A Serious Pain In The Butt
2006-04-26, 16:23

After a six day wait, I finally got to drive my van (an '02 Oddysey, for those who would Google their way to vehicular repair horror stories) again yesterday.

For about six hours.

Last Tuesday evening, I dropped the van of at the dealership to have the transmission looked at. It had been acting up fairly recently, and there was some sort of recall situation due to 2nd gear overheating and slipping. The fun part was, I bought out the lease a couple of months ago, and in order to get my plates, I had to take the thing to Ohio's E-Check to get the emissions validated. And it didn't pass, because of the transmission. So I took it in to get fixed.

No worries about cost at least, a major fear I'd had after reading horror stories here and there on the 'net about dealership service centers trying to charge people for the repairs and having to make phone calls to Honda to get it cleared up. I'm not all that big on phone calls. But everything was going to be fixed for free, save for some wiring connected to the power steering that was corroding (totaling lest than 00 - a mere pittance in a repair shop). Naturally there were delays getting the new transmission in, because there are always delays. After borrowing my dad's truck, I get the official word on what needs to be replaced, and they give me a loaner - a gold Pontiac Grand Prix. This car is in so many ways not me, yet driving it was not something I'd pass on. It felt like playing a video game. I started calling it The Car That Goes 'Vroom'. I had it over the weekend and up until yesterday morning, when all the repairs were done and I picked up the van. I'd stayed home because a) the car was done, and b) I felt like crap from too little sleep, too much rehearsal and too much pollen in the air, apparently. A stuffy nose is not something I want during Tech Week. I hadn't been sleeping well when I was sleeping, mainly from worry dreams and songs from the stupid show running in my head nonstop.

Anyway, I pick up the van, and the baby and I spent the day erranding, including picking up the tux I was fitted for to wear in the show. But before that, I went directly from the service shop to E-Check. Little did I know, but that ended up being a mistake.

For you see, computers need time; time to register the fact that the car is once again moving and emitting at-or-below government-standard levels of stuff into the air. By the time I got to E-Check, my van apparently still had no such knowledge to that effect, because when they hooked up to the van's computer, it still said that problems still existed. Stupid computer. What I learned after calling Honda is that I'd need, according to the manual, to spend several days driving in 'various conditions' (highway, city, etc.) before the computer would properly register car conditions. And I had on my car a now expired temp plate, no renewals left. So it seemed that I was destined to break the law so that I could comply with the law. Ain't life grand? Thus I drove to Strongsville for the tux, taking a slow detour through the Metroparks while the baby slept blissfully in her car seat. Laurana's been something of a drama queen this week, and I think she's been suffering from allergies like I have. She did, as is usual, charm the pants off the folks working at the clothing shop, but threw herself to the ground in a fit when she wasn't allowed to climb on the metal ladder they use to get to the higher up shelved stock. Smart people that they are there at the Men's Warehouse (plug intended - they were fast and nice people), they had a small bin of toys to keep tots busy whilst getting fitted. God knows how many germ-ridden mongrels have chewed on these things, but at least hey kept her entertained for a few moments.

Time ran out to go back to E-Check before the kids got home from school, so I bade my time until H got home from work, and then went again (and again also with baby in tow, so H could work on dinner unclung to). This time, miracle of miracles, it passed. Yay, I get my paper that says 'passed' and head over to the BMV, hoping they were still open. And of course, they'd closed five minutes before I got there. So I head home, and halfway there I look down and notice something strange - the D light on my gear indicator is flashing. This has certainly never happened before. My first thought was that something funky went on during the E-Check and that it would (ever hopeful) 'go away'. Instead of going away, the 'check engine' light pops on, the TCS locks in the ON position, and the transmission gets stuck in 2nd gear. I tried to downshift into 1st, and the van actually lurched into gear. Not good; not good at all. So I hobble home, too stunned and daddy-ful to be furious yet, and immediately get on the phone to the shop. The guy says, after I explain to him what happened, "Yeah, sounds like the transmission. We might have to replace it again (emphasis added)." Again! So they replaced my crappy transmission with another crappy transmission! And chances are that I'll get yet another crappy transmission to replace that one. Chances are that in four years I'll be looking into replacing it again, assuming it gets past the first day this time. Chances are that I'm not going to be buying another Honda in the future.

I got another loaner, at least. I was hoping, since I'd just turned it in that day, that I would get The Car That Goes 'Vroom' back. Alas, I ended up with a red Dodge Neon. Not exactly the same driving experience, ya know? But it gets me to work. And reminds me why I don't like driving a four-cylinder car.

Then there was rehearsal. We were again without our other male singer, whom I hope has been working his butt off on the music during his spare time. And the band is still working out the kinks, to the point where, during a three-hour (we actually got started a half hour late, so two-and-a-half hour) rehearsal, we managed to only get a little bit into Act II. Did I mention that the show starts Friday? Friday!? Friday! Egad. Granted they (and we, the singers) are sounding a lot better in a short period of time, but there's still many inconsistencies to be cleared up, half of which are caused by the score itself. Seems that MTI (the company that has printing rights for the score) didn't bother to make sure that the instrumental scores and the performers' scores matched up. Or make sure that all the time signatures were right. Or even make sure that all the measures were there at all. Seriously, there's a page where an entire bar of music is missing. There's another where two bars on the page are out of order. Some look like they were written by a child just learning to write music. In a nutshell, pathetic workmanship. But as they have the monopoly on printing certain musical scores, whaddaya gonna do? Not perform a show because the score is crappy? Boycott Kander and Ebb (among others)? Maybe. Rise up, peoples of the stage! Defy your musical score masters! Fight the Broadway Power!

Ahem.

Anyway... one thing I'm getting out of this is Performance Adrenaline, where I suddenly seem like I know what I'm doing, at least to a degree. Songs sometimes come out of me better than I expected them to. That section of my brain that turns my knowledge into instinct really does its job on occasion. I'm going to miss that when I vow off of doing shows until Laurana's older. These last couple of weeks have shown me that I cannot justify to myself doing theater while I have a family, especially a toddler, at home and needing me. I don't know how long it's going to be before I feel like I can manage to not feel guilty about being away for so many nights while my baby slowly forgets who I am or I make myself sick to the point of needing a day off just to feel like I've been home at all. Sure, I love being on stage, but the sacrifice isn't worth it right now. It's either I'm miserable without a proper outlet and do see my family, or I have a proper outlet and am miserable because I don't see my family.

Family wins every time.

-- End Transmission --