I didn't even know they could do that! 07/14

Today was a problem day. First, let me mention that somewhere between Toronto and Niagara Falls, I goofed my back left tire somehow. I ran over some glass, or hit a weird pothole, or something. Whatever I hit, it tore up my tire. The tread literally just came off of some parts of the tire. However, the ripping and tearing didn't go deep, so my tube wasn't punctured. This made for a very bumpy ride.

I woke up in Buffalo, New York and went to a Wal Mart to get a new tire. After fees, they wanted nearly 100 dollars! I thought that was outrageous, and the guy behind the counter recommended a used tire place down the road. I went there, got an almost new used tire put on and balanced for 45 bucks. My front left tire also had 2 nails in it and had been leaking slowly since about a month before I left. I had the guy fix that too for another 10 bucks. So I got my tire issues straight for 55 dollars, considerably cheaper than what Wal Mart wanted.

I went to Home Depot to get some aluminum flashing to try and cover up the front corners of my camper where the caulk was splitting. Long story short, it didn't quite work out the way I wanted it to. I put flashing on the front corners, but couldn't get it to go along the front wall, so I just put some super glue in the cracks, hoping that would keep the rain out. Interestingly, I needed someone to jump my car from the Home Depot. I thought it was maybe because I had had my trunk open for the entire hour span of time I had been trying to do the aluminum thing.

As I made my way southward to Fallingwater in Mill Run, PA, I was noticing a putrid smell. At first I attributed it to the big tanker in front of me for the first few hours. Then whenever I got out from behind him, I attributed the smell to the nuclear power plant I was passing. After I passed through Punxsutawney (where Phil the Groudhog determines when spring will come), I needed some gas. I was in a town that had a plant of some kind, so I figured the smell now belonged to that plant.

But whenever I stepped out of my car, I noticed smoke coming from under my hood. I thought, not good. I opened my hood, and my battery was steaming. I wasn't even aware batteries could do that. After a call to my Dad, he said if I just put water in it, I should be fine. I hadn't ever checked the water levels in it in the 2 years since I've had the car, so it was feasible that it had just run out of water. Almost all 6 cells were completely dry. I filled up up with water, filled my car up with gas, and started to head towards Fallingwater again.

I holed up in a Super 8 motel lot about 15 minutes outside of Mill Run. A better estimate of where I was is that I was about 60 minutes southeast of Pittsburgh. My battery was smoking again when I pulled in. So much for filling it up and being fine. I filled the cells with water again before going to bed, thinking I would just drive down to Advance Auto Parts in the morning and get them to look at it. Right then I was tired from a long day of driving and car problems, and slept well.