A Car and a Washing Machine

The last two weeks have been an adventure for us to say the least. Martha’s car had developed a leak in the power steering pump or hoses and was scheduled to go in for service on that. As you will see, that service never occurred.

It was two weeks ago today, Martha had gone to Wal-Mart for some things and I was preparing to leave for a board meeting. The phone rang and I answered it. The caller identified himself as a sheriff’s deputy and then asked “who is the woman in your car?” Well that was a strange question so I said “what do you mean?” Finally we got to the point. There was a fire in a vehicle (ours) and they could not locate Martha. The officer called it a little fire but when I arrived there at the Wal-Mart parking lot it looked like a pretty big fire to me. By that time they had found her and the fire was out. No one was injured and no other property was damaged but the car was destroyed. We cleaned it out and they towed it away and it was sad to see it gone forever. We have owned it for 12 years and it was a good old car.

That led us to begin the search for a new car, well not new, but new to us. We looked mostly on the internet at dealer web sites and Craig’s list. We eventually settled in on a Chrysler PT Cruiser. We liked the body style and a lot of the comments from owners were positive. Chrysler even offered original owners a lifetime limited power train warranty, whatever that is, but alas it is not transferrable. We found a couple that we would like to see but they were in Ft. Worth so we had to schedule a day to go see them.

In the meantime, the washing machine started acting up. I had a guy look at it and he didn’t know if it was the water valves or the timer. It still worked so we put off that decision until we dealt with the car. Last Friday was the day to go to Ft. Worth and we found a car we liked and we bought it. Since it was an out of state car we needed to get it inspected and on the way to do that we almost got smashed by someone who ran a stop sign right in front of us. On the way home we came upon an accident that had the road closed and we had to detour around it. Through all of this we give credit to God for protecting us.

We went to bed that night pleased with our “new” car and looking forward to a nice Saturday. About 3:30 am I was awakened abruptly by Martha yelling something about the washer flooding the house. Sure enough that was the case and after a bit of chasing around we got the water off. She cleaned up what had gone on the floor and we went back to bed. It had just started and somehow Martha was awake at that hour and heard it so there was no real damage from the water. The problem turned out to be the hot water hose that connects to the wall. In the process of fixing that I found that the other problem was a bad valve so I was able to fix all of that at once. So again we praise God for waking Martha up and her hearing the water leak. We are blessed and we are grateful.

The Builder Chapter 5

Airplanes again


I think I mentioned airplanes in the second post of this series but this post will be about a few more airplanes that were prominent in our life in the 50’s. As I said, my dad was a prolific modeler and sometime in the early 50’s he got into flying control line airplanes. We had two acres and the back half or more was mostly open. We mowed a circle of about 140 foot diameter and that was where we flew. Mostly dad and I did the building and flying, I don’t remember my brother getting into it much. These planes used a glow plug engine and flew in a circle with 60 foot control lines that allowed the pilot to control up and down as the plane flew. The rudder was installed in such a way as to drive the airplane to the outside of the circle and keep tension on the control wires. Dad built many airplanes and flew them all on Sunday afternoons and occasionally at other times if someone wanted to see them. I remember 2 particular models that he built that were twins. He built them from scratch using plans from a magazine and he labored on them for months. Parts were cut from balsa wood and glued together and the plane was covered with a silkspan paper and then painted with airplane “Dope”. This was a special paint that would resist the alcohol, nitro and castor oil fuel mixture used in the engines.

These planes were finally finished and were perfect. Dad invited some folks to watch the maiden flight. My job was to mow the flying circle and viewing area. I did that and on Sunday afternoon all was ready. The engine was started, the controls were checked and all was ready. As the plane started the takeoff roll it encountered a weed about a foot high that I had missed in my mowing. The control wires caught on the weed and the aircraft swung around and headed straight for the pilot, who was Dad. Of course with no tension on the control wires, there was no control so the airplane was pretty much in free flight. Dad stayed out of the way but soon it began to climb and then from an altitude less than 50 feet it dove for the ground on the other side of the circle. I don’t know how fast it was going when it hit but it was totally destroyed. There was not much to identify the pile of balsa as an airplane. Dad was a bit upset to say the least and I was well scolded for leaving one weed in the circle.

We did remove the weed and were able to successfully fly the twin airplane and in fact it lasted several years and endured several crashes that were more violent than the first plane had encountered. I think I finally did it in by running into an asphalt parking lot at a fairly steep angle.

These were memorable times spent with dad around the model building table and learning to fly them. Dad flew these airplanes for only a few years but I kept at it and even owned a hobby shop for a while in Austin Texas.

There are a few more of these stories and I will get to them as time goes by. Thanks for reading.

Retirement busyness

Retirement was supposed to be slowing down but it seems that since I began this retirement thing life has been speeding up. I have wanted to go to the creek and work on the house for a while but there seems to be something that keeps me here. I am on the board of a local non profit and two committees at church so there are periodic meetings. The non profit held a fund raiser recently and that took time. I am working on a backdrop for the stage in the children's worship room at church and HPU will celebrate homecoming this weekend. A couple of weeks ago was the Brownwood reunion where I drove the train in the parade. So I am staying busy. The trike is mostly done and has a few miles on it but I really should be riding more. I need to make a couple of repairs on it but haven't taken the time to do so. Oh, and the house needs painting and the camper needs some repair on the roof and... I think the list goes on forever. I am sure it will slow down someday.

Fall is here and we are enjoying the cooler weather. Nights have been in the 40's and days around 80 or sometimes cooler. It is much better than the hundred degrees or so of a month ago.

I do hope to post another story from the series I started on The Builder. Maybe I will find time to write that soon.