Betsy

Betsy is a 1997 Chevy Cavalier. I drove her at the end of my college years, then she went to my sister, then to her boyfriend Sau, and I have had her back since last summer. She will be going back to Sau this summer when he comes back to Texas. Justin and I have been wonderful babysitters for him while he's been gone! Betsy has not been behaving this week though. She decided to start acting up yesterday and got the best of me today.

When I left work yesterday I started up 'ole Betsy to go home and apparently she was not ready to go. She died and showed me her battery light and anti theft light. After about 8 attempts of this, she finally gave in and decided we could go home. I told Justin about her behavior and he told me to let him know if I had any more trouble out of her and he would have a talk with her. This morning she was ready to go back to work though. Started right up and off we went!!

Betsy and I did not see eye to eye again after work today. I don't know why she likes that place so much. Home is much more pleasing! She would not cooperate today either. She kept shutting off. So I called Justin to have him give her that "good talking to". He threatened taking her to the mechanic and that didn't even do anything for her. The mechanic said it sounded like she has a short in her steering column. Poor girl. That would make me not wanna go anywhere too! So we had to call a tow truck to take her over to the mechanic to get fixed.

When I got the phone call from the tow truck man, I should have known then my afternoon was going to go downhill quickly. He said he was pulled up behind my green car...Betsy is dark gray. I go out to the parking lot and give him the key. He starts her up to back her up behind his tow truck and backs her up ALL THE WAY ACROSS THE PARKING LOT. Just my luck. He asks me what I want to do. I have Justin on the phone so I ask him. The man was not going to charge us for coming out so we decided to just drive it over to the mechanic. Justin asked if I got the tow truck guys name and before I could ask him for it he was already in his truck driving out of the parking lot. We wanted to thank him for coming out, but I didn't have any cash on me. He never introduced himself and as soon as I said we would drive it, he was gone before I could ask anything else.

I had to go back into my office to get my stuff and lock up. I get back out to Betsy and ask her to work for me like she did for the tow truck man. She starts to act like she will, but decides once we get out of the parking spot she is not going to cooperate afterall. Which is perfect timing right there in front of a big group of high school kids. In my panic of trying to not look foolish and get my car working to just get back into another parking place, Betsy decides it would be funny to turn her windshield wipers on. I have NO clue how this happens. And in my confusion of trying to get her back on track, I can't figure out how to turn them off! The kids have now begun to laugh. I get her started back up, wipers off, and think we are set only to realize we are going in reverse. Betsy does not like this either so she does her thing. After much persuading I finally get her back into a parking spot and get her running. She stays running for a couple minutes so I take my chances and go for it, praying the whole time that she will just get there. I had already decided that if she gave up in the middle of this 6 lane road, I was just going to get out - leave her there - and walk home. The entire way there I debate on what lane to drive her in. We start out in the right, but have to move over to the middle...it was all so stressful. When we get to the mechanic I take a U-Turn on 2 wheels praying she doesn't die blocking traffic and fly into the parking lot almost hitting a man to just get her parked before she decides to call it quits again. To get her key out of the ignition I had to use my jacket. It was hot enough to cause 3rd degree burns. I took it into the mechanic and laid it on the counter that way and told him to be careful because it was hot. He laughed and asked how he could help me. I explained to him what was going on and told him Justin had called about it. He laughed and said they would take a look at her. I asked him while they were at it to check out one of her squeaky wheels. I tend to get a lot of stares from that too. Maybe that's why she's been protesting the past couple days!! She just wants to roll around in peace and quiet!!