Karin's Adventures

Let me think. The last time a barrel of crude cost just below $100 gas was running at around $3.80 per gallon. So why are they charging $4.14 now? Of course the big oil companies will have no shortage of explanations for the current situation:

First it was the switch to 'summer mix', then there was the civil war in Libya, and don't forget the weakening US-Dollar, and right after that the Mississippi river flooded, currently it's some pipeline problem in Canada...... Whatever it is, us little people can't do much about the price of gasoline. But we can still attempt to lower our personal cost of transportation, even whithout much of public transportation available.

We can scrap unnecessary driving, consolidate trips, look for options closer to home or on our way. We can also ride our motorcycles to work whenever we get the chance. The latest trick we learned is getting a new fuel-efficient car, like our Hyundai Elantra which hit the 40.0 m.p.g. mark recently.

Ha!

Truth and character are the two motto ideals of the National Alpha Chi Honor Society to which I was formally inducted today, among a group of 19 students, during a solemn and very moving ceremony at Indiana Tech.

Our 2000 Ford Windstar van was one of roughly half a million vehicles recalled with rusted out, ready to fall apart, rear and front axles. The rear end wasn't that bad on ours, but the front was dangerously rotten. Which is why we had been driving a rental car for over six weeks now.

Today I got a call from the repair shop. They finally got the necessary parts in, fixed our van, and wanted us to come by and pick it up. When I looked under the vehicle, curious to see what they had put in there, I almost laughed out loud.

No, they did not replace the rusted pieces of metal that connect the wheels to the sub-frame! They just bolted some funny looking braces onto them. Hilarious! I will never buy a Ford again.

Last Thursday, while I was driving home from work, the transmission in our 2005 Ford Taurus died without warning. I was lucky to be able to safely roll onto the left turn lane. Other than bruising my knee, when I fell on the parking lot where we pushed the car to, I suffered no injuries.

Two people going to work need two cars to get there, so we had to find replacement quickly. Transmission repair was estimated to cost between $1,200 and $2,000 - more than we were willing to pay, not knowing what would be next. So we went car shopping on the weekend and picked up our new vehicle today.

Proudly presenting:
2011 Hyundai Elantra
with manual transmission

Europeans tend to believe they 'invented' recycling, or at least they are way better at doing it. This is not the case! Fort Wayne has had a recycling program ever since we moved here, and before that. The two plastic boxes, containing recyclable glass, plastics 1 and 2, paper, cardboard, and metal, were being picked up on trash day every other week.

That was pretty good already, but now it's getting even better! When I came home from work  today I found a shiny new big trash bin with a bright yellow lid parked by our curbside. All neighbors along our street got theirs too!