Another truck "adventure" - Day 1847 (Year 6, Day 21)

Zephryhills, FL

Ok, last week (Wed. when Mitch left for Reno), when I took the truck out for a shopping run, I felt that something wasn't quite right, but I couldn't put my finger on it.  It didn't seem to have a lot of power while accelerating, but then again, I was on 30 mph streets, so it was hard to tell.  I chose not to go to Shabbat services because I was afraid it would break down.

Yesterday, I had an appointment for xrays and labs (for my hips and rheumatologist follow up).  I had a little bit of trouble getting it to start.  While driving, I noticed the gas tank was a little below 1/4 (I never like to go below that), so I switched to another tank (we have 3 totaling 105 gallons) which put the gauge up to FULL.  While driving the 2 miles to the doctor, it still didn't feel right: the idle was weak and it felt like it was going to stall.  I did make it to the office ok.

On the way home, I had a little more trouble getting it to start and the feeling of it being about to conk out was much stronger.  I was going to stop en route at the supermarket to pick up a few things, but decided not to tempt fate.  That was a good decision because just as I was about to cross the street into my RV park, it did die.  After what felt like an eternity (but was probably only about 5 minutes) I was able to get it started again, at which point I slammed on the gas pedal and went as fast as I could into the campground to my site and landed safely.  I'm sure someone "up there" was watching out for me.

Anyway, I arranged for my friend to take me to Walmart to pick up my groceries (that I buy online) on Thursday and figured Mitch will deal with the issue when he gets back (which will be 6:00 am on Friday, so that's really not very fair to him).  When I was a bit more calm and level headed this morning, I thought the best I could do is find a diesel mechanic in the area.  I lucked out!!! I actually found a mobile diesel truck repair place that not only answered the phone on the first ring, but said they could be here within 1/2 hour! (I had a client call so I needed to push it out another hour).  I checked out their reviews and they come out to 5 stars.  And yes, they deserve every star!

Bottom line is that the problem was that I was out of gas in all of my tanks!  There is something wrong with the gauges so for the time being, we'll need to use paper, pen and math to figure out  how much gas we're consuming since we can't rely on the gas gauges now.  While they were here, they also did an oil and fuel filter change.  Total was only about $350 (plus the gas they had to run out to buy) which is very low.  Would have been closer to $800 at a mechanic shop.  Anyway, truck is now fixed and purring.  Glad I was able to get the problem resolved and not leave it to Mitch.  I know he'll need a lot of decompression time when he gets home.