The dealership called this afternoon with two words regarding Bird’s car.

fuel.  pump.

That’s all he had to say and my heart sank and hundred dollar bills started figuratively flying out of my heart.

The estimate:  $650

And just to make matters worse, they don’t have any fuel pumps in stock and one won’t arrive until Monday.  So I guess I’ll be driving the minivan through the weekend.  And on top of all that, the tow from Monday showed up on my credit card statement today: $115.

All this led me to transfer $750 out of our Car Fund at ING dropping it to $2,150.  Long ways to go until we can get a new car!

The good news is my lucky streak has continued and I won a little duffel bag at work today.  Woot!  Maybe I should buy a lottery ticket.

I was getting my oil changed a few weeks ago in preparation for our 1,000 mile drive to Chicago and the service guy mentioned that the tread on my tires was pretty low and that I should probably look into getting new tires sooner than later.  Since I was planning on driving all the way to Chicago and I had only gotten two new tires back in 2007, I figured it was probably time for two more.

I shopped around a little bit, but I knew I was going to use Discount Tire since that’s what I used last time and was happy with them.  Plus, there’s a shop right down the street from my house.  I made my appointment online and the next day I had two fresh tires and a bill for $171.48.

Then we went to Chicago.

When we got home from Chicago, Bird’s car wouldn’t start.  Doh! We had just put $300 into back in June.

Thankfully, my folks have an extra vehicle so we borrowed that and Bird took my car to work.  Yesterday, her little Jetta got towed to the dealership and they said they would run tests on it today.  I have no idea what’s wrong with and no idea how much it will cost, but I usually estimate a minimum of $200 when a car has to go in to the shop and probably at least another $100 for the tow.  Woof!!!

So we’re probably looking at dropping at least a grand on our cars in the last 2 months.

I’ll let you know when I hear something from the mechanics, but for now, fingers crossed that it’s a cheap fix!  Until then, I’m the guy driving the pale blue minivan to work

Last Thursday Bird arrived home after work with her car spewing steam from under the hood and a pink liquid dripping steadily all over the driveway.  She said her coolant light came on during her commute home.  No kidding, I thought.

Her sister took her to work on Friday and then we borrowed one of my parent’s vehicles for the long weekend.  We had a wedding to attend on Friday night so I couldn’t take the car in until Saturday morning.  By then, all the antifreeze was completely drained out of the car, so I went to get some more for the drive to the shop…that cost me about $10.

The shop was super busy on Saturday, but the guy told me they would do a cooling system test for $40 and then they would go from there depending on the test results.  On Tuesday, they called to say the test showed we had some leaking coolant hoses (duh!).  All they had to do was replace the hoses and fill ‘er back up wth antifreeze and we’d be good to go.

$289.56 later and Bird has her car back.

We both have older cars (’99 and ’01 – both paid off) so we understand that these things happen…but it’s still not very fun to pay for.  Thankfully, we have a car fund (savings for a future car) that we put $200 a month in to and we’ll use funds from that to pay for the repair.

Here’s a total breakdown of the repair:

• Cooling System Test – $39.95
• Hazardous Waste Fee – $2.50
• Hose 1 – $29.95
• Hose 2 – $29.95
• Labor to install hoses – $141.30
• Antifreeze – $16

My recent downgrade in my phone plan got me into a savings mood.  So I decided to look around and see where I could save some more money.  Bird and I had separate car insurance policies that were both set to expire in late March.  Rather than just renewing as we’ve done for the last few years…we decided now that we were married it would be wise combine our policies, so we went out and collected some quotes.

Here’s what we used to pay:

• Bird’s Car Insurance:  $559.50 for 6 months
• My Car Insurance: $294.50 for 6 months

To be honest, I have no idea why Bird’s insurance was so much more than mine.  Whether it has to do with her car or her coverage or where she lived…I’m just not sure but that seemed like a crazy high amount to me.

Now that we live in the townhouse and have a lot more stuff (wedding gifts) we decided to get a home insurance policy as well.  The Association covers the external stuff on the townhouse so we mostly had to worry about all the stuff inside it.  The nice thing is, you get a discount on your auto insurance by combining it with a home policy.

We ended up going with AAA for our new insurance.

• Both cars: $461.59 for 6 months
• Home: $193.24 for 12 months

We end up saving almost $600 a year.  Nice!

Okay folks, what was I thinking?  I had grand plans to catch you all up on my last few days with several specific posts, but who am I kidding?  I’m getting married in 1.5 weeks and work is crazy…so that’s not gonna happen.  I will try to post in the future about some of this stuff.

Here’s  a breakdown of what went on over the last few days:

Friday:  Took the day off (used the no car excuse), finalized the wedding cake, finalized the photo booth, applied for marriage license, called insurance about the stolen car.  Friday night was my bachelor party.  So fun.

Saturday:  Woke up and ran my first 5k.  Went to the Farmer’s Market with Bird and talked to flower vendors about providing flowers for our reception.  Saturday night, went to a friend’s to work on wedding slideshow and programs.  Went out to dinner and then went home.

Sunday:  Slept in.  Worked on wedding stuff in the morning.  Thought about my missing car and everything that was in in it.  Met with our photographer and finalized plans with her and made a final payment.  Sunday night, I had dinner at Bird’s and we worked on rehearsal dinner invites as well as writing thank yous.

Which brings me to Monday morning.  My phone rang at 6:30 am with an unknown number.  It woke me up and I didn’t answer.  I listened to the VM and it was the police saying they had found my car at 2 am in the parking lot of a technical college about 20 miles from where it had been stolen.  They only mentioned damage to the steering column and nothing else.  They said it was towed to the PD and they were processing it for evidence.

