Good/Bad Car-ma?

A week ago Friday M left, as usual, for work around 5:30 am. Fifteen minutes later, the phone rang. Not a good sign.

"The transmission in the truck died. I need you to drive down the bank and pick me up."

So I threw on my robe and went. It was the end of C's spring break and he was spending the week with my parents so it wasn't as complicated a situation as it would have been had there been three of us trying to get to three different places that morning. M dropped me at the bus stop and headed on off to the dealership to see what they could do for him.

"Dude. It's going to take some serious work to get that truck running again. Maybe $4000." (Oh shit.) "Too bad it's not under warranty."

(Wait a minute - maybe it is!) We bought the truck used and the guy who bought it originally had purchased a very expensive extended warranty for it. While it wasn't a purchase we would have made ourselves, it was only $25 to get the warranty transferred over to us, so M had very sensibly done so.

It took a couple of days for the dealership guys to deal with the warranty guys and get back to us, but the end result was that the repairs were covered under the warranty. Now we only had to pay for the tuneup the truck needed to have done concurrently. A few more days and $1000+ later, we had the truck back.

The guys at the dealership said that the truck needed new tires, too, but since the $1000+ was already an unanticipated expense, we opted to wait another month or so, in order to pay cash for them. After all, it's April, right? It's not like it's the start of the rainy season or anything....

So it rained for a good part of this last weekend. Another bad sign, right? Last night, M was toodling down the freeway when one of the front tires blew out. Not pretty. He changed it to the spare and came on home. Can you say Not Happy? I thought you could.

This morning, M left the house for work at about 5:30. His keys in his pocket, he leans over to tie his shoe. Something in his pocket knocks the right (or wrong) button on the keyring and the alarm goes off. Twice in a row.

That's three bad things. We're done now, right?