This week, we’ve had some cold temperatures. When the mercury drops into the single digits, things stop working. Cars for example. Batteries die, mechanisms freeze up, and as in my case this week, welds weaken and parts fall off the car.
My car has been somewhat louder than usual recently, but I wasn’t overly worried about it. I was heading home from town and planned to stop at the bank in Ponderay. When the light at Highway 95 and Kootenai Cut Off Road changed and I went to make my right-hand turn, part of my car’s exhaust system decided not to go with me.
Suddenly the car was a lot louder. (Fortunately, the Ponderay Police officer behind me didn’t notice and kept going north.) Along with the exhaust sound was the telling noise of metal hitting pavement. Uh oh.
I limped the car into the bank parking lot and looked underneath. A pipe that used to be attached to both the front and back of the car was now only attached to the back. I called my husband and told him I’d be late getting home. I called a nearby car dealership and they suggested I talk to a muffler place. (They didn’t seem interested when I pointed out that the only muffler place is in downtown Sandpoint, which was going to be a long trip with a piece of the car dragging on the pavement.)
Then someone drove up next to me with the magic words "Construction" on the side of his truck. I thought, "construction means tools, which could be used to take the part off my car" Interestingly, he didn’t have tools in his rig, but he found a friend with a bunch of zip ties. We crawled under the car and he tied up the exhaust pipe to the bottom of the car.
I called Melody Muffler and they said, "come on down." So after doing the bank deposit, which was the whole point of my errand in the first place, I got back in the loud car and headed down the highway.
The zip ties broke and the pipe hit the dirt again right before the pull-out across from the Chamber of Commerce. I was SO CLOSE. After lying on the ground under my car playing with zip ties for a while, I realized they weren’t going to work. I found a dog leash in my car and used that to tie the exhaust pipe back up.
I finally made it to Melody Muffler and they welded my car back together. The moral of the story is in wintertime, it’s a good idea to have tools in your rig. And if not tools, at least a dog leash.