Hard Lessons Learned; Scarlett Edition

Well so much for having life happen every day right? Lol. Well a ton of things have been happening over here lately! I’ve been doing better with my craft blog (slightly neglecting my “life” blog..oops) which means I’ve been super busy with crafts and such over at FROM ''EEK!'' TO CHIC If you don’t already follow, take a peak over there and check it out! I’ve put a hold on my Weight loss blog DIARIES OF A FED UP FAT GIRLTill January, when I will be totally ready, mentally and physically for a diet that is so strict. So those are my updates on those. Now for a little “LIFE” in this “LIFE” blog.

     I’m not sure if any of you know but we got rid of Scarlett. No Scarlett isn’t our dog, child, or relative. Scarlett was my car. (Yes, I am weird and name my cars)

This is/was Scarlett.

She was pretty, um..pretty..and uhh..pretty. I got scarlet about 2 months after Tyler and I got married in 2008, and let’s just say that she has been trouble ever since. I should never have gotten her, but we have learned some lessons, mostly the hard way, while Scarlett was in our possession. Going through, 1 clutch (almost 2), a radiator, having to get her towed 2 times, getting her towed away for being illegally parked once, 2 sets of tires, Who knows how many speeding tickets, 2 expired registration tickets, 1 exhibition of speed ticket resulting in court, some hoses, broken heater, passenger window broken, being almost killed by an aggressive driver in Roy resulting in a hitch puncture in the bumper, some idiot throwing a can of pop over the fence and denting her, Here are my lessons, followed by a story to go with each of them.  

1-     DO NOT under ANY circumstances, but a car without having a mechanic look at it. I was such an idiot lol. Ever since the Hyundai Tiburons came out, I wanted one. And when my 1996 Saturn (Platty) 

      Exploded it was time to get a new car. In the mean time I drove The Blue Death (1985 Toyota Corolla my family got from my uncle Mark for $1)

      Till Tyler and I got married and settled. So in June we bought it from these people in Orem. Let’s just say that we put more into that car then what we got out of it when we sold it 2 years later.

2-     With that said, DO NOT buy a car just because it “Looks Pretty” Scarlett was cute! Way cute! But she ended up being a POS in disguise. Right when we got it and we were driving it home from Orem, the airbag light went on. A couple months later, the radiator cracked, then it needed new hoses for the intake, then the converters were plugged, then I needed new tires, then the clutch went out, then a year later, I needed MORE tires, then the clutch started going out AGAIN! Freaking money pit!

3-     NEVER trust a bunch of red necks that have gotten both their licenses taken away BECAUSE of the car. HAHA. These people were ridiculous. I don’t know WHAT I was thinking. They both had their licenses suspended for speeding, DUI, and something else. But that was another sign that I should have stayed FAR FAR away! BUT she was pretty…

4-     DO NOT buy a 6-speed turbo standard transmission car even when you LOVE to go fast. You will get tickets. I learned to drive on a manual transmission. I would prefer to drive a standard anyway, less boring when driving far lol. I love (let me put that in passed tense…LOVED) driving fast. Like all my family says, I was like born to race because I love driving fast, and I get anxiety when people pass me. So I just try and stay ahead of everyone J Now this is where the cops interrupt lol. Cops HATE when you go fast. Therefore I got MANY speeding tickets and Tyler wasn’t happy about them at all. Oh and all that crap about being nice to the cop and usually you can get out of it is a bunch of BS. I have only been rude to 2 cops ever. 1 when I was getting pulled over for no seatbelt, and the other time was when I got my exhibition of speed ticket. All the other times I “should” have gotten out of them because I was being so nice. BUT NOPE!

5-     If #4 applies to you, MAKE SURE the car isn’t RED. Cops say that White is in fact the top color that gets pulled over the most, but I think that is a LIE! I got pulled over SO many times it’s not even funny.

6-     BE VERY CAREFUL with used cars from red necks. They DO NOT know how to fix a car the right way. They use super glue, duct tape/electrical tape to fix things that should be fixed by a professional. LOL. Okay this one is really funny actually. The first thing to go out in my car was the radiator. It didn’t go out really; it just had a crack in it that the previous owners tried to fix with super glue. Yeah...what in the crap. THEN after one day of my car just shutting off I lifted up the hood and found that the hose coming from the air intake was cracked, and had been for a while. THEY FIXED IT WITH A COMBONATION OF DUCT TAPE AND ELECTRICAL TAPE. UhM HELLOO?!? So I had to get a piece of hose that was like $7 and it was fixed. Now why didn’t they do that? Because they are red necks.

