Speakin' of doing stupid stuff........The Dizz pulled an all-time
classic today..
Long story but I'll
try to be brief...
Been real cold out lately, and today it was very clear,
and plenty cold. Got up about 12:30, and as I poured my
first cup of coffee (it's decaf, but I still need it to wake up) I
realized I'd need to run to the store for cigs and milk. No
big deal, right?
Guess again..
Got myself woke up, and after taking care of a couple chores
I grabbed my coat and went out to get the truck warmed up.
My old Toyota doesn't get out much these days, and we've
had plenty of cold weather, so went to start it and got about
half a crank out of it. It quickly became obvious that the battery
was deceased.
Still no big worry. Grabbed the spare keys for the wife's car,
pulled it out of the garage and once situated I hooked up
my set of heavy gauge jumper cables. Just let it charge
for a few minutes, and after a couple cranks the old 22RE
fired right up. Cool!
Well...sorta..
After letting the truck run for a bit with the idle raised, I headed
off to the local gas station for a few gallons of gas and a couple
packs of smokes. Cigarettes are damn expensive up here, even
if you buy the by the carton on one of the local reservations, and
the local market charges too much.
Pumped in $15 worth of gas, went in and bought the cigs, came
out and .....you guessed it...not enough charge on the battery
to start up again...
Oh crap....
Within a minute a fellow pulls up right in front of me and offers
a jump..sweet! Get 'er started up again and I head out to the
market, about a mile away. As I drive I'm thinkin' "Wonder if I
should take the chance of shutting it off again?"
That's where the trouble starts...
So, I get to the Red Apple, which is the closest thing we have to
a supermarket, but it's not a big store at all. If you need groceries,
you have a choice of the RA, or you can drive 30 miles downriver
where you have a choice of major supermarkets. A 60 mile r/t
ain't necessary for a gallon of milk.
As I'm parking I realize that I could leave the truck running, and use
the key fob button to open it again. I could also leave the heater
running, and being in the low 20's outside it'd be nice to get back
into a warm truck. Closed and locked the wing-window, stepped
out and closed the door with the truck still running.
Now, my Toy is an '87, and has an aftermarket alarm and automatic
door locks. The fob with the open/close buttons was on a clip, so
I just unhooked it without shutting off the ignition, stepped out,
and using the button fob locked the doors.
Y'all know where this is goin', don't ya?
It's late afternoon and I noticed the Sun was dropping pretty low
when I went into the store. Being a very small town, there's usually
little choice but to chat with folks as you shop, but today I got in,
grabbed a couple gallons of milk and was back out the door in a
matter of a couple minutes. The locking handle on the door to my
Snugtop canopy was near frozen, but finally got it turned and set
the milk in the back.
Pulled the door fob from my pocket, pressed the button to open
the doors and ...
..nothing happened...door locks didn't even flinch....every door
and window is locked tight, and it's getting colder out by the minute.
I stand there like an idiot pushing that damn button for a few minutes,
and finally figure out that the locks won't unlock if the engine is running.
Study on it for a minute, and decided to go borrow a coat hanger from
the store and try to pop the lock/unlock button up. Problem is, the knobs
are actually sort of oval, and there is no head on them for the coat hanger
to grab on to. These locks are hard to pull up when you can get two fingers
on it, and I knew already that this wasn't going to be easy.
I kept working away at it, and a couple minutes later on of the local
Good 'Ol Boys stopped on his way out, and after explaining my
bonehead move we started working on it together. It wasn't
long at all before there were a few long gray beards (and a couple short
ones) all putting our heads together. Hell, musta been 250 years
worth of cumulative redneckin' among us, and we couldn't come up
with a way to get the damn thing open.
Not to mention the truck has now been idling for about an hour, it's
down to 18F. and my cigarettes were on the
inside....





...to be continued