Micro Rescue - Dead Audi - Then Idiot Rescue - Full Day

No, I didn't "have to" bug out, but I had to mount a "micro rescue".

Short background. My wife and daughter had to be in Prescott yesterday at 1830 for a Girl Scout Backpacking weekend. Friday morning, my wife had to be at Mayo in Scottsdale for a seminar on trauma surgery that was supposed to end at 1530.

I suggested, that instead of going to the seminar, then driving 90 minutes back home to pick up our daughter, turning around and heading back through the valley...they get a room at the Courtyard Marriott at Mayo on Thursday afternoon, go get sushi (they like bait, I don't), and have a giggly girl's night then leave from the seminar/conference and head up to camp. They both thought it was a great idea. Yay dad.

Anyway... the conference got over early my wife called me and told me her car was dead. "Not like a dead battery dead, but like...just dead dead".

She told me she called the dealership and they told her it would be "several hours" before they could get a tow truck up and a loaner up there and that Enterprise would take just as long to get her a rental. So, I told her not to panic, I would leave our house in ten minutes, and I would be there in an hour and fifteen minutes-ish.

As I left our house in my Dodge Ram, I called the Audi dealership to get a status and after ****ing around with the "Press One For English" switchboard, I get our service advisor who tells me that it will be 1800 before they got anyone up there. Ugh.

So, I called my best friend and asked if he wanted to go on a road trip to Prescott and that I would be by his house in 15 minutes.

I picked him up and we headed up to Scottsdale. Traffic was "mid day normal" so it was moving at the speed limit or over and I got to the Marriott in an hour and twenty minutes.

My wife and daughter were ready when we got there. I told her rather than ****ing around with a rental, or the dealership anymore yesterday, I would just drive her and the critter up to our place in Prescott. From there she and the critter could take my truck over to camp (which is on the other side of Prescott in the Willow Springs area), and that Alan and I would pick up our Jeep and drive it back down home because I had some things I wanted to have done to it anyway.

She protested because our Jeep is an older one with no AC and just a bikini top. I told her we would head back east through Prescott Valley, then north to Camp Verde, then go the northeastern route through Strawberry, Pine, and Payson before cutting down through the east valley home. We'd miss the heat and it would be a great road trip.

I checked the oil, coolant, tires, and tossed my "possibles bag" into the back seat, put a case of water into the cooler in the back of the Jeep, put my AR into the lock on the roll bar, stowed Alan's AR in the rifle sleeve on the back of his seat and grabbed a couple of fleece pullovers out of the house because it might get down into the 60s going between Camp Verde and Payson.

We all went into old town Prescott for dinner before the girls headed over to the camp, and Alan and I headed out too. It is Rodeo weekend in Prescott, so getting TFO of town early was a good idea. Traffic on the way into town was a prick, but going out of Prescott and Prescott Valley was great.

We hit the Circle K, filled up the Jeep, dumped a couple of bags of ice into the cooler, filled up the jerican on the back of the Jeep and we rolled out of town at 1830...just about on the dot. I got a text from my daughter, they were at camp and checked in. Problem solved, they were handled.

It was 86f in Prescott and only 89f in Campe Verde...and the temperature kept going down, down, down, down, as we went out of Camp Verde through the Prescott and Tonto National forests which is one of the nicest drives you can take through the mountains and pines. It actually got chilly and I put on one of the fleece pullovers.

We were going across the 260 East out of Camp Verde, and literally 3 miles from the turn to the 87 South that runs into Strawberry and Pine and there is a white Mercedes SUV (I think it was a GLC) on the side of the road and a woman in her mate 40s, dressed like she was out for an afternoon wine tasting in Sedona. The hazard lights were on, so we pulled over and she literally jumped back into her Benz and locked the door...so I asked through the OPEN sun roof..."Ma'am, are you okay?".

She said "My car won't go, I think it's the gas tank".

Okay, there are a lot of ways one could interpret that...I went for the most obvious, that she thought she was out of gas.

I told her I had a gas can on my Jeep and that I could spare enough to get her to the Chevron in Strawberry which was only about twenty minutes away and she would be all set.

Then she asked the dumbest question I thought could be asked under the circumstances..."It is Premium gas?".

I told her my Jeep was 30 years old and that if I put premium gas in it, the damned thing would have a heart attack.

Then she said she had tried calling AAA but couldn't get a signal and asked if she could use my cell phone. I told her she could try, but I didn't have any signal either...but I could use my CB to call the fire station in Strawberry and they could make a call....OR...she could have some gas, get to Chevron, fill up with premium and be on her way with no more waiting...and it was starting to get dark there in the deep pines.

Alan is just shaking his head by this time.

Finally after about 5 minutes of indecision...she allows me the privilege of putting some fresh, non premium gas into her Benz...and then asks if she can follow us to the gas station.

She followed us to the gas station, and I thought it was over...as in...I was done dealing with her...while I topped off the Jeep and the gas can with 87 octane. Anyway, she just sat in her car at the gas pump like she was expecting ME to fill her car up too.

.....and that is exactly what she wanted me to do...she rolled her window down for the first time, about a half an inch...and slid two 20s through the crack. By this time, I was insulted, so I pulled my badge out of my pocket and showed it to her. I put my debit card into the reader, pumped $40.02 into her car and she leaned over, LOOKED AT THE DOLLAR AMOUNT that I had pumped and then drove away without even a thank you.

Alan walked out of the gas station, handed me a Reese's and shook his head.

We got into Payson by 2030 so I could fill ME up on Dunkin Donuts coffee and we tooled on down to the valley and home.

Seriously though....she wasn't prepared for a drive from Camp Verde to Strawberry. Can you imagine how she would have fared in a real emergency or if someone who wasn't fundamentally decent were the ones who stopped?

Humanity is doomed.

On another note: The computer in my wife's Audi fried, that was the issue. Totally, completely fried. Meh...it's a lease. It has warranty.

Anyone else ever tried to help someone who was that dense?

 

Audi and VW have a bad rep for reliability here these days, they used to be good back when they were allowed to pollute but these days the new emissions control software has crippled their engines. Truthfully I'd trust a reasonably well maintained 30 year old jeep more.

 

My wife leases a new car every three years through her medical practice (she is a trauma surgeon). This is her second Audi. The last one was great. I mean, that car never gave her a lick of trouble in the entire three years she had it. The dealership does "concierge service"...which means for oil changes, and service, they will send a driver with a loaner to her office and pick up her car take it to the dealership do the service and detail it and bring it back. So the service really sold her on it. Personally, I don't like it because it's the Q7 crossover SUV so it doesn't know if it's a station wagon or an SUV...it's confused.

I have had my old Jeep for about 30 years. I bought it for next to nothing and brought it back to life mechanically and I would drive it all the way across the country right now and trust it. But, it's a totally different animal. It has a carburetor, points and a rotor, all things I understand and can work on. I have a cargo box behind the back seat with radiator hoses, spare hose clamps, both belts, and a set of points, a rotor, condenser, distributor cap. plugs and wires. It has never broke down or given me a lick of trouble since I did the work to it all those years ago.

I banged out a few dents and dings. Painted the metal of the interior with spray on bedliner. I painted the exterior with a flat desert tan. The whole idea of the Jeep is "no frills utility". It is the Anti-Audi...lol.