2020-06-04 — Sometimes Even With Bungees

I’m beat. 🤪

It’s another late night, I’m on my way home right now from the last job of the day in Fayetteville. It’s 12:44 a.m., and I am exhausted, dehydrated, and undernourished.

And, yep. I did it to myself. No one to blame but me.

The allure of reaching my financial goals faster is still winning out over my better judgement. I meant it when I said that the very thought of saying no to a job made me cringe. I don’t mind saying no when I’m so beat down that I can’t do anything more, and I don’t mind saying no as much when I’m completely booked, but as long as I have free time in a day, it’s hard for me to say no; or as long as I think I could possibly squeeze another person in, I don’t want to say no.

One of the problems with my struggle to get balance is that I am being financially rewarded very well for the effort I’m putting in, so I’m “getting what I want.” It’s hard to convince myself that it’s not best because it’s working at getting me closer to where I want to be in an incredibly quick manner..

But will it last?

You’d think that maybe I would have learned after I spent half a decade financially preparing for a life that never materialized. You’d think that I would have learned that finances are fleeting, and you never know what’s going to happen, so it’s not the most prudent thing in the world to kill yourself in order to be financially stable when it’s not fully under your control.

One car accident… one illness… One disaster…

No, apparently I haven’t learned.

Or perhaps I’m just hopeful? Or naive? 🙃 Perhaps I think maybe this time it will work?

Anyway, so it’s been a crazy day. I totally forgot about my first job of the day because they sent the text message to the 801 phone number I’ve had forever and ever. The number still works, but I can’t receive text messages on it right now or phone calls properly because I haven’t properly set up my Google voice account with my new phone. I will put that on my to-do list right now, so I don’t miss anything in the future.

Okay, done… On my list.

Where was I?

Anyway, so while I’d promised one customer way the heck and gone out between Fayetteville and Elkins that I’d be there at 9 this morning, while I was driving down, I got a call from the other that I’d told I’d be there at 8 for, asking where I was.

Oops.

So I turned around and booked it to Bentonville, diagnosed a bad battery and a shorted out taillight, got those replaced, and then I spent the next 7 hours fighting with an alternator and valve cover gasket job on an ’09 Santa Fe.

Today was cleanup day. I was supposed to have done the Santa Fe job yesterday, as well as the next one (2006 oil pressure issues) and the next one (2009 PT Cruiser radiator).

So… I did a lot of cleanup. I couldn’t reproduce the problem with the Trailblazer, but it was having a low idle issue, and I cleaned the throttle body, and that seemed to fix that issue, so they were happy.

Then it was the PT Cruiser radiator, which turned into a bit of a creative job because it had been wrecked in front. I had to bend metal to get the radiator fan and radiator out, and I had to leave off the entire lower radiator support because the wreck had kinked the radiator hose, and it would overheat that way.

Anyway, We managed to rig a workable solution for the short run–using bungee cords to hold the radiator/condenser/fan/tranny cooler assembly in place. 🙃 It was a hodgepodge, but he now has a driveable car, which was more than he had. 😊 It’ll need some serious metal bending to have a place for the radiator to sit. I also fixed his hood latch issue for him (he hadn’t been able to latch his hood since he rolled his car over).

After that, it was on to the last car of the night–a 2006 Galant that wouldn’t start. I had to give the poor guy a bunch of bad news–bad starter. Bad alternator (overcharging and overheating the battery), likely bad cam sensor, and cooked new battery (he just bought it in February, but his alternator is cooking it. So it was a quadruple whammy for him. ☹️

After the diagnosis, we spent a good while talking about the current protests and riots and whatnot. He happens to be black, so it was interesting getting his perspective on it. There are things we could totally agree on and things where we agreed to disagree, but it was just the kind of conversation that demonstrates exactly what I want to see out of my nonprofit–conversations, and recognizing that we have more in common than we have different. That in the things that matter most, we are remarkably alike.

Hmmm… “Remarkably Alike.”

Organization name idea? Hmmm…

Anyway, good stuff. He suggested I watch 13th, the documentary, and I think I will (I don’t count educational movies as movies. 😁)

Then… I got home, tried to hydrate a bit, ate some dinner (I’d only had two cans of spaghetti O’s as my entire day’s rations–Oh! And the granola bar the last guy gave me.

I debated whether or not to exercise. I chose to swap yesterday with Saturday because I was physically in bad shape and didn’t want to end up in bed recovering for two days. But then I was in bad shape again today (was 90 degrees, and I was out in it all day. It’ll be 94 tomorrow [and for you westerners, 94 degrees with high humidity is miserable. I’ll take dry heat any day over this stuff.]) I didn’t want to swap two days, especially since tomorrow is gonna be nasty, and what happens if I’m down again?

So I compromised. I ran a half day today, at least getting my exercise in, even if it wasn’t the full 30 minutes I’d have wanted, but it is allowing me to perhaps stave off a total crash. We’ll hope.

Well, time for gratitude…

#1. I’m grateful that I had that good conversation with the young gentleman about his perspectives on race and riots and whatnot.

#2. I’m grateful that despite a killer day, yet again I did very well financially. I probably either broke or came close to breaking my record for the most money I’ve brought in in a day as a mechanic working by myself. (doesn’t help my “work less” goals so much).

#3. I’m grateful that I’m not totally over the edge yet. I think I might still have a chance at staving off a crash.

#4. I’m grateful for my mom still letting me use her car. I’ve been so busy I completely forgot that today was auction day. I don ‘t think I even looked for a van today, but I’m grateful to have the Durango to use.

#5. I’m grateful to have had the courage to at least run for 15 minutes before hanging it up for the night.

Time for bed, my lovelies. Good night! 😉

Lift the World.

~ stephen