Still Flooded; Car in Shop

The highway to Corvallis is closed due to flooding.

It's mainly now the Willamette River flooded, as all the other rivers and streams, overflowing, dump into it.   The parks and areas along the Willamette are under water.  And highway 34 over near Corvallis is an area that often floods.

I should know, I tried to rescue a stranded cat there once long ago, and someone called the cops and the fire department came and tried to "rescue" me when I needed no help whatsoever.  It made the paper and embarrassed me something awful as they hauled me off as a danger to myself while leaving my friend alone, who was helping me, simply because she wasn't me.  I was in the mental system then and she wasn't, was the difference.    It was not running water it was trapped back water I was wading through, to get to the cat, with an inner tube with a rope tied to it, with my friend hanging on to the rope.  One officer, Luther, apologized to me later, offered me a ride home.  Nice guy.  The rest?  Gosh.  I won't comment.

Anyhow, this flooding is pretty significant this year, to close the highway.  The little store at Peoria road is badly flooded, as are businesses and homes.  That's just one spot where flooding is a problem right now.   Now we brace for yet another week of rain, only this will be a colder front coming in from a different direction and will bring even more snow to the mountains.  Where is spring?

Yesterday, a news helicopter captured on video a speed boat suddenly emerging and racing down the flooded highway.  Later, in comments below the video, the boat owner himself posted a photo of his boat, which is aptly named "Titan Uranus" beached on the lawn of flooded Avery Park, up by the play train.  An epic photo, if you ask me.  I hope he doesn't mind if I snatched it to show off his now famous boat here.

I am without a car.  I took it to the shop yesterday morning and still do not have it back.  I hope to have it back soon.  The mechanic called to say the problem is the TPS.  Throttle Position Sensor.  You might think "whew, that's not too bad", but it is costing nearly $400.   Yikes.   And he says the clutch is nearly worn out.   He says it was slipping badly on his test drive to figure out the other problem. He thinks it has several months left though.  Those aren't cheap to replace.   A broad calm enveloped me when he told me that.  It was an "oh shit" sort of calm, the sort of calm one gets maybe when they realize their house just floated off down the river, or that their house needs a new roof, and then find out the foundation too is cracked and sinking, that kind of thing.  Or when the doctor announces more spots of cancer have been found when you thought you were done with it and cancer free.  Well having a money pit old car isn't like any of those things, not nearly as bad, but quite bad really, when you need a car, not only to keep working but even to get groceries.

I have not even had this car two years.  Nor have I paid off the loan I got from a friend to get the car yet.  She'll probably die of old age before I get it paid off.  Or I will.  Already I have paid out more in repairs than I did for the entire lifetime I had the other car.  Gosh darn.  At least it didn't flood here.  At least my car didn't wash away down the river.

I hope to have the Money Pit back today, so I can get out of the house and see something other than what other people are doing, through youtube or the news.   My already small world shrinks to nothing without a car.  Even if that car is not exactly giving me warm fuzzy affectionate thoughts right now.

It's clear I need to win a large lottery jackpot soon.  Or marry into wealth.  Or find a buried treasure.   Of those three options, for maintaining a working car, I like the last one best.