Monday morning was my first day in my new office.  It’s always weird starting at a new place.  I can’t even find my way around the building.  It’s my third day here now and it’s getting better, but I still get lost sometimes.  Around noon, I left work to go see my car.  First, I had to go to the impound lot and pay the $185 towing charge.  Then I headed to the PD to see my car.  The police thought it might be driveable, but when I got there, it wasn’t.  The steering column was all jacked up, and my key would go in, but it wouldn’t turn.  So that was a bummer, but do you know what wasn’t a bummer?  All my stuff was still in the car!!!  My stereo, my sunglasses, everything in the trunk!  I didn’t get a chance to look over everything in detail because the police kind of rushed us along once the car wouldn’t start, but the only thing I noticed missing was my ipod charger, a jacket and all the packages of books I had been going to ship that day.

So I went back to work and arranged for a tow from the PD to the auto shop.  Now my car is in the shop and should be fixed in a few days.  There really wasn’t much damage.  The thieves did break my steering column in order to hotwire it or whatever, but other than that, it seems to be ok.  I’m glad they didn’t go crash it somewhere or start it on fire!

So that’s my big news as of late.  I’m feeling very thankful! 

Not much of a PF angle on this post, but maybe I’ll post in the future about dealing with insurance and the mechanics….believe me, there is money involved in all of this…and I’m definitely going to be the one who ends up on the losing end, but not for as much as I originally thought…so I’m still happy!  Plus, I’m getting married next week…how could I not be happy?!?!

I have a lot to tell you guys about the last few days.  A million things have gone on, but let’s just start with Thursday.

It was a perfectly normal day.  The plan was to go to work and run to the post office on my lunch break to mail out  about 8 books that I had sold the day before.  After work, I was planning on heading down to my parent’s and going over the seating charts for the wedding with them.

The morning was a usual morning and around 11 am, I ran to the post office.  But once there, the machine I use to print stamps was out of order and I didn’t want to wait in line.  I took my packages back out to my car and threw them in the backseat, figuring I would just mail them after work from another post office.  I got back to work at about 11:30 and parked a little closer to the building than normal (one of the perks about running an errand at mid-day).

So back to work and 5 pm can’t come fast enough.  In fact, I dip out at about 4:45 pm.  I head out to the parking lot and at first, I can’t find my car.  This sometimes happens after running errands at mid-day.  I park in pretty much the same spot every morning, so it throws me off a little if I get a closer spot during the day.  Our parking lot isn’t huge, but it’s not tiny either. And I can’t find my car.  So I start to feel like an idiot and decide to walk up and down every row looking for it.  After two rows, I call Bird and tell her to just talk to me so it looks like I’m just talking on the phone in the parking lot rather than just wandering around like an idiot.

Well, it was after walking throughout the whole lot and not finding it that I remembered an email we had got the day before from facilities warning about suspicious activity in the parking lot.  This memory added to the sinking feeling that I already had.  So I hung up with Bird and went back inside and found a coworker and asked her to drive me up and down every row just to double check.  I definitely wasn’t going to call the police until I was absolutely sure it wasn’t out there because that would just be so embarrassing if they came out and found it.  The second search yielded the same results.

I headed inside and talked to the security desk.  I told them my car was missing and asked if they had any security cameras out there.  Of course they don’t.  So we called the police , reported a stolen car and they sent an officer out to file a report.  The policeman was very nice and sympathetic.  He didn’t seem too surprised about the theft and I now know why as he informed me that my car was the fourth one stolen this month from that very parking lot!

We talked through a lot of stuff and he told me on average, they find stolen cars after about one week.  No guarantee of condition though.

I called Bird and she came and picked me up and on the way to my parent’s I tried to make a mental list of everything that was in there.  There wasn’t really anything that was super valuable, but I guess it all adds up.  I had my stereo system, sunglasses, a gift card, and a ton of sporting goods in the trunk: ice skates, rollerblades, winter boots, sleeping bag, broomball equipment, tennis racquet, etc.  I’m not even sure what it would all add up to to replace it.  I’m just glad there wasn’t a computer or anything like that in there.

By far the greatest loss was the car itself.  And it is such an inconvenience at possibly the worst time with just two weeks to go until the wedding.

Oh, and did I mention it was my last day parking in that parking lot.  The next day my department was moving to a new building in a different city.  So that is just bad luck.

Bird bought me chipotle for dinner to try and cheer me up and then we headed to my parent’s and ran through the seating charts.  My dad and I looked up my insurance policy and I’m covered for theft but I have a $1,000 deductible.  I held off on calling them until Friday.

My parent’s loaned me one of their vehicles that night, so I’m driving around a mini-van for a while but it’s a lot better than having no car.

Bird and I talked about what we were going to do and I think we will just hang off on making any decisions about anything until we are back from the honeymoon.  We did a little dreaming about what kind of car we would get if my car never shows up and we get to go car shopping.

So that was my Thursday.  Not a very good day.

My economic stimulus check was direct deposited into my account yesterday. Ever since word came out that we were getting these checks, I’ve been thinking about what to do with it. While most of America was wondering what bill to pay or what new toy they should buy, I was mostly debating between various methods of saving or investing it.

But life comes at you fast…and so does car trouble. On my way to work Tuesday morning, I hit one pothole too many and my rusty exhaust pipe decided it was time to break in half. There’s nothing like the sound of dragging metal along at 70 mph in rush-hour traffic, not to mention the shower of sparks shooting from beneath my car. After pulling over and rigging it up so it wouldn’t drag anymore, I got it to a shop and got it fixed, but had to kiss most of my stimulus check goodbye.

Even though car repairs suck, I realize they are inevitable and I’m thankful that I didn’t have any pressing bills and that I could use my check and not my emergency fund to pay for this.