Wednesday morning. Jessica, who happens to live in the same apartment complex as me, drove me to campus at 9:00. On just four and a half hours of sleep, I had to hop myself up on caffeine, which is not easy to do when you don’t drink coffee.
The experience wasn’t a total waste. I learned a lot. I learned that I can place AAA orders online and that I hate my car. I learned that I can always count on my friends when I’m in need (thanks Jessica, Grant, and Emily). I learned that I become extremely attuned to environmental stimuli when I drink too much caffeine.
Most of all though, I learned not to eat a 7-Eleven hot dog past midnight.
Nathaniel French is a junior theater major. He can be reached for comment at [email protected].
