Forced Patience

Don’t you hate it when life forces you to be patient? It’s either that or go crazy, or get ulcers…

You know I have been dealing with car problems for weeks. I finally relented and decided to take it to a mechanic. I have 2 possible candidates, and neither one could look at the car until Monday – today.

Guess what happened?

I drove my daughter to work. On the way I threw in a few bucks worth of gas. She ran great all the way there, and all the way back. No check engine light, no stuttering, no stalling. I ran into construction and a freight train – and still she ran great. I went to the shop anyway. We decided that maybe the fuel injector cleaners were actually working and we’d just see what happens.

On the way home – she started acting up again. Of course. I should have turned around right away, but I was starving and really needed to be home for just a bit.

In the meantime, the other mechanic calls, but we can’t work out a schedule. He wants the car for a couple of day. No can do.

So, I’m finally having soemthing to eat when my neighbor comes over and tells me to look out the window. We have a heron struggling to get up on the beach through all the algae. Great.

Herons are very big, very mean birds. Plus, with all these bird diseases…

So I start calling around to try to get some help. I called 2 police departments before getting the right number for the local conservation police. They tell me I have to call a federally licensed rescue group. I call them. After being on hold for a while, the girl comes back and says that herons are especially dangerous to try to handle. they will treat the bird if the conservation police will help me get it into a crate. RIGHT! Otherwise, we might have to just let nature take it’s course. ???

The heron finally made it onto the beach and collapsed. I went down to take a look. The poor thing just looked at me. He didn’t seem afraid of me. My neighbor often catches carp just to get them out of the lake, so I went to see if I could find one. Of course not. A few of us discussed giving him tuna, but we decided against it.

Finally, our neighbor who has been trained in animal rescue gets home. She makes some calls and is told the same thing. They will treat the bird if we get it there.

At least we have someone who knows what to do – even if she’s never actually done it before…

At this point, the bird seems better. He is moving. Which is a bad thing for us. We sent my daughter around and down to the neighbor’s beach to block off that route of escape. Debbie and her husband quietly got close enough to throw a sheet over the heron. For whatever reason, when you throw a sheet over a bird, it stops struggling. Debbie scooped it up – I had the crate, and the bird was in and safe in no time. Amazing how smooth it goes when you have someone who knows what to do! Hopefully he will survive.

We are well fed. The dishes are done, the house is pretty clean, and all is calm at the moment. My daughter is reading, and I’m finishing writing to you before I hit the shower and call it a day.

Tomorrow is another day.

And if I have to drive this car like this another week, I’m going to scream. You’ll be able to hear me in Cairo!

I know… patience

Maybe I’ll try my hand at replacing the O2 sensor. It doesn’t look that hard….