either they love me or hate me

[kaigou]

I just got back from Sears. My little veedub, the longtime trooper, has been having sluggish starts on some mornings. I rephrase that: in the morning, it won't start at all. By noon, or midafternoon, it'll start... sluggishly. Last time I tried, I think I flooded the engine or something, and figured I'd let it sit, then have it towed over to get a new battery. But today, it started on its own (by around 3pm, after a half-day in the winter sun), and I said, oh, hell, I could use some chocolate, let's go to Sears.

Me: I need a new battery.
Sears Guy: *opens hood*
Sears Guy: *looks at car*
Sears Guy: .......
Me: *not paying attention* Y'know, I'm thinking, I can't remember ever getting a battery for this car.
Sears Guy: .........
Me: It's a '96, and I got it in '98...
Sears Guy: .........

This is where I look around and realize there are now six Sears Guys all flocked around my engine compartment. Which sounds really obscene, but carrying on.

Me: Hello?
Sears Guy #1: We don't sell this battery anymore.
Me: You don't? That sucks, because it's been a great battery. I was gonna ask for another just like it.
Sears Guy #1: I imagine it's been the best battery anyone's ever seen.
Me: Hunh? It's a regular Die Hard. Aren't you supposed to change them like, I don't know, once a decade?
Sears Guy #2: *does the math* Or about every fifteen years, in your case.

All the other Sears Guys look shocked. I think some of them even looked positively reverent.

Sears Guy #1: Ma'am, batteries are expected to last about three years.
Me: Really?
Sears Guy #1: Really really.
Me: ...
Sears Guy #1: ...

Everyone else joined in the moment of silence, and then:

Me: Maybe I did change it and forgot.
Sears Guy #1: No, we discontinued this type.
Me: What, like a year or two ago?
Sears Guy #1: Like ten years ago.
Me: Wow. So I really haven't ever changed it.
Sears Guy #1: You're either doing something really right with this car...
Sears Guy #2: ... or really, really wrong.
Me: Can I go with "right"? I like how that sounds.

When I left -- with new battery in place -- four of the guys were arguing over where best to display that positively ancient battery in a good location of honor. I'm not sure whether to be flattered, or worried.

Comments

[dejla]

Yeah, those little veedubs just keep going and going and going... You had the Energizer Bunny in your car!!

[hokuton_punch]

... that is amazing. o.o

[branchandroot]

*deeply amused* That's really funny. And clearly you're doing something very right and have a magical car to boot.

[onyxlynx]

I added this to memories, onaccountabecause reverence. Also, wow!

[okaasan59]

It's a shame everything sold now has such a short life expectancy. Ah, planned obsolescence, how I hate thee.

[kaigou]

Yeah, but I don't think "fifteen years per battery" was quite the manufacturer's intention. I mean, there's planned obsolescence and then there's "you do have to change these things once in a while, ma'am."

Only now I'm worried my car will blow up tomorrow because it doesn't like the taste of the new battery, after so many years perfectly happy with the old...

[kaigou]

Hah. Yeah. I did something right... AND I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT IT WAS.

[kaigou]

I think I probably need to give it a bath soon, so it doesn't start getting ideas about wanting anything else new. Or take it personally that I traded out the battery after it's been such a faithful... battery. Sometimes my car seems to take these things personally. I swear it skipped the clutch on me a few times, in the first month after we got the Honda. Not because the clutch was going bad, just to make me pay attention. And I did! And it stopped. *shiftyeyes*

[dragonhand]

When something like this happens, it seems to happen to you. *laughing* Gear head. Of course you did stuff right. The other option isn't even a consideration.

[kaigou]

...and also kinda worrisome. I mean, I know I can be absent-minded but I didn't think I could be fifteen years of absent-minded. I'll do my share on a car, if needed, but batteries are the one thing I've never bothered to change. (Cue CP in the background saying, they're the easiest thing to do on a car, and that's the one thing you've not done? ...I'm sure he's certain this says a lot about me.)

Still. I keep thinking that maybe I did get a new battery. I had to have. Didn't I? But I can't think of a single time of the car dying from lack of battery. I don't think I've ever even had to jump-start it. No, wait, once I did! After it sat in a parking lot in Baltimore for a week, and got snowed on, repeatedly... and when I got to it, it was after midnight and encased in two feet of snow and another inch of ice. Had to jumpstart it, but first we had to de-ice the locks and shovel out the doors, but the airport security guys were really helpful.

Okay, and one other jumpstart, when I went off on business trip and left the back door just a hair more than completely closed, and the interior light stayed on. Naturally, battery died, I got a jumpstart (again from the long-suffering airport folks) and after that... not a problem.

I'm gonna be up late pondering this one, I know it.

[kaigou]

From the way the Sears Guys were reacting, I think I had the Grand High Poobah Master Overlord Energizer Bunny in my car!

Really, what did they put in those "specially for european cars" batteries, anyway?

[kaigou]

Really! IF ONLY I KNEW WHAT I DID.

I would patent it and bottle it and sell it for like a million bucks.

But I have NO IDEA!

Now I'm all worried I won't be able to do it again, and I'll be back for another battery in like three years.

of course, this is assuming the little car is still running in three years, but I CAN HOPE.

[margrave]

This is absolutely amazing. And I could not stop laughing.

You are an unique snow-flake.

Also, the Sears Guys are hilarious.

[starscream]

You're going to go back and they'll have erected a shrine around it in honor of the Machine God.

[kaigou]

I DEMAND ROYALTIES.

Or a percentage of the shrine god's take.

[kaigou]

Yeah, I'm a unique something or other. I'm fairly certain the entire reason I'm unique is because most people I've met would willingly suffer extended durations of Three's Company on repeat rather than contemplate the notion of there ever being two of me, but hey! Unique FTW! And stuff!

I've dealt with the Sears Guys for tires three or four times in the past two years or so, and I suspect they're getting used to my sense of humor. And my marvelously bizarre and yet wonderfully does-not-freaking-die go-go-gadget veedub.

[the_future_modernes]

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHHAHAHAHAHHAHA!!!!!!

[starscream]

Games Workshop would probably demand royalties for using the term "Machine God," and claim it was a breach of the Warhammer 40k license.

[kaigou]

Hey. I think my 15-yr old battery is older than Warhammer... wait, when was Warhammer first rolled out? Early aughts, or thereabout?

Besides, Machine God is pretty... well, not very exciting. Aren't shrine gods supposed to have awesome names, like Super Electric Battery of Goodness?

[starscream]

40k was 1987, Fantasy was 1983.

You're right, it's not very exciting really. :[

[kaigou]

Wait, wait, you mean that shit dates from the eighties?

I need a drink.

[kaigou]

Heh.

[starscream]

Ahahaha, very nice. Are you going to tell me you remember it coming out?

[kaigou]

*squints hard*

No.

Not in the least.

But I remember the hair, and that counts as permanent trauma.

[starscream]

I had to question myself before I asked that. I was not certain if you had learned the ways of psychically killing someone over the internet.