August 29, 2012

Maggie is a Little Under the Weather...so to Speak.

Maggie, My 1978 Toyota FJ40
Yesterday I had to take the ride of shame home.  If any of you have an older car that requires periodic maintenance of an "interesting" sort, you know what I mean.....

.....I had to have Maggie towed home.  Nothing is more embarrassing than having to have the tow truck take you and your ride home.

Yesterday I had a speech to give and a Speech Contest to run, so I was a bit occupied.  Fortunately, or unfortunately as the case may be, my car problems weren't a matter of me overlooking some basic maintenance because I was "busy".  Nope....this time it was just having a 34 year old car.  I think some of the rubber seals and/or caps of the clutch's master cylinder just gave out.  As I drove to the meeting last night I noticed that the clutch had way too much play and as I drove it got worse.  About a block before my destination I had next to no clutch at all and there was some hydraulic fluid dripping onto my shoe.

That is never a good sign.

Luckily it is a relatively easy fix.  I just have to get a new master cylinder and while I'm at it I might as well replace the slave cylinder.  I'll probably need some help bleeding the system, but even that is a relatively easy task.

I just cannot go anywhere right now.....bummer.  At least I do have the city bus which runs right by the house.  If I don't borrow my wife's car I might just take the bus downtown to the auto parts store.  Today I don't need to go anywhere and I can catch up on some school work.  

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