Let's Take It to the Bridge

On Thursday afternoon, the rusted metal pipe that created a culvert under our bridge finally gave out. Its collapse created a large hole -- just about the size of my Smart Car (tho luckily I'm only guessing this and didn't find this out the hard way!). Shirra was lucky enough to get ahold of our road guy, Tim, and he was over in less than a half hour. Shortly thereafter, we had a bandaid in place of the real work to come, but at least it allowed us to cross the bridge again.

But then yesterday, while taking the kids to Woodstock, I noticed that a hole had reappeared. Since we don't have a culvert, the large stones that Tim put down are only going to wash away as they're buffeted by the gentle tide of the lake and the not-so-gentle pounding of heavy automobiles. I put a pylon into the hole as a warning to other drivers, but by the time we'd returned, the pylon had been almost completely swallowed up as the hole enlarged. At this point, I could probably get the Smart Car past it, but I'd rather not take the risk. Shirra and I are simply walking past the hole to where our cars await us on the other side.

We're hoping to have a new culvert soon -- and we're running out of time! The forecast calls for snow this Thursday. This isn't the best timing. With any luck, we'll have a few estimates by tomorrow and will have the work done by Wednesday or Thursday. If not.... Well, life could get even more interesting.

Trapped in Manhattan

There was an ice storm warning, so I expected this might happen: It was too dangerous for me to drive home, so I had to sleep over at my mom's (which is also where I tutor).

I realized around midnight that my car was on the 'wrong' side for tomorrow and would have to be moved by 11 am, so I decided to take care of that just now rather than in the morning. Since it's the country's (world's?) smallest production car, I knew that it wouldn't be too hard to find a spot nearby, but this time I managed to wedge the car into the smallest space it's been squeezed into since the summer.
I have maybe three inches, total, of wiggle room.







Of course, as soon as I got out of the car, I noticed this cute little tomato just behind me:



It was only on my way home that I realized... I didn't have to move the car at all; I'm taking it to the dealer tomorrow morning to get snow tires. D'oh!

Smart Car after 20,000 Miles

Well, I made it to 20K before the snow hit; who knows what's going to happen with that car in the next few months. Will I be able to drive it up our path? The highway? Time will tell. Actually, I'm most afraid of Rte 32 -- that's the only place a nasty head-on collision could occur. Ironic that the highway is much safer than a two-lane road in a rural place.

I had some electrical hiccups with Cheewawa, as I've come to call my car, and I had to take the car in recently for its 20,000-mile check-up anyway, so I was hoping that they could take care of the routine maintenance and the minor repairs at the same time. At first they thought I had a problem with one of the electrical components called a SAM, but replacing the SAM didn't help. Then they blamed the alternator. But before they put the car up on the lift again, they tested the battery and discovered that it was faulty. A simple battery change was all I needed. Now the car runs like a dream.

I'm still getting excellent mileage, tho it definitely diminishes with the decreasing temperature. Normally I get about 47 miles to a gallon, but lately I've been hovering more around 42-44. Partly this is due to the wind -- it was ferocious yesterday and for part of today, and the car had to fight just to roll down the hill.

I've added a small armrest in the car (it doesn't reach out as far as I'd like, but it adds a bit of storage) and put in a 6-CD changer, which helps with those books-on-CD, but otherwise the car is basically unmodified. My next alteration, however, is for safety: snow tires. I'm putting them on this week! Gotta have a safe Cheewawa!

All Tucked in for Winter

My Smart Car is not the ideal car for winter driving. It might do ok on snow, but I'm not sure I want to be driving that little thing on highways with huge trucks passing me by, and in some ways I'm even more scared of driving on Rt 32, where head-on collisions are a rare but terrifying prospect. Even our road is going to be a hazard -- it's unpaved, and there are tricky patches and some hills. So I might have to keep the car under wraps for a few weeks now and then when the weather tells me to.

The previous owners of our house used to have a garage. For some reason that I still don't understand, they converted it to a shed. I noticed, however, that the Smart Car is just narrow enough to fit under the porch of the shed. By backing it in carefully, I can keep the car from getting covered in snow. I'm not sure if this is ever going to prove helpful, but it certainly has proved cute. I like how it looks like a guinea pig in a hutch.











Emmett's guinea pig, Snowball...

Smart Firemen

I was walking around Main Street when I spotted another Smart Car in New Paltz, and the driver was heading towards Shirra's store. I caught up with him and chatted for awhile. It turns out that he's also a fire fighter (as is his wife) -- I had noticed the little plate on the front of his car -- and that he lives in Woodstock.

A few days later I was shopping when I noticed his car in the parking lot. I didn't manage to spot the owner, but I got a cute shot of our cars side by side. I am jealous of his yellow -- that's an awesome color!

When Shirra and I first moved to New Paltz, I experienced a lot of coincidences, like how our next-door neighbor's son was born in the same hospital on the same day or how my long-lost best friend from childhood ended up moving to NP a few years ahead of us and has a son in our son's class. I'm glad the coincidences have continued -- it makes life more interesting.