Bless the Mechanically Minded! & Loving Family Relations!

Lots and lots to do this week (OH HELP), buhht I must stop what I'm doing to sing glorious praises to dear Cliff of Ogden, UT ~ Wendy's adorable daddy ~

Early this past Sunday night, with blankets and gobs of car munchies in order and a couple Christmas CDs on hand, we were all loaded in the car to head over to Griffith Park in L.A. to see the lovely Chrimpus lights on display, buhht there was a big problem: my - new - 2005 - Matrix - WOULD - NOT - start - !?!

Can you say "WHAT THE HELL?"

Oh no, I did not panic = it was far too depressing to get all riled up about it! These days, that kind of moment has been exactly par for the course... and at the time though, I must say, it did certainly help that my honey-man didn't get upset nor mad or panicked ~ thank you, babes!

So yeah, my car wouldn't start! We popped the hood and grabbed a flashlight and performed a thorough visual inspection of every nut and bolt, casing, tube and wire for anything that looked remotely out of sorts. We then tried the engine a couple more times - - definitely not turning over...

Then the remarkable: My honey-man told me he was going to call Cliff, that he'd know what to do. So he dialed his former father-in-law and briefly explained our situation, and he held his cell phone out and over the car engine, cuing me to try the engine again... And then? A diagnosis was given aaannnnd not only was it absolutely free of cost, turns out it was dead-on correct! THANK YOU SO MUCH, CLIFF!

The next morning, my honey-man did as he'd been instructed: He picked up a spray can of starter fluid, which he sprayed into the engine air intake to check if we had an ignition spark, which we did have, and then he gave my gas tank a good dose of fuel injection cleaning treatment and it's worked!

#1 - How absolutely awesome is that? - to have someone correctly diagnosis an engine's troubles over a freakin' cell phone connection!?!? HUH?!? - - YOU SOOOOO TOTALLY ROCK, CLIFF!

#2 - How touching is that? - for my honey-man to have his former father-in-law available for such a connection?

#3 - How wonderful is that? - to be in love with a man whose former in-laws love him enough to maintain more than just civil contact with him?

#4 - How absolutely heart-warmingly cool is that? - to have those kind of people in our lives? what fabulously yummy good people!

Ahhh, my heart!

Life is good.