7-     NEVER trust a MONTE’S SERVICE to do mechanic work. This is kind of harsh, but I don’t really care. When my clutch went out, he replaced it. After he replaced it, my horn didn’t work, my heater didn’t work, my hazards didn’t work, my bottom set of lights didn’t work, my passenger window got stuck rolled down, (I had to take the freaking door panel off and rig it so it would stay up, and it still leaked) and not to mention 1 YEAR after he replaced the clutch for $1200, it started going out again!!! And after I told him about all the stuff that went out after he replaced my clutch, all he said was bring it over and we can go over price when I take a look at it. UMMM PROBABLY NOT BUDDY, YOU FREAKING BROKE IT SO YOU FIX IT. And he refused. So I drove around for about a year I drove around with all those problems! Then the clutch started going out AGAIN.

8-     DON’T buy a car that is 5 years old and has 95,000 miles. I still have no idea what I was thinking. They must have driven to Egypt or something lol. But driving almost 20,000 miles a year must mean you don’t really care about your car. AND it had so many dings and scratches on it. They didn’t care. My advice is to buy from Grandmas lol.

9-     Screeching your tires while pulling out of Pizzeria is considered Exhibition of speed and results in a $1000 fine if you are not brave and take the cop to court for over- exaggerating. This was the most ridiculous thing known to mankind. So we were sitting at Pizzeria on Washington after we went to the ATV Rodeo. We all decided to leave at the same time and I was second in line to get out. In front of me was Conner, and behind me was Mindy and Zach. I pulled out and my tires BARELY screeched. I got to the light and started going as it turned green and BAM got pulled over. That cop was such a freaking JERK! He was like screaming at me. And when I told him that they barely screeched, he yelled “DO YOU WANT ME TO IMPOUND YOUR CAR RIGHT NOW? YOU WERE OUT OF CONTROL!” Yeah so long story short Exhibition of speed tickets are like $1000 and I only had to pay $90 because I went to court and told them that he was over exaggerating and I WON J HA HA!

10-Make sure to ALWAYS check your registration papers. Sometimes the DMV will give you an 8 sticker when you need a 6 sticker, then when you get pulled over, you get a ticket for expired registration. Last but not least. I received 2 tickets for this. When I got my registration papers at the DMV they were supposed to give me a 6 sticker, but she gave me an 8 instead. Who actually looks and makes sure they match? I sure didn’t. But yeah sure enough when I get pulled over, BAM TICKET. So be sure to always check your sticker and month just in case!

So there are some stories about Scarlett. I will miss her speed and her comfy bucket seats, but I will DEFINITELY NOT miss what we were paying to fix her. So last Wednesday when the clutch started going out again, we took her to First Choice Kia in Kaysville. Tyler’s friend from work’s husband is the GM there and he hooked us up with our new baby.

BETTY WHITE!

Like Scarlett, I have always LOVED the Kia Souls, BUT Betty comes from a dealership where they actually make sure they are mechanically sound before purchase, so we were safe! :) 

I love Betty. It took me a while to come up with a name for her, but Betty White is hilarious and catchy. I always like the older names, Basil, Edna, Ruby, names like that. But Betty White is just awesome! Although Betty isn’t very fast, she is reliable and super cute. AND Titan can fit! Although the scariness of having a new car, with a new car payment, is kind of overwhelming, she is so much better than Scarlett. We owed $4700 on Scarlett and only ended up getting $2000 for her. But I could not be happier to NOT have that car in our possession any more. In fact, I kind of hope they blow her up. I couldn’t and wouldn’t feel comfortable letting someone else buy that car. It is a black hole. And I know they fix them up, but still. Scarlett is cursed; my God have mercy on her soul. (Is that bad to say?)

Needless to say, we are very happy with our new addition (car addition) to the family. We want to make sure that we still have money to do the things we like, (like crafts! WOOOT) and be able to quickly get out of debt, so Tyler is getting a second job. Can I just say what an awesome Husband he is? I really can’t even express how good he is to me. He is literally my best friend. It takes a lot to go out and willingly get a second job so that your wife can have the car that she wants. I love him so so so much and he means the world and so much more to me. He works hard, and deals with my attitude, my crafts, my weaknesses, my hard head, and my blanket-hogging-ness lol. Words can’t even explain how much he means to me, and I appreciate everything that he does for me. I am very happy with the life that we life and I am very excited for what is to come in our life together. I can’t wait till we can be sealed in the temple so he can be MINE for ETERNITY.

(is that selfish? ;) )